45 Facts About Elmo Hope

St Elmo Sylvester Hope was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger, chiefly in the bebop and hard bop genres.

Elmo Hope grew up playing and listening to jazz and classical music with Bud Powell, and both were close friends of another influential pianist, Thelonious Monk.

Elmo Hope was not happy during his four years on the West Coast, but had some successful collaborations there, including with saxophonist Harold Land.

Elmo Hope remains little known, despite, or because of, the individuality of his playing and composing, which were complex and stressed subtlety and variation rather than the virtuosity predominant in bebop.

Elmo Hope was born on June 27,1923, in New York City.

Elmo Hope had classical music lessons as a child, and won solo piano recital contests from 1938.

Elmo Hope attended Benjamin Franklin High School, which was known for its music program.

Elmo Hope developed an excellent understanding of harmony, and composed jazz and classical pieces at school.

At the age of 17, Elmo Hope was shot by a New York policeman.

Elmo Hope was taken to Sydenham Hospital, where doctors reported that the bullet had narrowly missed his spine.

Six weeks later, after Elmo Hope had been released from the hospital, he appeared in court, charged with "assault, attempted robbery and violation of the Sullivan Law".

The police officers involved testified in court that Elmo Hope had been part of a group of five involved in a mugging.

None of the other four, or any of the three alleged white victims, was identified by police; Elmo Hope stated that he had been running away with other passers-by after police started shooting, and was hit while trying to enter a hallway.

Elmo Hope's recovery was slow, and he did not go back to school.

Elmo Hope had been married and had a son, who died.

The terms of enlistment stated that Elmo Hope would be in the army "for the duration of the War [World War II] or other emergency, plus six months".

Elmo Hope was part of an octet led by trumpeter Eddie Robinson late in 1947, and played briefly with Snub Mosley around the same time.

Elmo Hope had his first long-term association, with the Joe Morris band, from 1948 to 1951, including for several recordings.

Some of those Elmo Hope met in Morris' band were interested in jazz.

The tracks recorded illustrated, according to critic Kenny Mathieson in 2012, that Elmo Hope was interested in the architecture and aural detail of the music more than in individual virtuosity.

Elmo Hope signed to Prestige in 1955, and recorded the trio album Meditations for them that year.

Elmo Hope claimed that he had gone to visit an aunt in hospital, but his absence was attributed by others to his heroin addiction.

Unable to earn a living in New York because of the performance ban, Elmo Hope toured with trumpeter Chet Baker in 1957 and then began living in Los Angeles.

Elmo Hope soon found other musicians who had been influenced by bebop, including saxophonist Harold Land and bassist Curtis Counce.

Hope played with Rollins again, and, in October 1957, recorded a session known as The Elmo Hope Quintet Featuring Harold Land which Pacific Jazz did not release until 1962, along with the contents of a 1957 Jazz Messengers album.

Elmo Hope did some arranging for others around this time, including for Land's 1958 Harold in the Land of Jazz.

Elmo Hope had his own band, with personnel that varied, and in 1959 he played with Lionel Hampton in Hollywood.

Back in Los Angeles in August 1959, Elmo Hope was pianist for Land's quintet album The Fox; he wrote four of the album's compositions.

In 1960, Elmo Hope married the pianist Bertha Rosemond, whom he met in California.

Elmo Hope's wife recounted that he was no longer working with Land, had recording offers from companies based on the East Coast, and still preferred it to Los Angeles, so the couple and their baby daughter moved to New York.

In June 1961, Elmo Hope was part of Philly Joe Jones' quintet, which included trumpeter Freddie Hubbard.

Between these two sessions as leader, Elmo Hope was briefly in prison again for drug offenses.

Elmo Hope led a piano trio: early in 1963 it contained Ray Kenney on bass and Lex Humphries on drums; in late 1964, it had John Ore on bass and Billy Higgins on drums.

In 1965, Elmo Hope was continuing to lead a trio and quartet in the New York area.

Fellow pianist Horace Tapscott reported that, later, Elmo Hope's "hands were all shot up and he couldn't play".

Visits to one hospital that was experienced in addressing the health problems of drug addicts left Elmo Hope feeling that he was being experimented on, so he went to another, St Clare's.

Elmo Hope was hospitalized with pneumonia in 1967 and died a few weeks later, on May 19, of heart failure.

Elmo Hope's wife was aged 31 at the time of his death.

Elmo Hope's playing was strongly based in the blues-influenced jazz tradition.

Elmo Hope employed dissonant harmonies and spiky, contrasting lines and phrases.

The Penguin Jazz Guide commented that Elmo Hope's compositions were strongly melodic, with some containing concepts of fugue and canon taken from classical music, but retaining foundations in the blues.

Atkins stated that Elmo Hope wrote highly structured, complex compositions that he played with improvisational flexibility.

Hawkins said in 2013 that Elmo Hope was important because he had a highly individual style but does not have the iconic status of pianists such as Monk.

Bertha Elmo Hope has released albums dedicated to her former husband's compositions.

Elmo Hope transcribed recordings to recreate his arrangements, following an apartment fire that destroyed most of the original manuscripts.