His 1974 release, Bad Benson, climbed to the top spot in the Billboard jazz chart.īy the mid- to late-1970s, as he recorded for Warner Bros.
At the age of 10, he recorded his first single record, “She Makes Me Mad”, with RCA-Victor in New York, under the name “Little Georgie”.Īt the age of 21, he recorded his first album as leader, The New Boss Guitar, featuring McDuff. Benson’s next recording was It’s Uptown with the George Benson Quartet, including Lonnie Smith on organ and Ronnie Cuber on baritone saxophone. Benson followed it up with The George Benson Cookbook, also with Lonnie Smith and Ronnie Cuber on baritone and drummer Marion Booker. Miles Davis employed Benson in the mid-1960s, featuring his guitar on “Paraphernalia” on his 1968 Columbia release, Miles in the Sky before going to Verve Records.īenson then signed with Creed Taylor’s jazz label CTI Records, where he recorded several albums, with jazz heavyweights guesting, to some success, mainly in the jazz field.
At the age of eight, he played guitar in an unlicensed nightclub on Friday and Saturday nights, but the police soon closed the club down. At the age of seven, he first played the ukulele in a corner drug store, for which he was paid a few dollars. Benson is the guitar-playing equivalent of Nat King Cole - a fantastic pianist whose smooth way with a pop vocal eventually eclipsed his instrumental prowess in the marketplace - but unlike Cole, Benson has been granted enough time after his fling with the pop charts to reaffirm his jazz guitar credentials, which he still does at his concerts.Benson was born and raised in the Hill District in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Yet Benson can also sing in a lush, soulful tenor with mannerisms similar to those of Stevie Wonder and Donny Hathaway, and it is his voice that has proved to be more marketable to the public than his guitar. Not only can he play lead brilliantly, he is also one of the best rhythm guitarists around, supportive to soloists and a dangerous swinger, particularly in a soul-jazz format. His inspirations may have been Charlie Christian and Wes Montgomery - and he can do dead-on impressions of both - but his style is completely his own. He can play in just about any style - from swing to bop to R&B to pop - with supreme taste, a beautiful rounded tone, terrific speed, a marvelous sense of logic in building solos, and, always, an unquenchable urge to swing. George Benson is simply one of the greatest guitarists in jazz history, but he is also an amazingly versatile musician, and that frustrates to no end critics who would paint him into a narrow bop box. Classic Grammy winning album that contains 2 sought after classics: This Masquerade and Breezin'. Classic Grammy winning album that contains 2 sought after classics: 'This Masquerad'e and 'Breezin'.
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