Musicians - Chick Corea

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	Musicians - Chick Corea

Armando Anthony "Chick" Corea (born June 12, 1941) is an American jazz pianist/keyboardist and composer.

He is arguably best known for his work during the 1970s in the genre of jazz fusion, although his contributions to straight-ahead jazz have been tremendous. He participated in the birth of the electric fusion movement as a member of Miles Davis' band in the 1960s, and in the 1970s formed Return to Forever.

He continued to pursue other collaborations and explore various musical styles throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Among jazz pianists, Corea is widely acknowledged as one of the most influential since Bill Evans (along with Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner and Keith Jarrett). He is also known for promoting Scientology.

Life and career

Youth

Corea was born in Chelsea, Massachusetts. His father Armando, a jazz trumpet player who had led a Dixieland band in the Boston area in the 1930s and 1940s, introduced Chick to the piano around the age of five. Growing up surrounded by jazz music, he was influenced at an early age by bebop stars such as Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Bud Powell, Horace Silver and Lester Young. At eight Corea also took up drums, which would later give him the ability to handle the piano as a percussion instrument.

Schooling proving to be unsuccessful, Corea mostly developed his piano skills by exploring music on his own. A notable influence was concert pianist Salvatore Sullo for whom Corea started taking lectures at age eight, who introduced him to classical music, helping spark his interest in musical composition.

Given a black tuxedo by his father, he started doing gigs when in high school. He enjoyed listening to Herb Pomeroy's band at the time, and had a trio which would play Horace Silver's music at a local jazz club. He collaborated with Portuguese bandleader and trumpet player Phil Barboza, and with conga drummer Bill Fitch who introduced him to Latin music:

:I liked the "extraversion" of Latin music, especially the dance and salsa style music - bands like Tito Puente
's band and Machito's band. The Cuban dance music was a great kind of antidote to some of the more serious, heady jazz that I was into. I liked the "outgoingness" and exuberance of the music. I just stayed interested in all kinds of Latin music. Then I discovered Spanish Latin music, which is flamenco.

He eventually decided to move to New York where he took up musical education for one month at Columbia University and six months at The Juilliard School (among his Juilliard teachers was Peter Schickele, who described Chick as "the most awake student ever taught"). He quit after finding both disappointing, but liked the atmosphere of New York whose musical scene became the starting point for his professional career.

Early career

Corea started his professional career in the '60s playing with trumpeter Blue Mitchell and Latin greats such as Willie Bobo and Mongo Santamaria. One of the earliest recordings of his playing is with Blue Mitchell's quintet on The Thing To Do. This album features his composition "Chick's Tune", a clever retooling of "You Stepped Out of a Dream" that demonstrates the angular melodies and Latin-and-swing rhythms that characterize, in part, Corea's personal style. (Incidentally, the same tune features a hellacious drum solo by a very young Al Foster.)

His first album as a leader was Tones For Joan's Bones in 1966, two years before the release of his legendary album Now He Sings, Now He Sobs, with Roy Haynes on drums, and Miroslav Vitouš on bass.

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