Ed Bickert born 29 November 1932

Edward Isaac Bickert, CM (November 29, 1932 – February 28, 2019) was Canada’s best-known jazz guitarist. He developed a unique, understated style of considerable harmonic sophistication. 

Rooted in bebop, his intuitive, pianistic approach was characterized by lyrical and rhythmic ease, a deceptively complex simplicity and a generally muted tone. He played mainstream jazz and swing music and  worked professionally from the mid-1950s to 2000, mainly in the Toronto area. A Member of the Order of Canada, Bickert won a Juno Award and multiple National Jazz Awards. He also played on dozens of Juno- and Grammy-nominated and award-winning recordings. 

Raised in farming and ranching family in Vernon, BC, Bickert began teaching himself the guitar at age eight. He first played with his father, an old-time fiddler, and his mother, a pianist, in a country dance band. In 1952, he moved to Toronto and worked until 1955 as a radio engineer on CFRB radio. At nights, he played at such after-hours jazz clubs as the House of Hambourg. His few lessons with renowned guitar teacher Tony Bradan were his only formal training. 

In the 1950s, Bickert was a member of Norman Symonds’s jazz octet. He also played with Ron Collier (1954–66) and with Phil Nimmons (1957–70). He played in most of Moe Koffman’s successive jazz groups beginning in 1956, and in the Boss Brass beginning in 1968. He also did a great deal of studio work in Toronto until the early 1970s, and performed intermittently with the groups of Peter Appleyard and Hagood Hardy, among others. He also appeared in duos with Don Thompson and Boss Brass bandleader Rob McConnell. 

Ed Bickert Trio

Bickert taught briefly at the Advanced School of Contemporary Music in Toronto during the early 1960s, at the Banff Centre for the Arts in 1978–80, and at the University of New Brunswick Chamber Music and Jazz Festival in 1978 and 1982. He was a formative influence on a generation of Toronto jazz guitarists that includes Lorne Lofsky, Roy Patterson, Rob Piltch, Reg Schwager and Geoff Young.  Formed in 1974, Bickert’s own trio comprising of Don Thompson (bass) and Terry Clarke (drums) played widely throughout Canada in clubs, at festivals and on CBC Radio. In 1979, the trio played the Bracknell, Northsea and Montreux jazz festivals during a European tour sponsored by Radio Canada International. (See also Music at the CBC.) During the 1970s and early 1980s, Bickert (with Thompson, Clarke and others) accompanied many American jazz stars at the Toronto club Bourbon Street, including Paul Desmond, Chet Baker, Red Norvo, Milt Jackson and Frank Rosolino. 

                      Here’s “Bye Bye Baby” from above album

                                   

Bickert’s work with Desmond from 1974 to 1976 first brought him international attention. In 1979, he toured with Jackson in Japan. During the 1980s, Bickert appeared on international stages with Koffman, Appleyard and the Boss Brass, and at several festivals in Concord, California. By 1982, Bickert had secured a recording contract with Concord Jazz, for which he recorded nine albums as a leader or co-leader between 1983 and 1997. In Toronto during the 1980s, Bickert also performed and recorded in a quartet with tenor saxophonist Rick Wilkins or guitarist Lorne Lofsky and various bassists and drummers. 

Bickert also appeared as a backing musician for artists including Benny Carter, Ken Peplowski, Rob McConnell, Fraser MacPherson, and Rosemary Clooney. Bickert played on five Clooney albums between 1983 and 1987, and the two recorded nine songs during these years as guitar/vocal duets. In 1987, he returned to Japan with the Concord All Stars. 

In the winter of 1995, Bickert slipped on some ice and broke bones in both of his arms, which halted his musical activity for a period of months before returning to playing and touring. He contributed to Mike Murley’s Juno Award-winning albums Murley, Bickert & Wallace: Live at the Senator (2000) and Test of Time (recorded in 1999). Bickert recorded almost exclusively using the Telecaster during the final three decades of his career, including on all of the albums for which he was leader or co-leader Bickert and his Fender Telecaster retired in 2000. 

Bickert himself explained his retirement to the Toronto Globe & Mail in 2012: "I haven't played for 12 years, and I don't know if I could even remember how to hold the instrument right now. No, I just packed it up completely. Maybe I'd had enough… My wife passed away, and at the time, I was having some problems with arthritis, and I was starting to drink quite heavily, and those things combined sort of finished me off. I just never tried to get back to it. I envy or admire people who keep going until they drop. But it just wasn't for me." 

Bickert died of cancer in Toronto, Ontario, Canada on February 28, 2019, aged 86. In 2022 the Bickert estate sold his Fender Telecaster for $32,500. (Edited from The Canadian Encyclopedia, Wikipedia & The Globe & Mail)