GEORGE CALDWELL - BMHOF CLASS OF 2022

Unlike many previous inductees, whose Hall of Fame careers took them away from Western New York, award-winning jazz keyboardist and educator George Caldwell’s long and winding road brought him TO Buffalo. Western New York became the place where he made the most lasting impact on the music scene, at the capstone of a career that features an incomparably lengthy list of national and international credits.

George was born in Mississippi, but his travels took him to numerous musical meccas before he landed in Buffalo in the 1990s. His studies included stints at the Manhattan School of Music, Oberlin Conservatory, and Rutgers University. He taught music at private schools in the Bronx, Harlem, and Memphis, and worked as a music director, pianist, composer, and recording artist for theatre productions on Broadway, and in New Jersey, Cleveland, Denver, Rhode Island, California, and Canada. 

Caldwell also performed and conducted around the world with well-known singers and bands including the legendary Duke Ellington Orchestra. He has played at Carnegie Hall, Royal Albert Hall, the Kennedy Center, The Blue Note, Montreux and Newport Jazz Festivals, and Tivoli Garden, just to name a few.

He is featured as instrumentalist, arranger, and composer on works by Tito Puente, Craig Bailey, Lewis Nash, Joe Williams, Bill Easley, and Hank Crawford, among others.

After arriving in Buffalo, George instructed Piano Performance and Jazz Improvisation at the University at Buffalo and became director of its Student Jazz Ensembles. In fall 2022, Caldwell was elevated to a full-time position as Professor of Practice. He has continued to perform live and in studio on piano and synthesizer with a variety of artists (including Savion Glover, Ruth Brown, Midtown Jazz Mobile, and Rufus Thomas) as well as his own George Caldwell Quintet playing originals and standards. Musician and writer James McBride, author of The Color of Water, said, “There is no major musician on the American jazz scene who knows more about the technical and creative side of playing jazz."

The “humble and soft-spoken” Caldwell won a Grammy in 1996 as Best Pianist in a Large Jazz Ensemble Performance, for Count Basie Orchestra Live at Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild, one of five albums he recorded with that legendary big band. He has also composed for and appeared on television and acted in three films.

"Caldwell is a fully tenured jazz piano legend... He's one of the pre-eminent swing jazz players in modern jazz" 
- Jeff Miers, The Buffalo News Music Critic