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Artist
Fred Kaplan
12+ albums
bluespianopiano blues
about
VOICE OF A LEGACY... Kaplan's place in blues history is best known as a member of the immortal Hollywood Fats Band, but even more so, he belongs on the pedestal of Angeleno blues pioneers. He was drawn to the ivories at age three, lessons by five and performed his first recital when he was seven. While working for his father's furniture store, one of his father's customers sold him discarded 45 rpm records at a nickel a piece from his juke box servicing business back in the mid 1960’s. Records from the likes of T-Bone Walker, Big Joe Turner, Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry, BB King and Little Richard opened new frontiers and wetted Kaplan's appetite to learn more. Kaplan’s early blues piano influences were players such as Otis Spann, Floyd Dixon, Charles Brown, Big Maceo Merriweather, Bob Call, Blind John Davis, Sunnyland Slim, Walter Roland, Pete Johnson, Professor Longhair, Leroy Carr, Amos Milburn, Ray Charles, Roosevelt Sykes and many others too numerous to mention. In later years, his jazz piano influences were ivory aces such as Art Tatum, Bud Powell, Sonny Clark, Oscar Peterson, Teddy Wilson, Hampton Hawes, Earl Hines, George Shearing, Ahmad Jamal, Willie The Lion Smith, McCoy Tyner, Barry Harris, Horace Silver, Thelonius Monk, Errol Garner, Paul Smith, Johnny Guanieri, Tete Montoliu, Bobby Timmons, just to name a few. Then there were his deep gospel piano influences, such as Arizona Dranes, Thomas Dorsey, Evelyn Starks Hardy, Mildred Falls, Evelyn Gay and several others.
