Casey MacGill
Casey MacGill plays Happy Hour at Vito's
Vito's
927 9th Avenue
Seattle, WA 98104
Nov 3, 2016
5:30 PM UTC
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About this concert
Casey MacGill croons classic tunes in a style encompassing blues, ballads, and boogie. His piano weaves a spell of smoke-filled joints where little dramas played out to the sounds of tinkling keys.Casey is a native of Los Angeles, grew up with folk music, surf, 60's pop, and eventually the blues. He attended the Monterey Pop Festival, saw icons Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, blues artists Paul Butterfield, Junior Wells, Albert King, and the blues became the cornerstone of his musical style. He majored in music at Pasadena City College and Cal State LA, studying with jazz greats Gary Foster, Warne Marsh, and Buddy Collette.MacGill performed on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, the Gong Show, and the movie Frances with his trio Mood Indigo. Casey was featured in the Broadway musical Swing, opening the show and writing five songs.Casey currently plays in the group the Blue 4 Trio, on ukulele and cornet, in addition to piano, and occasionally Roy Kay's Red Hot Rhythm Club. He particularly enjoys his solo turn at Vito's for the chance to help create the ambience of a vintage cocktail lounge with his music.
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Casey MacGill Biography
Casey MacGill performs music that swings. Nat "King" Cole Trio meets the Mills Brothers. Fats Waller meets Fats Domino. Slim Galliard meets Fred Astaire. It is American music of many decades and no decade in particular, all happening at the same time, woven into a seamless, beautiful whole. At the core of his sound are his band's sometimes sweet, sometimes rough-hewn three-part harmony vocals and a piano-ukulele-bass-and-drums rhythm section that swings in a variety of textures. Casey MacGill is the heart and soul of the band. From California, he is a classic Hollywood character in appearance and style. MacGill plays boogie-woogie, swing, and stride piano. He blows a lyrical jazz cornet, and his most unique instrumental voice is a 6-string tenor ukulele. He has been singing and arranging vocal harmonies for over 40 years, in a career that stretches from Los Angeles (Mood Indigo, feature films "Frances" and "Swing Shift") to Spokane, WA (The Spirits of Rhythm and the neo-swing classic CD "Jump") to Broadway (The musical "Swing") and finally to Seattle (most recently with the Blue 4 Trio). "I've played a lot of music with a lot of people," he says "and one thing I've learned is to tailor my arrangements to the individual players. It gives each musical situation a unique sound." He steers the band from his piano bench, alternately cruising along and sweating feverishly, switching intuitively between the ukulele and the piano and the cornet, singing and scatting, sometimes all within the same song. With his former Seattle band, The Blue 4 Trio, Casey released 3 CDs, the most recent of which is Barrelhouse. From the familiar standards ("Out of Nowhere") to boogie-woogie ("Cow Cow Boogie") to vocal pyrotechnics ("Changes") to classic ballads ("Small Fry") to all out good time stomp ("Barrelhouse", a MacGill original) this CD is already considered by many his best yet. The band also toured extensively in Europe, performing for enthusiastic swing dancers in festivals and dance camps. Ukulele, piano, cornet. Songs. Music of the 20's-30's, some 50's rock n' roll, N'Awlins R & B, various odds n' ends; Debussy, Randy Newman, Satie, Gershwin, Villa Lobos, Floyd Cramer, Jelly Roll Morton
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