Herbie Nichols
Herbie Nichols was an influential yet often overlooked jazz pianist and composer, born Herbert Horatio Nichols in New York City’s San Juan Hill neighborhood in 1919. He grew up in Harlem, immersing himself in the vibrant cultural sounds of the Harlem Renaissance, and began formal piano training at a young age, focusing on Western classical music. Nichols's early professional career took off in the late 1930s as he accompanied prominent musicians and developed a distinctive style that blended complex harmonies with rhythmic innovation.
Drafted into the U.S. Army during World War II, Nichols continued to pursue music after his service, performing and recording in various styles and collaborating with notable artists like Thelonious Monk and Mary Lou Williams. His most significant contributions came in the mid-1950s when he recorded a series of acclaimed albums for Blue Note Records, showcasing his unique melodic and rhythmic approaches. Despite facing challenges in receiving recognition during his lifetime, Nichols's work gained posthumous acclaim, influencing a new generation of musicians in the avant-garde jazz scene. He left behind a rich catalog of nearly two hundred original compositions, highlighting his creative vision and enduring legacy in the world of jazz.
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Herbie Nichols
Jazz musician
- Born: January 3, 1919
- Birthplace: New York, New York
- Died: April 12, 1963
- Place of death: New York, New York
Despite his low public profile, Nichols was a significant innovative force in the history of jazz piano. He contributed a sizable catalog of original compositions to the jazz canon and influenced later developments in the music.
Early Life
Herbert Horatio Nichols was born in a predominantly African American section of New York City called San Juan Hill and was raised in the neighborhood of Harlem. As a youngster, Nichols was exposed to the sounds of the Harlem Renaissance along with the trumpet playing of his maternal uncle, Walter Norris. At the age of eight, Nichols began his formal music training, which focused exclusively on the piano literature of the Western European masters such as Johann Sebastian Bach and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. He continued his musical education at DeWitt Clinton High School and later at the City College of New York.
In 1938, Nichols garnered his first significant professional experience as the accompanist to alto saxophonist Floyd “Horsecollar” Williams at Clarke Monroe’s Uptown House, the site of some of the earliest developments in the style of bebop. In 1939, Nichols produced his first compositions.
Life’s Work
With the United States’ entry into World War II, Nichols, like many young American men, was drafted into the armed services. In 1941, he joined the U.S. Army and trained at Fort Lee, Virginia, before serving in the Pacific with the Ninety-second Division. After his discharge, he returned to New York, where he played with alto saxophonist Walter Dennis at Murrain’s Cabaret in Harlem and accompanied burlesque shows at Ernie’s Three Ring Circus in Greenwich Village. He performed in myriad styles, including Dixieland, and continued to compose complex, harmonically adventurous works.
In 1946, Nichols played in a swing band led by Illinois Jacquet that included J. J. Johnson, Leo Parker, and Shadow Wilson. That same year, he wrote an article on Thelonious Monk for the jazz periodical Music Dial. Nichols worked with double bass player John Kirby and singer Maxine Sullivan from 1947 to 1949 and recorded with trombonist Snub Mosely in October, 1949. In 1950, he recorded rhythm and blues with Bobby Mitchell, alto saxophonist Charlie Singleton, and trumpeter Frank Humphries. In 1951, he worked with Lucky Thompson and Edgar Sampson and, most important, was introduced by Monk to Mary Lou Williams. Williams recorded three of Nichols’s songs: “Opus Z” (also known as “Stennell”), “The Bebop Waltz (Mary’s Waltz),” and “My First Date with You”—all for Atlantic Records. The next year, Nichols was coleader of a recording session for Savoy Records with Danny Barker, double bass player Chocolate Williams, and Wilson and recorded with Rex Stewart and his Dixielanders for Jazztone Records. During 1952 and 1955, Nichols continued to perform with Barker, Joe Thomas, Sonny Stitt, Arnett Cobb, and Wilbur de Paris. Nichols’s last recording as a sideman was with Thomas in 1958.
Nichols signed with Blue Note Records and recorded three brilliant piano trio albums in 1955-1956—perhaps his most significant contributions to recorded jazz history. These records document the melodic angularity, harmonic complexity, and rhythmic zeal that Nichols favored. Tunes such as “The Gig,” “Lady Sings the Blues,” and “Spinning Song” demonstrate a technique of florid runs similar to that of Bud Powell, along with the percussive approach of Monk. “Chit-Chatting,” however, is something of a harbinger of the avant-garde movement of the 1960’s.
In the notes accompanying his album The Herbie Nichols Trio (1955), the pianist listed an eclectic series of music influences: West Indian folk music, calypso, Jelly Roll Morton, Bach, Ludwig van Beethoven, Frédéric Chopin, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Duke Ellington, Art Tatum, Béla Bartók, Igor Stravinsky, Paul Hindemith, Dmitri Shostakovich, and Walter Piston. While it is evident that the Western European masters greatly influenced his harmonic conception, Nichols’s work is enlivened by the sound of the rhythmic pulse of jazz.
Nichols languished in obscurity after the Blue Note sessions; he contracted leukemia and died on April 12, 1963. In the years after his death, Nichols became a favorite composer in avant-garde circles, inspiring tributes by artists such as Misha Mengelberg, Buell Neidlinger, the Herbie Nichols Project, Roswell Rudd, Phillip Johnston, Geri Allen, Dave Douglas, the Clusone Trio, Steve Lacy, Frank Kimbrough, Marian McPartland, Howard Alden, and Ben Allison.
Significance
Nichols was arguably one of the most influential, yet most overlooked, artists of the first century of jazz. His personal catalog of original compositions consists of nearly two hundred songs, all of which illustrate his unique musical conception and his forward-thinking creative aesthetic.
Bibliography
Mathieson, Kenny. “Herbie Nichols.” In Giant Steps: Bebop and the Creation of Modern Jazz 1945-65. Edinburgh, Scotland: Payback, 1999. Offers a cogent account and analysis of Nichols’s career and compositions.
Miller, Mark. Herbie Nichols: A Jazzist’s Life. Toronto: Mercury Press, 2009. The first biography dedicated to the inimitable pianist and composer, this book weaves painstaking research with colorful anecdotes.
Spellman, A. B. “Herbie Nichols.” In Four Lives in the Bebop Business. New York: Limelight, 2004. Provides lucid analysis of Nichols and three other seminal artists of the 1960’s avant-garde movement.