Ron Steen is literally the Godfather of Jazz Jams in Portland, Oregon, and one of the most successful musicians in the area. He has had an ongoing jam session since 1980, and has been hosting Produce Row for about 13 years. Any New York pros who come through town stop in to Produce Row to jam on Monday nights.

In 1965, 21 years after his New York Philharmonic debut on piano at age 16, Leon Fleisher was no longer able to play with two hands. A neurological disorder called focal dystonia had settled in, and he couldn't move two fingers of his right hand.

That did not keep him from his music. He plunged forward into conducting (including major orchestras such as those in Boston, Chicago and San Francisco), teaching, and mastering the extensive piano repertoire for the left hand. He will play from this repertoire tonight at 8 p.m. at Harris Concert Hall, an Aspen Music Festival and School special event.

"My greatest pleasure is to see the light of understanding in a student’s eyes – what I call the ‘Aha!’ moment. A teacher should be irresistible, should find THE way of getting information across to a young pianist. We have to serve music."

"Even though I had some success in New York City and established a reputation, it is still hard to get work there," he says. "I wanted to come to Houston to relax a bit, but also see what I can create in terms of a jazz audience. I'm trying to find a place where I can develop something, maybe bring some musicians from New York."

Jack Costanzo is known and responsible for the popularity of the bongos all over the world. He introduced bongos into American music when he was with the famous Stan Kenton Band, which shot him to jazz fame overnight. Jack recorded with Stan such favorites as The Peanut Vendor, Bongo Riff, Cuban Carnival and about fifty other recordings.

JV: How was Kenton to work with?

JC: Marvelous! He let you stretch out. "Play what you feel Jack," he'd say. I remember the opening night at the Rendezvous Ballroom in Balboa. It's a little island he'd worked for years. It's opening night, his return, and he's going to show off his new band. So we start with Stardust and you know the tempo is real light and he gives Laurindo Almeida a guitar solo, then points to me. I looked at him like 'what am I supposed to do with this tempo?' So Shelly yells 'pick up the tempo' so I did these really fast runs and Kenton is yelling 'that's what I want!' (laughter)

[...]

JV: Tell us about your jazz experience.

JC: I went through bebop and cubop. When I went to Birdland, which I did fairly often, I was playing with Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Max Roach, Percy Heath, Curley Russell, and before he died, Fats Navarro. Playing with Lester Young was probably one of my favorite experiences. But I really didn't play Latin and that's why I was so well-liked by the musicians at Birdland because I could play jazz. I remember Bud Powell saying finally we have a conga drummer that can play jazz.