McCann, Les(lie Coleman; aka Maxie)

McCann, Les(lie Coleman; aka Maxie) , jazz pianist, singer; b. Lexington, Ky, Sept. 23, 1935. A self-taught musician, McCann left the South in the early 1950s and joined the Navy. While stationed in Calif., he took every opportunity to visit San Francisco’s jazz clubs, where he first heard Miles Davis and became influenced by Erroll Garner. After his discharge, he moved to Los Angeles and formed a trio, Les McCann Ltd., which became a favorite on the Sun Strip in the late 1950s. He was recommended by Miles Davis to play with Cannonball Adderley, but turned it down in favor of backing pop vocalist Gene McDaniels in 1959. In 1960, McCann signed to the Pacific Jazz label and became the label’s top-selling artist; he also co- headed albums with legendary labelmates such as organist Richard “Groove” Holmes, saxman Ben Webster, The Jazz Crusaders, and the Gerald Wilson Orch. He was a hit at the 1962 Antibes Jazz Festival in Juan-les- Pins, France, where he shared the stage with Ray Charles and Count Basie. The year after, he toured Europe with Zoot Sims and Charlie Byrd. He co-produced and coheadlined Lou Rawls’ debut album, and in 1967 he signed to Atlantic Records, his first major label deal. He is best known for his work in the late 1960s and early 1970s with Eddie Harris, whom he first encountered at the Montreux Jazz Festival. The resulting album, Swiss Movement (1970), was a top seller, and the single “Compared to What” sold platinum; that same year, he also had a hit with the ballad “With These Hands.” On his album Layers, he helped pioneer the use of electric piano, clavinet, and synthesizer. In the early 1970s, McCann heard Roberta Flack at a nightclub in Washington D.C., and immediately became her champion, as he had earlier with Nancy Wilson. The early 1980s saw the creation of McCann’s Magic Band, which recorded a number of independently released albums and featured Jeff Elliott, Keith Anderson, Tony St. James, and Abraham Laboriel. His latest release, On the Soul Side, once again reunited him with Eddie Harris and Lou Rawls. In the mid-1990s, his music has been sampled by hip hop artists, including Mobb Depp, De La Soul, Lords of the Underground, and Pete Rock and C.L. Smooth. His personal relationships with jazz legends such as Miles Davis, Art Blakey, and Duke Ellington, as well as many other great historical characters, have been documented in a collection of more than 8,000 photographs that McCann took over the years; he built a darkroom in his home, and has sold a significant number of pieces. In addition, he is an exhibited painter, primarily a watercolorist with a particular interest in flowers. He no longer plays the piano due to a 1995 stroke, but continues to paint and photograph.

Discography

In New York (1960); The Shout (1960); Plays the Truth (1960); Pretty Lady (1961); Les McCann Sings (1961); Plays the Shampoo at the Village Gate (1961); In San Francisco (1961); Groove (1961); Somethin’ Special (1962); Stormy Monday (1962); Les McCann on Time (1962); Gospel Truth (1963); Jazz Waltz (1963); Spanish Onions (1964); McCann/Wilson (1964); New from the Big City (1964); McCanna (1964); But Not Really (1964); Poo Boo (1965); But Not Really (1965); Live at Shelly’s Manne-Hole (1965); Bucket of Grease (1966); Plays the Hits (1966); More or Les McCann (1967); Les Is More (1967); Les McCann Live at the Bohemian (1967); From the Top of the Barrel (1967); Much Les (1968); Comment (1969); Swiss Movement (1969); Invitation to Openness (1971); Second Movement (1971); Live at Montreux (1972); Layers (1972); Talk to the People (1972); Another Beginning (1974); Hustle to Survive (1975); River High, River Low (1976); Change Change Change; Live at the Roxy (1977); The Man (1978); Tall, Dark & Handsome (1979); The Longer You Wait (1983); McCann s Music Box (1984); The Butterfly (1988); More of Les (1989); On the Soul Side (1994); Listen Up! (1995); Piano Jazz (1996).

—Lewis Porter