Nearly sixty-five years after moving from Kingston, Jamaica to the United States, Grammy®-nominated legendary pianist Monty Alexander remains an American classic with unmistakable Jamaican roots. A tireless international performer and perennial favorite at the Montreux Jazz Festival, where he has performed over 20 times since 1976. His spirited conception is one informed by timeless verities: endless melody-making, effervescent grooves, sophisticated voicings, a romantic spirit, and a consistent predisposition, as Alexander accurately states, “to build up the heat and kick up a storm.”
Documented on more than 80 recordings and cited as the fifth greatest jazz pianist ever in The Fifty Greatest Jazz Piano Players of All Time (Hal Leonard Publishing), Alexander has received major honors from Jamaica, which designated him Commander in the Order of Distinction in 2000 and Order of Jamaica for his “Sterling Contributions to the Promotion of Jamaican Music and the Jazz Genre Interpretations Globally” in 2022. The University of the West Indies awarded him an honorary Doctor of Letters in 2019.
Born on D-Day, June 6, 1944, Alexander showed extraordinary musical gifts early, playing Christmas carols by ear at four, entertaining neighbors and relatives by five, and taking piano lessons at six. Though he resisted formal instruction, he absorbed the sounds that shaped his mature palette. As a child in Jamaica, he heard Nat “King” Cole and Louis Armstrong in concert, experiences he has described as transformational. By age 14, Alexander was playing Kingston clubs and making his first recordings as leader of Monty and the Cyclones, whose music reached Jamaica’s top ten charts. He also worked as a sideman for producers Ken Khouri, Duke Reid, and Clement “Coxsone” Dodd. These early sessions, which Alexander describes as part of “the beginning of Ska,” included future Jamaican music greats such as Don Drummond, Roland Alphonso, and Ernest Ranglin.
After moving to Miami in 1961, Alexander began establishing his jazz identity. A 1962 Las Vegas engagement brought him to the attention of New York club owner Jilly Rizzo and Frank Sinatra. At Jilly’s in New York, his trio played for entertainers, tastemakers, and jazz icons including Miles Davis, Count Basie, Milt Jackson, and Roy Haynes. Before long, Alexander was working with Dizzy Gillespie, Clark Terry, and Sonny Rollins.
As the 1960s progressed, Alexander held regular gigs at Minton’s and the Playboy Club and met Quincy Jones, Ray Brown, and Oscar Peterson, whose recommendation led to a dozen recordings for Germany’s MPS label between 1971 and 1985. He also appeared on Jones’ Smackwater Jack, sharing piano duties with Herbie Hancock, and on classic live albums with Dizzy Gillespie and Clark Terry from the 1977 Montreux Jazz Festival. He later joined Gillespie’s United Nations Orchestra and performed with Sonny Rollins.
Alexander is widely known as an upper-echelon master of the swinging piano trio, heard in celebrated groups with bassist John Clayton and drummer Jeff Hamilton on Montreux Alexander ’76, and with bassist Ray Brown and guitarist Herb Ellis on the Triple Treat recordings.
On Jamento, a 1978 recording for Norman Granz’s Pablo label, he introduced his “Ivory and Steel” concept, marrying steel pan and hand drums to the acoustic piano trio. He continued these explorations on recordings for Concord and Island Records, including Yard Movement, and found their definitive expression in his 2011 Grammy®-nominated recording Harlem-Kingston Express: Live!
In 1991, Alexander worked with Natalie Cole on Unforgettable… with Love, her seven-Grammy-winning tribute to Nat “King” Cole. Other highlights include performing Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with orchestra under Bobby McFerrin at Switzerland’s Verbier Festival, recording piano selections for Clint Eastwood’s Charlie Parker biopic Bird, and playing on Quincy Jones’ For Love of Ivy film score.
2019 marked Alexander’s 75th birthday, his solo debut at London’s Royal Albert Hall celebrating Duke Ellington, and the 10th edition of the Monty Alexander Jazz Festival in Easton, Maryland, where he has served as Artistic Director and perennial performer. In 2022, Obelisk Media began production on The Monty Alexander Story, a feature documentary chronicling his life, artistry, and influence, led by producer Arthur Gorson with Academy Award®-winning documentarian and cinematographer Jefferson Miller.
On June 6, 2024, Alexander turned 80 on the 80th anniversary of the Normandy Landings. His album D-Day (PeeWee!) commemorates both milestones with wartime standards and original compositions.
“I love Jamaica. I love America. I love them both together more than each one separately. I inhabit the rhythmic aspect of both things. I can’t explain why. I do it naturally and joyfully. I am confident and proud and privileged to say that I come from a multi-cultural and multi-ethnic thing. The slogan of Jamaica is like America’s ‘E Pluribus Unum,’ ‘out of many, one people.’”—Monty Alexander
Photo credit: Jean Baptiste Millot