Patti Bown

Patti Bown (July 26, 1931, Seattle, Washington – March 21, 2008, Media, Pennsylvania) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and singer.

Early life and career

Bown was born in Seattle, the daughter of Augustus Bown and Edith Ruth Cahill Brown. She began playing piano at age two. Her sister Edith Bown Valentine was a classical pianist; another sister, Millie Bown Russell, became known for her work on diversity in STEM education.

Bown studied piano while attending the University in Seattle on a music scholarship. She played in local orchestras toward the end of the 1940s. From 1956, she worked as a soloist in New York City, playing early on in sessions with Billy Eckstine and Jimmy Rushing. She released an album under her own name, Patti Bown Plays Big Piano, in 1958 for the Columbia label. The next year she was invited by Quincy Jones to join an orchestra for the European tour of the musical Free and Easy. While there she also played with Bill Coleman in Paris. In the 1960s, she recorded with Gene Ammons, Oliver Nelson, Cal Massey, Duke Ellington, Roland Kirk, George Russell, and Harry Sweets Edison. Her musical compositions were recorded by Sarah Vaughan, Benny Golson, and Duke Ellington. She also recorded with soul musicians such as Aretha Franklin and James Brown. Between 1962 and 1964, she served as the musical director for the bands accompanying Dinah Washington and Sarah Vaughan.

In the 1970s, Bown worked as a pianist in orchestras on Broadway and composed for film and television. She played regularly at the Village Gate nightclub for many years and lived in Greenwich Village for the last 37 years of her life.