MARTY GROSZ
Genres: Swing, Classic (1920s) Jazz, Original New Orleans Jazz, Dixieland • Germany

Marty Grosz is today's foremost jazz rhythm guitarist and chord soloist. He is virtually the only major jazz guitarist who doesn't use an amplifier. This makes him either the last remaining proponent of the acoustic guitar tradition in jazz or the lone harbinger of a new non-electric movement. Marty sings, too. His vocals have become as much in demand at record sessions and jazz concerts as his driving guitar rhythm. They are delivered in styles ranging from barrelhouse abandon to whispered restraint, and are sometimes raucous, often mischievous, but almost always informed with a wry sense of the absurd. One of jazz music's great comedians (his spontaneous monologs are often hilarious), Marty Grosz is a brilliant acoustic guitarist whose chordal solos bring back the sound of Carl Kress and Dick McDonough of the 1930s, while his vocals are very much in the Fats Waller tradition. Martin O. Grosz was born in Berlin, read more...