Mike Longo

Mike Longo is best-known as a reliable and versatile player who was the pianist with Dizzy Gillespie during 1966-1973. He started taking piano lessons when he was three, played professionally when he was 15, and while in high school in Ft. Lauderdale, he had the opportunity to play with Cannonball Adderley. In 1960, Longo worked at the Metropole in New York with Red Allen and Coleman Hawkins, spent 1961 living in Toronto (where he studied with Oscar Peterson), and then returned to New York, where he accompanied some singers. Mike Longo recorded with Gillespie during his period with the great trumpeter and led a few of his own sessions for Mainstream, Pablo (1976), and Consolidated Artists (1981). His career slowed down after that, with his next major release being Explosion in 2000.