The following article on Art Tatum appeared on December 27, 1999 in The Toledo Blade as part of the newspaper’s millennium series, which included articles on influential Toledoans during the century. The article is reprinted by permission. Time-tested Tatum Toledo jazz pianist was the best there ever was By David Yonke - Blade Pop Music Writer Art Tatum lived only 47 years, but his music will live forever and, according to many musicians and scholars, will never be equaled. “Any serious jazz pianist knows that Art Tatum is, and always will be, the greatest of all time. He will never be eclipsed,” said Benny Green, a New York-based pianist who records for the Blue Note label. “When you talk about the art of jazz piano,” said Jimmy Amadie, a pianist and educator from Philadelphia, “Art Tatum stands alone. His playing today would have been considered just as phenomenal as it was back then and, the thing is, a thousand years from now it will be just as phenomenal.” “He was the greatest soloist in jazz history, regardless of instrument,” Leonard Feather, the esteemed jazz critic, wrote in the liner notes of Tatum’s, “Piano Starts Here” CD. His admirers included George Gershwin, Vladimir Horowitz, Artur Rubinstein and virtually every jazz artist, including saxophonist Charlie “Bird” Parker, who once remarked: “I wish I could play like Tatum’s right hand!” Born Oct. 13, 1909, in a yellow, two-story frame house on Mill Street in South Toledo, near Dorr Street and City Park, he was all but blind from birth, with limited vision in his right eye only. His father, Arthur Tatum, Sr., was a guitarist and an elder at Grace Presbyterian Church, where his mother played piano. He lost most of his sight due to illness at age 3, but soon after began picking out tunes on the piano. He learned to read music in Braille and would entertain fellow pupils during recess at the Jefferson School. His piano teacher, Overton G. Rainey, recognized the youngster’s prodigious talent and tried to steer him into a career in classical music. Tatum, however, was more fascinated by the adventurous jazz piano of Fats Waller and James P. Johnson. And, as he knew all too well, in those days the prospects for African-American pianists in classical music were not exactly bountiful. Tatum played piano in Speed Web’s dance band and led his own group in concert at local venues such as Chateau La France and Chicken Charlie’s. At 17, he was featured playing interludes on WSPD radio, which were so popular the station gave him his own 15-minute program. Tatum moved to New York City in 1931, originally hired as an accompanist by singer Adelaide Hall. But he soon became a phenomenon on 52nd Street, which was lined with clubs featuring the jazz world’s greatest artists. “Tatum’s appearance on the jazz scene in the early ’30s upset all the standards for jazz pianists,” Feather, the jazz critic, once recalled. “His fantastic technique and original harmonic variations placed him incomparably far ahead of earlier artists.” Tatum made his mark immediately in a legendary “cutting contest,” where musicians try to outplay each other, in Harlem by playing a version of “Tiger Rag” that knocked Willie “The Lion” Smith and two of Tatum’s idols, Waller and Johnson, off the throne. One night Tatum walked into the Yacht Club on West 52nd Street while Waller was performing. After the song, Waller announced: “I just play the piano, but God is in the house tonight.” Not only did Tatum have the ability to play with blinding speed, sending cascades of solo notes flying from his right hand while brisk, sturdy chords resonated from the left, but he also played with stunning clarity, every note precisely articulated. And his improvisational skills were dazzling, taking brilliant new approaches to the same songs every time. “When I was 13 years old,” said Green, the 34-year-old jazz piano ace, “my parents bought me the reissues of the solo recordings that Tatum had recorded for [producer and record owner] Norman Granz. “As I listened to it, I knew that it was a monumental experience for me. .. On a superficial level, anyone can recognize his dexterity. But there’s so much more subtlety to Tatum’s playing. His harmonic palette was absolutely the most sophisticated ever. “He stands forever as a landmark, as a testament, to how beautiful this instrument can sound.” Jason Moran, a 24-year-old jazz pianist who recently made his debut as a band leader on Blue Note, said he has spent months transcribing Tatum’s piano solos, carefully recording every note and then trying to duplicate songs that Tatum played spontaneously. “The amazing thing about him, at least for me, is not only the incredible technique but the mind power that he put into the music,” Moran said. “To get past the notes and just to try to get into what he was thinking about, man, this guy was so inventive! He never played the same song the same way twice. "Technically, harmonically, rhythmically, in every sense of the word, he was a true artist and genius.” Claude Black, the veteran Toledo jazz pianist and member of The Murphy’s Trio, saw Tatum at Baker’s Keyboard Lounge in Detroit shortly before the jazz legend’s death in 1956. “Oh man, I thought he was just terrific. The best, I think, of anybody I ever heard,” Black said. He met Tatum after the show. “He seemed to be a quiet, laid-back person,” Black added. “He just sat there and talked.” Amadie, the Philadelphia jazz artist, said he was a teenage piano player when he went to see Tatum perform at the city’s Academy of Music in 1955. “I couldn’t believe it, I just couldn't believe it,” Amadie said, his voice rising in excitement even 44 years later. “ I remember talking to three keyboard players at the time who also happened to see Tatum. One said, ‘I think I’m going to quit. I’m never going to play again.’ Another said, ‘I think I’m going to get a day job.’ The third said, ‘I also play a little drums. I think I’ll start concentrating on the drums.’ “I said, ‘I’ve been practicing seven or eight hours a day, I think I’m going to start playing 10 or 12.’ He motivated me. He’ll keep you humble. He’ll make you understand that you have to study the rest of your life.” “Anything you say about him is an understatement,” Green said. “To say he was an orchestra, to say he was the greatest solo pianist of all time, ultimately the music tells the tale. And his music is some of the most heavenly sounds I have ever heard or ever hope to hear in life.” As a musician, Tatum’s abilities were beyond question. But as with many of history’s greatest artists, his level of fame and fortune never rose to his level of artistic achievement. “How many frustrations Tatum had to suffer during his 46 years, none of us can ever quite know,” Feather once wrote. “He was black in a society that awarded honors to white musicians with a tenth of his talent. ... Beyond this was having come into jazz, his talent in full flower, during an era where there was no such thing as a jazz concert. During the peak creative years he was confined for the most part to small nightclubs.” Tatum died of kidney disease on Nov. 5, 1956 at age 47 in Los Angeles.