Cedar Walton Transcriptions

Biography of Cedar Walton

Cedar Walton was an influential American hard bop pianist and composer who came to prominence in the early 1960s as the pianist-arranger for Art Blakey's seminal Jazz Messengers band. He is celebrated as a first-rate composer whose original tunes, including "Bolivia," "Mosaic," and "Ugetsu," have become essential jazz standards. A versatile and highly valued musician, Walton also had an early, historic connection to jazz innovation, having been the pianist on John Coltrane's initial 1959 studio session for the landmark album Giant Steps.