LARRY VUCKOVICH
Larry
Vuckovich is a highly regarded veteran of the San Francisco and New York
City jazz scenes. He has played and recorded with many of the top names
in jazz. Here are two of his many recordings. The newly re-issued Deja
Vuk is a solo session, showing off Larry's piano talents on a
mixture of jazz standards and his own compositions. Tres
Palabras finds Larry in a Latin jazz setting leading an outstanding
group of some of the San Francisco Bay Area's finest musicians.
About Larry Vuckovich
Growing up in Yugoslavia, in Kotor,
Montenegro, Larry Vuckovich studied classical
piano. There he also developed an interest in jazz, listening to it on
our Armed Forces radio and experimenting with it himself. When he was
just fourteen, he and his family emigrated to San Francisco. That was
1951 and the jazz scene here was flourishing. San Francisco clubs hosted
jazz stars from all over the country. Famous jazz musicians including
Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, Gill
Evans, Milt Jackson, and many others appeared at clubs like
the Black Hawk and the Jazz Workshop. The young Vuckovich was an eager
listener. He met Vince Guaraldi at the Black Hawk and Guaraldi took him
on as his student. A student of both classical and jazz piano, Larry went
on to get a degree in music at San Francisco State. He started playing
as a full-time professional in 1960. He had the good fortune to appear
with such instrumentalists as Brew Moore, John Handy, and vocalists Mel
Torme, David Allyn, and Irene Kral. In 1965, he began his twenty-year
association with vocalist and lyricist Jon Hendricks, who had previously
gained fame as a member of the group Lambert, Hendricks, and Ross. With
Hendricks, Larry toured the U.S., Canada, and Europe, performing at major
festivals and clubs. 
He appeared on two recordings with Hendricks, Cloud Burst and Tell Me the Truth, and in Hendricks' exceptional musical stage production, Evolution of the Blues. In addition to touring with Hendricks, in the late 60's Larry led the house band at what was then Germany's top jazz club, The Domicile in Munich. In that role, he backed visiting jazz greats including Lucky Thompson, Slide Hampton, Pony Poindexter, and Clifford Jordan. It was also in Munich where Larry met master drummer Philly Joe Jones, with whom he went on to tour Europe. Later, in the late '70's, Larry was to meet up with Jones again, in San Francisco. Larry was the house pianist at the Keystone Korner club here. At the club, he performed with jazz masters Arnett Cobb, Buddy Tate, Charles McPherson, Leon Thomas, Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson, and Scott Hamilton. The Keystone Korner closed in 1983, ending Larry's long-time gig there. Larry moved to New York, the jazz capital of the world, in 1985. He appeared at most of the major jazz clubs there, including the Village Vanguard, the Blue Note, Bradley's, Zinno, and others.
Some of his musical associations in New York included Billy Higgins, Charles McPherson, Cecil Payne, Al Cohn, Curtis Fuller, Milt Hinton, Mel Lewis, Michael Moore, and Tom Harrell (who appears on Larry's CD Tres Palabras). In 1990, Larry returned to San Francisco, where he is one of the mainstays of the jazz scene. He has appeared on many recordings by Bay Area jazz musicians, including three that are now available through Five Spot, Nika Rejto's Bridge Weaver, Al Molina's Straight From the Heart, and his own Deja Vuk and Tres Palabras. Also, you can often catch him live in The City.
