Ramsey Lewis is an American Jazz pianist,composer,and radio personality.He was born in Chicago,Illinois in 1935.Piano lessons began at the age of four,and he had shown an interest in Jazz as he progressed with his piano. At the age of 15 he joined his first Jazz band called ‘The Cleffs.It was a seven piece group and it was a good base for his first involvement in Jazz.Later he would go onto form his popular ‘Ramsey Lewis’Trio

The first album was released in 1956-’Ramsey Lewis And The Gentlemen Of Swing’which had moderate sales. In 1965,the trio had a hit with the single’The In Crowd’ that reached No.5 in the the pop charts and the album reached No.2.It was during the mid 60′s that Lewis became one of the most successful jazz pianists with chart topping singles’Wade In The Water’,and ‘Hang On Sloopy’.Both sold over a million copies and received Gold Disc’s.

Many of Ramsey Lewis recordings attracted a non-jazz following mainly due to the pop influence in his music.He would often use electric piano when performing live, but later on returned to acoustic piano using an additional keyboard player.
In 1994 Lewis was featured on a compilation album,’Stolen Moments’with other jazz artists Herbie Hancock and Roy Ayers and was in support of Aids.It was voted the album of the year by Time Magazine.Inbetween recording Lewis made a name for himself as a radio presenter with his own shows ‘Legends Of Jazz’ which ran from 1990, and in 2006 worked on a smooth Jazz station in Chicago until it finished in 2009.He also presented a TV series on Jazz Legends which featured artists such as Dave Brubeck,Chick Corea,Pat Metheney.

Ramsey Lewis over the years has performed with over 25 symphony orchestras in the US and Canada, and has played many of the jazz festivals in the U.S,and still performs in concerts to this day.My first track I ever listened to was ‘Spring High’that was written by Stevie Wonder.I enjoyed his piano playing and have always bought his albums.Hope you do too.ENJOY.