Alfred McKibbon, born January 1st, 1919 at 12:00am in Chicago, Illinois, died this morning at Good Samaratin Hospital in Los Angeles. It seems like just weeks ago that Al and his daughter, Alison, were here at the house — we ended up going out for seafood dinner, Al loved seafood — but that was five months ago. My husband, John, and Al were friends for more than fifty years. When John put down his bass to become a fulltime manager, it was Al that he hired to play bass with the George Shearing Quintet. We will miss him.
Al’s first-person bio, which includes photographs from his personal collection, can be read online here. Also included are liner notes and audio clips from Tumbao Para Los Congueros Di Mi Vida, his first recording as a leader.
And here’s a Wikipedia entry that has links to info about many of the great artist with whom Al worked.
Also check out “Al McKibbon: a living history of Jazz/Al McKibbon and the Roots of Latin Jazz” a recent (April 2005) article by Nelson Rodriguez in Latin Beat Magazine.