Jonny King

A fine pianist who is quite literate (and even wrote What Jazz Is, a book on jazz that focused on the Young Lions), Jonny King has strong potential for the future. He started playing piano when he was nine (Earl Hines and Teddy Wilson were early influences) and within a few years as a teenager he was already playing some gigs in New York clubs. In the early 1980's he studied with Tony Aless and Mulgrew Miller, and had the opportunity to sit in with Art Blakey. Since then King has been closely associated with the Young Lions, toured with Joshua Redman, was featured with OTB and played with such players as Christian McBride, Bobby Watson, Kenny Garrett, Vincent Herring, Roy Hargrove, Joe Lovano and many others. In addition to his music career, King graduated from Princeton and Harvard Law School and has been an attorney at a copyright practice! Jonny King (whose initial reputation was actually as a composer since his works were being recorded before he was) has led dates of his own for Criss Cross (1994) and Enja.