Remembering Andy Bey

October 28, 1939 – April 27, 2025

Click here if you have a memory of this artist that you’d like to share

–

Click here to Support Jazz on the Tube

Singer-pianist Andy Bey passed away on April 27, 2025 at the age of 85.

He was born in Newark, New Jersey on Oct. 28, 1939, began playing piano when he was 3, and at 17 in 1957 formed a vocal trio with his sisters Salome Bey and Geraldine Bey that was called Andy and the Bey Sisters.

The group lasted until 1967 and had some success, recording three albums and touring Europe in 1959 where they recorded with Kenny Clarke.

Bey, who recorded with the Howard McGhee Big Band (1966), Max Roach (“Members Don’t Git Weary” in 1968) and the Duke Pearson Orchestra (1968-70), gained some attention for his association with Horace Silver.

Bey was on many of Silver’s projects in the 1970s and ‘80s was able to interpret Silver’s often very wordy and philosophical lyrics as can be heard on such albums as That Healin’ Feeling, The United States Of Mind Phase 3, The Continuity Of Spirit, and Music To Ease Your Disease.

Andy Bey had a deep baritone voice but also could sing in four octaves and hit surprising falsetto notes; the same was true of his piano playing which often punctuated quiet passages with dramatically violent outbursts.

Bey, who also recorded with Gary Bartz, Stanley Clarke and David Murray, led his first album in 1973 (Experience and Judgment) but his solo career really got going in the mid-1990s and he eventually led eight additional albums before worsening health resulted in him being less active after 2020.

Andy Bey sings his “Celestial Blues” at his 80th birthday celebration at Birdland in Dec. 2019.

-Scott Yanow

Click here if you have a memory of this artist that you’d like to share

–

Click here to Support Jazz on the Tube