Cy's Guestbook
Your comments will appear below. Most recent posts will be at the top of the pages and earlier posts will be below, or on subsequent pages. We look forward to hearing from you.
I went to your website and am very impressed ... I'm an old time piano player (40+ years) ... I listened to your dad play "All The Things You Are" and had tears in my eyes ... absolutely beautiful! Thank you so much for this rare opportunity to hear him play. I'll be sure to visit often.
Laurie Kamp
Weyauwega, Wisconsin
June 9, 2009
Thank you so much for the beautiful website for Cy Walter. I thoroughly enjoyed all the recordings you so generously made available on line. I don't think "All The Things You Are" will ever be more beautifully rendered, as well as so many more of the standards. It was an eye-opener that Cy was such a fine composer, with the superb music and witty lyrics of "One Fine Day" [later modified by Cy and re-titled "Some Fine Day"]. Again, thank you.
Jim Thompson
Cumming, Georgia
July 16, 2007
I was taken to the Drake by a rich college chum and a fan of Cy Walter's in the forties. I [was] from a small milltown outside of Pittsburgh [and] had only been to the war (WWII, SW Pacific) and to downtown Pittsburgh. I thought Mr. Walter was the most wonderful thing I had ever heard in my life and also the most glamorous ... When I first got to New York, I couldn't afford to go to the Drake, but then I discovered because they had sympathetic bartenders that I could in fact go to the Drake and order a beer and sit there all night and listen to your father's sensational playing. He knew everything and would play anything, but when he didn't have a request, he played only the best. Later, when I got more established in the book business, I would take authors there on an expense account, and invariably they would fall in love with his playing. I now remember there was a writer of women's romances from Nova Scotia named Dan Ross, and he and his wife were in love with your father's playing. Dan Ross used to take me there -- [and it was] unusual for a writer to take his editor out. I once had a connection with Marlene Dietrich -- I was her agent's assistant, so I had a lot to do with her, since her agent ...had as little to do with her as possible -- and I think she was a big fan of your father's. The Dietrich job was my first job in New York. I'm eighty [now], but when I was young, and in New York, [Cy Walter] represented everything I had hoped New York would be: great music, glamour, taste and the high life. Cy Walter was absolutely the greatest and I will do anything to perpetuate that name and his wonderful music. He was, wonder of wonders, a wonderful man.
Patrick O'Connor
Glendale, CA
May 2, 2007
I met Michael Feinstein last night and he highly recommended your site. I just wanted to express my appreciation for the enormous amount of work and love poured into this amazing website - what a rich resource!
From an appreciative musician - with sincere thanks,
Ruth Ann Galatas
Miami, FL
March 6, 2008
Your father was, without question, the finest jazz pianist my husband and I have ever heard. We spent many years at the bar in the Drake enjoying his amazing talent.
Susanne Bullock
East Hampton, New York
June 2, 2008
What an awsome website! One could spend hours on it. Where in the world did you get that oldest animated film? That was so neat. I didn't see or find, maybe I overlooked it, where I could hear some of your father's music ... I found where to listen to his music. I was so intent on reading his boigraphy and everthing else I skipped over the link. I was able to hear the absolute genius of a pianist Cy Walter was. The one person that said you would swear there was more than one piano was right. He was fantastic ... After I listened to the clips of your Dad's music, I really feel like I remember hearing him on the radio when I was younger. It sounded so familiar. I so much enjoyed listening to the selections. Thank you for being able to down load some of his music. I love that kind of piano music, it is so relaxing.
Nina Belk
Culver IN
April 25-26, 2007
I was introduced to the music of Cy Walter when I discovered a few selections of piano sheet music in a friend's collection. I have greatly enjoyed the style and full use of the instrument that his arrangements display.
Since then, I have occasionally searched the internet to glean more information about him. My latest search brought me to this great website. I appreciate the detailed information and the chance to hear the man himself play. I look forward to the Shellwood CD.
Thanks for the effort to preserve Cy Walter's legacy.
Marybeth Hoffman
Evanston, IL
April 12, 2007
I was awash in nostalgia last week, attending Tony Caramia's excellent presentation on the music of Cy Walter at the International Association for Jazz Education Convention in NYC, getting to meet his son, Mark, and sharing memories in a room of his family and admirers.
I was captivated by Walter's music through much of my grade school years, growing up in the forties in the Midwest, studying classical piano, but intensely drawn to improvisation and composition. I first heard him on Milton Cross' Piano Playhouse, and my whole family became addicted to the show, huddling up to the loudspeaker in the living room each week. His music is so rich that it defeats categorization. I resonated with Terry Teachout's remarks that you link to on the site, particularly the observation that while Walter and Tatum were friends, and Tatum was Cy's favorite pianist, there is a major difference in Tatum's emphasis on reharmonization, drive, swing, and flamboyant virtuosity. In the current (February, 2007) issue of Downbeat, Ethan Iverson writes an insightful review of Walter's first CD re-issue, underlining Walter's reverence for the song, and placing him more in the tradition of classical composer/pianists like Leopold Godowsky than in the context of jazz or Broadway.
As a child I wasn't thinking of category or analysis, but was swept up in the grace, subtlety, originality, and effortless drama of his music. By high school, I was intensely focused on jazz, but I never forgot Cy Walter, and soon after I began to record a series of modern jazz piano albums for Columbia in 1963, my producer, John Hammond, knowing of my admiration, took me to meet and hear Cy perform at the Drake. It was a huge treat, and I swallowed my embarrassment and asked him to play Mrs. Malaprop, concerned that it would be akin to the millionth request for Melancholy Baby. He gave a shy little smile, and proceeded to play a gorgeous, quirky, sweeping version that carried me back to the forties. John Hammond wanted me to play for Cy, and arranged for us all to meet the next day at the Steinway showroom. I felt nervous and presumptuous, but I will always remember how complimentary and encouraging he was. I never saw him again, and in just a few years, he was gone.
Denny Zeitlin
Double Helix Music, Inc.
Kentfield, CA
January 21, 2007
Congratulations to everyone on this fantastic website.
I'm so proud to perform Cy's brilliant transcriptions and encourage
everyone to explore this site. Music and recordings by Cy which were not available for decades
are now available to everyone around the world.
Thank you for bringing this website (clearly a labor of love) to everyone.
This is a site which must be visited over and over again.
All best wishes,
Richard Glazier
Pianist and Storyteller
January 17, 2007
Last week I spoke with Dave McKenna, one of my all time favorite jazz pianists. I asked him if he knew [Cy's] work. Of course he did.
He said that he worked in a group with coronetist Bobby Hackett and at one point they played
in the room across the lobby from the Drake Room (where Fauchon is now) and that whenever
they took a break they would go and listed to Cy. Dave said, "He wasn't a jazz guy but was
an incredible player. Jazz guys called him The Park Avenue Art Tatum.'
Paul Shanley
U.S. Representative
Moscow World Fine Art Fair
January 4, 2007
Great music . We are lucky to have the torch passed on.
Don Pippin,
Brewster, NY
Dec 31, 2006
If the family intended to create new fans, you and they have done so!
I listened to "All the Things You Are."
I experienced the shy courtship, the not-yet-sure-and-stumbling, then the fun and frivolous, then maturity but with a light step, a unification of a couple, a ponderable glowing, then reminiscence. The phases of love and commitment.
It was inspired playing.
Kat Koorey
Dec 12, 2006
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