“Cleanhead really inspired me to start doing some other kinds of research,” Keys says. When Keys returned the next week ready to show off the solo he had developed on the chord changes of “Four”, Vinson called a different Davis piece, “Tune Up”. In one memorable encounter, blues singer and alto saxophonist Eddie Cleanhead Vinson called him out at a jam session and taught him the chords to the Miles Davis tune “Four”. Keys recalls the music scene around Omaha as a talent-laden environment that was constantly enriched by traveling players. He began touring with sax player Little Walkin’ Willie, then shifted to jazz after discovering the music of Miles Davis and Charlie Christian. “For the next six months I was up all night with that guitar,” Keys says.Ĭalvin Keys landed his first paying gig at 17, with an R&B band called Doctor Spider and his Rock and Roll Web. When his uncle caught him one day, he was so impressed by what the youngster had learned while watching him play that he gave his nephew his prized instrument. Calvin taught himself guitar as a teenager on his uncle Ivory’s Gibson – even though he’d been warned away from the instrument with the threat of a whipping. His father was a drummer in the local clubs, and his uncle played Delta Blues guitar. He has released nine albums under his own name, and has performed as a sideman on dozens of other projects with the likes of Ray Charles and Ahmad Jamal.Ĭalvin Keys was born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1943. Known for his funky deep grooves, this legendary sideman is primarily remembered for two albums he released in the early 1970’s on the underground Black Jazz Records label, including the soul-jazz classic Shawn-Neeq. ![]() This is a shout out to Calvin Keys, an American jazz guitarist currently residing in the San Francisco Bay Area.
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