GABE BALTAZAR
Genres: Bop, Big Band • United States

Gabriel Ruiz Hiroshi Baltazar Jr. was born in Hilo, Hawaii on November 1, 1929. His mother, born Chiyoko Haraga on a Hawaii sugarcane plantation, was the daughter of Japanese immigrants who came to Hawaii to work on the plantations around 1900. His father, Gabriel Baltazar Sr., was born in Manila in 1906 and came to the United States to work as a musician in the mid-1920s. Gabe started playing reed instruments while his younger brother Norman Baltazar took up the trumpet.    Gabe Baltazar was first playing music at the age of eleven when he was started on the E♭ clarinet, later he would switch to alto saxophone. There were numerous big bands stationed at Hickam Field during this time (World War II) and Baltazar got to hear Artie Shaw, Sam Donahue, and Claude Thornhill. Baltazar's main influences growing up were Benny Carter, Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Willie Smith and read more...