38 Facts About Giorgio Gomelsky

Giorgio Sergio Alessando Gomelsky was a filmmaker, impresario, music manager, songwriter and record producer.

Giorgio Gomelsky was born in Georgia, grew up in Switzerland, and later lived in the United Kingdom and the United States.

Giorgio Gomelsky owned the Crawdaddy Club in London where the Rolling Stones were the house band, and he was involved with their early management.

Giorgio Gomelsky hired the Yardbirds as a replacement and managed them.

Giorgio Gomelsky was their producer from the beginning through 1966.

Giorgio Gomelsky's father was a medical doctor, and his mother was from Monte Carlo.

Giorgio Gomelsky discovered jazz at the age of 10, while living in Italy.

Giorgio Gomelsky attended a Benedictine school in Ascona, near Locarno, Switzerland.

Giorgio Gomelsky attended a progressive private school, the School of Humanity run by Paul Geheeb, in the mountains of Switzerland.

Giorgio Gomelsky's father had worked for the Societe des Bains de Mer in Monte Carlo, a popular resort for the British, and so she spoke English and became an anglophile, with a particular love of English literature.

Giorgio Gomelsky would send her Swiss schoolboy son the English music paper Melody Maker on a weekly basis, from which Gomelsky learned English and became familiar with the British jazz scene.

Resources were so limited that, only possessing a ride cymbal, Giorgio Gomelsky would have to hire a drum kit every time they had an engagement.

Giorgio Gomelsky followed their model and formed a Swiss federation that staged concerts.

Giorgio Gomelsky had seen the 1948 film Jammin' the Blues and had formed forward-thinking stylistic ideas including synchronised fast cutting.

Giorgio Gomelsky succeeded in obtaining a 500 UKP commission from a young Italian TV station and departed for England.

The studio footage, shot in one day, used cutting-edge technology like large Mitchell cameras with 'elephant' suspended mics that restricted camera movements in the small studio, preventing Giorgio Gomelsky from getting all the angles he had hoped for.

Harold Pendleton had started the National Jazz Festival and Giorgio Gomelsky had participated as a volunteer helper at the first one in 1959.

Giorgio Gomelsky was able to secure the rights to film the 1960 festival.

Giorgio Gomelsky, then writing for Jazz News, became inspired by this to the extent of becoming evangelical.

Giorgio Gomelsky invited them to visit the Marquee Blues Night and they showed up the following week.

Giorgio Gomelsky wanted to build on the success of The Marquee Blues night with more shows but Pendleton was not interested.

Giorgio Gomelsky began to organize the bands, suggesting that they work co-operatively to obtain bookings and do other business, just as the earlier Jazz Societies had federated their efforts.

Giorgio Gomelsky even persuaded the Portobello Jamaican club to host a couple of blues bands, however the regular patrons were not impressed.

Giorgio Gomelsky was certain that the vitality of the genre depended on attracting new young fans, and that attracting young fans depended on involving young musicians.

Giorgio Gomelsky had taken on much of the responsibility for managing and promoting the Rolling Stones.

Giorgio Gomelsky considered he could exploit his reputation as a jazz writer and film-maker to generate interest in the band and entice the jazz critics to visit the Sunday Richmond sessions.

Giorgio Gomelsky announced that he would make a short promotional film of these "illustrious unknowns".

Giorgio Gomelsky showed the article to acquaintance Patrick Doncaster, the music critic of the Daily Mirror, the largest circulation British daily newspaper.

Giorgio Gomelsky had to return to Switzerland, for three weeks, as his father had died.

Giorgio Gomelsky went on to manage and produce the Yardbirds, and arranged for British rock musicians to record with American blues musicians, including the Yardbirds with Sonny Boy Williamson, who was Giorgio Gomelsky's roommate for a period in Britain.

Giorgio Gomelsky produced early recordings by Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Blossom Toes, Rod Stewart, John McLaughlin, Alexis Korner, Graham Bond and Soft Machine.

In 1978, having received a substantial royalty payment for his work with the Yardbirds, Giorgio Gomelsky relocated to New York in an attempt to open up the American market to the European progressive jazz-rock bands he was working with.

Giorgio Gomelsky established the Zu Club in Chelsea in Manhattan and after meeting 24-year-old bass player Bill Laswell, encouraged him to form a band, which began rehearsing in the club's basement.

The band became known as the Zu Band until Giorgio Gomelsky hooked them up with former Gong frontman Daevid Allen for a performance at the Zu Club.

Giorgio Gomelsky was a regular DJ at the club Tramps, introducing fans to an array of styles, including new African and experimental jazz music.

Giorgio Gomelsky was instrumental in bringing the important Czech group, the Plastic People of the Universe, to the international public eye by producing a benefit concert for the band's lyricist Egon Bondy at The Kitchen on 29 January 1989, featuring their exiled saxophonist Vratislav Brabenec and New York musicians including the Soldier String Quartet, Craig Harris, Borbetomagus, Elliott Sharp and Gary Lucas, who played the Plastic People's repertoire.

Giorgio Gomelsky was involved as guide, producer, and supporter of various New York bands including D Generation, 101 Crustaceans and Band of Susans.

Giorgio Gomelsky died of cancer on 13 January 2016 in New York City.