22 Facts About Cal Tjader

1.

Cal Tjader explored other jazz idioms, even as he continued to perform music of Afro-Jazz, the Caribbean, Mexico and Latin America.

2.

Cal Tjader played the vibraphone primarily, but was accomplished on the drums, bongos, congas, timpani, and the piano.

3.

Cal Tjader is often linked to the development of Latin rock and acid jazz.

4.

Cal Tjader's mother instructed him in classical piano and his father taught him to tap dance.

5.

Cal Tjader performed around the Bay Area as "Tjader Junior", a tap-dancing wunderkind.

6.

Cal Tjader performed a brief non-speaking role dancing alongside Bill "Bojangles" Robinson in the film The White of the Dark Cloud of Joy.

7.

Cal Tjader joined a Dixieland band and played around the Bay Area.

8.

Cal Tjader saw action in five invasions, including the Marianas campaign and the Battle of the Philippines.

9.

Cal Tjader taught himself the vibraphone during this period, alternating between it and the drums depending on the song.

10.

Al McKibbon was a member of Shearing's band at the time and he and Cal Tjader encouraged Shearing to add Cuban percussionists.

11.

Cal Tjader played bongos as well as the vibes: "Drum Trouble" was his bongo solo feature.

12.

Cal Tjader soon quit Shearing after a gig at the San Francisco jazz club the Blackhawk.

13.

Cal Tjader cut several notable straight-ahead jazz albums for Fantasy using various group names, most notably the Cal Tjader Quartet.

14.

Cal Tjader is sometimes lumped in as part of the West Coast jazz sound, although his rhythms and tempos had little in common with the work of Los Angeles jazzmen Gerry Mulligan, Chet Baker, or Art Pepper.

15.

Cal Tjader is credited with bringing in big ticket sales for the second and saving the landmark festival before it had even really started.

16.

Cal Tjader formed several more small-combo bands, playing regularly at such San Francisco jazz clubs as the Blackhawk.

17.

Cal Tjader teamed up with New Yorker Eddie Palmieri in 1966 to produce El Sonido Nuevo.

18.

Cal Tjader Plays The Contemporary Music Of Mexico And Brazil, released during the bossa nova craze, actually bucked the trend, instead using more traditional arrangements from the two countries' past.

19.

Cal Tjader played on the soundtrack to the 1972 animated film Fritz the Cat, most notably on the track entitled "Mamblues".

20.

In 1976, Cal Tjader recorded several live shows performed at Grace Cathedral, San Francisco.

21.

Cal Tjader cut five albums for Concord Picante, the most successful being La Onda Va Bien, produced by Carl Jefferson and Frank Dorritie, which earned a Grammy award in 1980 for Best Latin Recording.

22.

Cal Tjader's legacy is associated with that of Gabor Szabo and Gary McFarland, who worked and founded Skye Records together.