Remo Palmier

Remo Paul Palmieri (March 29, 1923 – February 2, 2002) was an American jazz guitarist.

Career

Remo Palmieri hit the New York jazz scene as a teenager in the 1940s and almost immediately found himself playing with some the premier jazz artists of the time. He teamed up first with Coleman Hawkins and then Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. His talents as a jazz guitarist and musician were in great demand and during this same period he recorded with Teddy Wilson. In 1945 he recorded with Gillespie and Parker and Red Norvo and was awarded a "new star" award from Esquire, Palmieri was one of the first guitarists to extend the ideas of Charlie Christian, but he chose to live the life of a studio musician. In the late 1940s he began performing with Arthur Godfrey on CBS, and taught Godfrey to play the ukulele. He was with CBS and for more than 27 years as he pursued a very successful career as a studio musician. If you listened to the Arthur Godfrey radio show on CBS in the 1960s and early 1970s you heard Remo Palmieri's guitar in the background. He changed his name legally in 1952, omitting the "i" at the end, to Palmier to not be associated with the already famous, Eddie Palmieri.

In 1972 Remo Palmier left the studio when the Godfrey show was canceled and he returned to playing in local nightspots in New York. Then in 1977 his friend Herb Ellis convinced Carl Jefferson to invite Remo Palmier to the Concord Jazz Festival in Concord, California. At that festival Palmier and Ellis teamed up for some duet playing and later that year they made the recording Windflower. That recording marked the end of a 30 plus year hiatus from recording for this talented jazz guitarist. Then in 1979 Concord Jazz produced the first recording on which Remo Palmier was billed as the leader, Remo Palmier.^[1]

In the 1990s Remo Palmier continued to perform. He was heard at the 1998 JVC Tribute To Herb Ellis With Love, at the 1997 Tribute To^[2] Barney Kessel With Love From Your Friends, and at the 1996 Tribute to Tal Farlow.^[3] He also taught privately, giving advanced guitar lessons to various aspiring guitarists including Gary Larson, the well known cartoonist.

He died in 2002, he had been suffering from leukemia and lymphoma. He was survived by his wife, Margery who died in 2009, twin daughters, Janis and Stephan, two brothers, Paul and Raymond and two grandchildren.^[4]

Recordings

Red Norvo's All Star Sextet-Brunswick

The Teddy Wilson Octet-Musicraft Freddie Slack's Boogie Woogie-Capitol

Freddie Slack's Boogie Woogie Volume 2-Capitol

Red Norvo's All Star Sextet-Keynote

Red Norvo Improvisations-EmArcy

Dizzy Gillespie and His All-Stars-Musicraft

Jazz Concert-Jazztone

Teddy Wilson Sextet Volume II-Jazz Archives

Arthur Godfrey Jazz For The People-Signature

Windflower-Concord

Remo Palmier-Concord

He played with Pearl Bailey, Coleman Hawkins, Billie Holiday, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Red Norvo, and Sarah Vaughan, and was part of Nat Jaffe's trio.

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References