Lorraine Geller born 11 September 1928

Lorraine Geller (September 11, 1928 – October 13, 1958) was a talented American jazz pianist who was one of the first females to break into a male-dominated genre of music. 

She was born Lorraine Winifred Walsh in Portland, Oregon  and studied classic piano in high school before she was introduced to jazz music in the African American community of Jumptown. In 1942 she was playing with the “Boogie-Woogie Quartet” at Franklin High School. She started with one of the first integrated all-female bands, “Sweethearts of Rhythm,” in 1949 which had for two years, Anna Mae Winburn, a well-known jazz vocalist. 

She and the band followed alto saxophonist Herb Geller and his band to New York City in 1951, where she and Geller married. That year, she played with trumpeter Norma Carson’s all-female group, which did a brief residency at The Welcome Bar in Atlantic City. By 1952 the couple were in Los Angeles, California. Her husband joined with Billy May and became a practitioner of the "West Coast" sound. Being a white female in this genre of music gave her an advantage with recording contracts as it seemed that aged, talented African American men were by-passed for this young, white girl. 

                     Here’s “Clash By Night” from above album. 

                                    

During her short professional career, she recorded three albums with her husband for EmArcy, a few titles with him for Imperial, and made a trio set of her own for Dot in 1954 “Lorraine Geller at Piano,” which is now a collector's item. In 1957 she performed on Red Mitchell “Presenting Red Mitchell,” which was her most successful recording financially.

Herb Kimmel, Lorraine Geller, Will MacFarland 1954

During her seven years in California, she performed in West Coast clubs or on LP's with greats in the jazz world such as Kay Smith, Miles Davis, Philly Joe Jones, Shorty Rogers, Zoot Sims, Stan Getz, Charlie Parker, Dinah Washington, Dizzie Gillespie, and more. At one point when the couple could not find a job, they would play for strip joints to make a paycheck as did many jazz bands during this era. 

In 1957 she worked as Kay Starr’s accompanist, but suffering from being short of breath, she was diagnosed with asthma. With the birth of her daughter, Lisa, in September of 1957, her respiratory condition declined greatly, following with a six-month stay in the hospital that her health insurance would not pay. This caused a financial burden on her family's budget, hence her husband left to tour to earn a better income. 

During 1958 she concentrated on bringing up her daughter, so did not often perform, but she did play at the first Monterey Jazz Festival on October 13, 1958. A week later while her husband was on tour, she had another critical episode of respiratory distress. 

She did not recover from this episode but died of pulmonary edema as a complication of a respiratory infection on October 13, 1958 shortly after her 30th birthday. Her mother had to phone her husband, who was on tour, to tell him of her death. Sadly, she is among the most underrated and barely celebrated pianists from the 1950s and is all but forgotten today. 

(Edited from bio by Linda Davis, Wikipedia & AllMusic)