Uploaded February 2011 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Olga's Children got Swing - Marty Grosz 1995
Where he got this tune from is a puzzle to me but it is performed in Marty's typical manner, always with that brilliant wry sense of the absurb. This is from a session with the Soprano Summit at the 1995 Bern Jazz Festival
Extracted from Riverwalk jazz:
According to the critics, Marty Grosz is today's foremost jazz rhythm guitarist and chord soloist. He is virtually the only major jazz guitarist who doesn't use an amplifier. This makes him either the last remaining proponent of the acoustic guitar tradition in jazz or the lone harbinger of a new non-electric movement. Marty sings, too. His vocals have become as much in demand at record sessions and jazz concerts as his driving guitar rhythm.
Grosz was born in Berlin, Germany in 1930. By the time he reached his third birthday, his toes were tapping to radio songs in New York. His urge for musical expression manifested itself when he began strumming a ukelele at the age of eight. In 1950, Marty cut his first record with a band that included the young pianist, Dick Wellstood, and the veteran New Orleans bassist, Pops Foster. A visit to Chicago in 1954 turned into a twenty-year residency during which he played with many of that town's jazz stars such as Albert Ammons, Floyd O'Brien, Art Hodes, and Jim Lannigan.
Marty returned to New York in 1975 to join Bob Wilber and Kenny Davern's Soprano Summit.
When he isn't on the road with his guitar, Marty and his wife like to spend afternoons on their patio in Piermont, New York, vodka in hand, watching the lazy Hudson drifting by.
Olga's Children got Swing - Marty Grosz 1995
Where he got this tune from is a puzzle to me but it is performed in Marty's typical manner, always with that brilliant wry sense of the absurb. This is from a session with the Soprano Summit at the 1995 Bern Jazz Festival
Extracted from Riverwalk jazz:
According to the critics, Marty Grosz is today's foremost jazz rhythm guitarist and chord soloist. He is virtually the only major jazz guitarist who doesn't use an amplifier. This makes him either the last remaining proponent of the acoustic guitar tradition in jazz or the lone harbinger of a new non-electric movement. Marty sings, too. His vocals have become as much in demand at record sessions and jazz concerts as his driving guitar rhythm.
Grosz was born in Berlin, Germany in 1930. By the time he reached his third birthday, his toes were tapping to radio songs in New York. His urge for musical expression manifested itself when he began strumming a ukelele at the age of eight. In 1950, Marty cut his first record with a band that included the young pianist, Dick Wellstood, and the veteran New Orleans bassist, Pops Foster. A visit to Chicago in 1954 turned into a twenty-year residency during which he played with many of that town's jazz stars such as Albert Ammons, Floyd O'Brien, Art Hodes, and Jim Lannigan.
Marty returned to New York in 1975 to join Bob Wilber and Kenny Davern's Soprano Summit.
When he isn't on the road with his guitar, Marty and his wife like to spend afternoons on their patio in Piermont, New York, vodka in hand, watching the lazy Hudson drifting by.
