Oscar Peterson at 100: The Heart of Canadian Jazz

In this episode of Canadian Time Machine, we explore the life, music, and legacy of jazz legend Oscar Peterson on what would have been his 100th birthday. We hear from jazz pianist Taurey Butler about the profound influence Peterson has had on his own music. Then we meet Kelly Peterson, Oscar’s wife and trustee of his estate, who shares personal stories and insights into the man behind the music. Featuring the performances of both Oscar and Taurey, this episode celebrates a Canadian icon whose joy, artistry, and advocacy continue to inspire musicians and audiences around the world.

Listen to the episode:

Angela Misri: This year marks what would have been the 100th birthday of Oscar Emmanuel Peterson, pianist, composer, Canadian trailblazer and one of the greatest jazz artists of all time. Welcome to Canadian Time Machine, a podcast that explores key milestones in our country’s history. I’m Angela Misri.

Born in August 1925, Oscar’s fingers danced across the keys with a speed and precision that left audiences breathless. He broke barriers as a black Canadian artist, earning international fame at a time when the music world and the world at large was far from fair. His music inspired, challenged and open doors. And that influence hasn’t faded. Musicians everywhere still feel it.

Taurey Butler: I think it’s global. I don’t think it’s limited to any one particular area. I tell people that sometimes too, like Oscar Peterson, I’ve never heard somebody’s name said with more accents in my life. He’s known everywhere.

Angela Misri: Meet Taurey Butler.

Taurey Butler: I am originally from New Jersey. I’ve been in Montreal about 15 years now, and I’m a jazz pianist, and Oscar Peterson is the biggest influence for me. He is the person I heard that made me really want to pursue jazz

Angela Misri: For Taurey the piano came early, but jazz and Peterson came later.

Taurey Butler: I started off there was a weekend program, and they asked me, you can do violin or piano. And so I chose piano. And that continued until I was 14, and I was on my way to the lesson, I remember telling my mother, I don’t want to do it anymore, almost in tears, because I was just so frustrated. But I realized that what I was frustrated about was that I wasn’t playing music that I wanted to play. And it was then my band director, he gave me a recording of Oscar Peterson.

Taurey Butler: I think it was cassette tape that was dubbed so I didn’t know where it came from. I just knew I enjoyed listening to it. I never knew the piano could sound like that. It’s the first time I heard a piano just, I don’t want to say dance, but just like, just flow, but feel good as well, too. You know, technically at another level as well, too. It was, it was a mix of everything from you, and that’s how I got into jazz.

Angela Misri: That first recording, the solo piano album, My Favorite Instrument from 1968, lit a passion in Tory that would carry him from New Jersey through Asia and finally to Montreal, Oscar Peterson’s own hometown.

Taurey Butler: I was working in Asia, and there was a gentleman from Montreal who had told me that’d be great if you could come to Montreal. You actually turned out to be a pianist who worked at the House of Jazz.

Angela Misri: The House of Jazz was one of Montreal’s most celebrated jazz venues, which unfortunately closed down in 2020 as a result of the pandemic. But back in the early 2000s it gave Taurey something most budding musicians could only dream of, steady work.

Taurey Butler: I was given carte blanche to, just, you know, entertain with my trio and well people, from what I understand, they received it very well.

Angela Misri: And living in Montreal has brought Taurey closer to his biggest musical inspiration.

Taurey Butler: I’ve been able to make connections with people who are connected with them. I was able to actually meet his wife and his daughter as well too. And they’re both great people, and it’s kind of trippy and surreal for me to meet people who were so close to the man that you know had such a great influence on my life. And yeah, no Montreal, his spirit lives on here. So little part of the reason I came here just to kind of feel his aura in this wonderful city.

Angela Misri: And over time, that influence has shaped Taurey’s own style. You can hear traces of Oscar Peterson in his playing, even as he makes the music his own.

Taurey Butler: I’m influenced by literally everything that I’ve heard, because it has an effect on you. But when I kind of strayed away a little bit, there was a period where I was trying to, you know, emulate more modern quote, unquote pianists, and always found myself returning back to Oscar Peterson. And I get that when people come up to me after a show and say, is Oscar Peterson influence to you? And I say, yes, there is. It’s a big part of my style.

Angela Misri: But for Taurey, music has always been more than technique or style. It’s about reaching people, helping them feel and reminding them of what matters.

Taurey Butler: I was playing at the House of Jazz. It was very gaudy, like a lot of chandeliers and a lot of tourists that would come by, just because the owner had very eclectic style. So it was very unique. And I took the first break, I went to the bar, and the person got my attention, and he told me, I just had the worst week of my life, and for the last hour, you made me forget all about it. And that to this day, has been one of the greatest compliments I ever got, where I really started to understand this is why I do what I do. You know, it’s not about being flashy. It’s about being able to help and be of service to others and just help them feel things, you know, help them get through difficult times, you know. And that’s been the most rewarding thing about what I do

Angela Misri: For Taurey, Oscar Peterson’s music is more than that first cassette tape from his high school band. It’s a guide, a mentor and a legacy. And in Montreal, you can almost hear that legacy continue to resonate through the streets of Little Burgundy, where Oscar Peterson grew up. But to truly understand Oscar Peterson’s life, his work and the mark he left on the world of jazz, we turn to someone who knew him best, his wife, Kelly Peterson.

Kelly Peterson: Hi, I’m Kelly Peterson. I was Oscar Peterson’s wife, and it was a tremendous privilege and joy and wonderful, incredible time that I never would have imagined years before. So very special. And now I am the trustee of his estate, and I’m the president of his company, so I really manage his legacy going forward.

Angela Misri: It’s great to meet you. Can you tell us the story of how you and Oscar first met?

Kelly Peterson: It is kind of like a fairy tale, the story of how we met. I was a fan of Oscar’s. I had been to hear him in concert when I was 20 with my mother and my brother in Rochester, New York. And then the following year, I was living in Manhattan. Then about four years after that, I was living in Sarasota, Florida, and I had just become a manager in a restaurant, and it was winter season, and a Saturday night, and I was the new manager, and even though Oscar Peterson was playing a concert that night, I could not take the night off. So I was grumpy. I was trying not to be grumpy to the guests, but I was a little bit grumpy because I wanted to be at the concert and I was working. However, I learned a little while later that evening that Oscar never ate dinner before a concert, and he needed a place to have dinner after the concert, so at about 11 o’clock at night, and we were the only restaurant that served food till one o’clock in the morning. So Oscar came to the restaurant, and I was so excited to meet him, and told him about the concerts I’d been to and how excited I was that he was there and and as he left that evening, he handed me a business card with a phone number handwritten on it, and said, If you want to come to my concert in New York this summer, call me collect and come and be my guest. And I said, well, thank you. That’s very sweet. You know, I never would have called him. Never in a million years. I just thought he’s being polite. He’s being very charming. But there was no way I would have called and said, Oh, remember when you told me that? No, that would not have been me. But wound up that his taxi never showed up to take him to his hotel, and I was leaving as I had finished my work, and I said, I’ll drop you off at your hotel. And he and his son, who was his road manager, had to squeeze into my little, tiny Volkswagen Rabbit, and I dropped them off at their hotel. And that was fine. And then the next day, he called the restaurant to thank me for taking him and to ask me to think about New York and whether I would come, which was, again, very sweet. I said, Thank you. Well, he started calling kind of regularly. This is 1981 by the way, I find myself now having to tell people, This is before cell phones. This is before Google. I had no idea you know anything about his personal life. I didn’t know where he lived. I didn’t know how old he was. All I knew was that I loved his music. At any rate, he called me fairly regularly. I gave him my home phone number so that he could call me during the day before I went to work, so he didn’t have to stay up all night. Finally, I, you know, I just said, Okay, why do you keep asking me about coming to New York? Because, you know, there were. Been in New York. But he said, No, I just really want to get to know you. You seem like a nice person. And I said, Oh, okay, then yes, I’ll come. I went. Had a wonderful time. Oscar was just a delight to be with, and we went to hear a lot of different musicians perform. Went to his concert as well. When I left, he said, Will you come and visit again? And I said, I would love to. And so I went to visit him again. And after a little while, then this friendship developed into a romance. And then in 1986 I moved to Canada to live with Oscar. He didn’t want to get married. He’d been married and divorced three times. He said, that’s three strikes. I’m out, but if that’s okay with you, I want to be with you. I want you to live with me. But then four years after that, he actually proposed, and we did get married.

Angela Misri: So what was he like at home, with family, his humor, his passions, or little quirks that made him unique?

Kelly Peterson: Well, I can share some of those things with people, and it does give a different perspective if you know something more personal about an artist, because otherwise he is, and particularly now, since he’s not here, but even when he was alive, the fans in the audience, they you know was this incredible virtuoso and composer, and people are didn’t know as much about His compositions before and and that’s one of the things that I really want, is for people to know more about how much music he composed, but also to share with people the fact that he was very down to earth, he was very humble, he was very funny. He was a charmer. He loved photography. He loved synthesizers. He loved learning about all kinds of technology. When he became interested in something, he as with all of his playing, which he gave, always 100% or more, if that’s possible. But you know, he was always trying to be better tonight than he was last night, when he performed and everything, every note, he just went all in on everything. Well, he did that same thing when he wanted to learn about photography. He went all in when he wanted to learn about synthesis, he went all in and started really learning. He loved food, interesting food, and he loved going to Japan with all the gadgets and technology, but also all the great food. And Oscar bought a special dish so that he could make sukiyaki at home. When we were in Italy, he liked trying all kinds of different things, and in France, different kinds of foods, and making cassoulet, because he loved cassoulet, and he would kind of improvise in the kitchen, like when he wanted to make something, he would sort of remember what he ate. But he wasn’t following a cookbook that improvisation, that jazz musicians do, all those improvisational skills and talents that applied to pretty much every part of life. He was joyful about living, and wanted to experience as much as he could experience. He had an incredible sense of humor. He was very funny. He also liked to put people on and play pranks. So he was fun to be around.

Angela Misri: Oscar achieved international fame while breaking barriers as a black Canadian artist. From your perspective, what were some of the challenges he faced, and how did he navigate them?

Kelly Peterson: A lot of that really happened in the earlier years. His first performance in the United States was at Carnegie Hall in September 1949 and then the following year, he was part of Norman Granz Jazz at the Philharmonic, and Norman Granz also was a staunch fighter for human rights. And in the south in the United States, everything was still segregated, and Norman refused to play to segregated audiences in his concerts, and he would not allow the concert halls to segregate the audiences. He would not allow them to have the black members of the audience relegated to the balcony. And Oscar faced a lot of discrimination at that time, the black musicians had to stay in the hotels that were on the so-called wrong side of the tracks, and Oscar’s trio included Ray Brown on bass and Herb Ellis on guitar. Ray was black. Herbie is a Caucasian Well, Herbie would stay in the hotels with Ray and Oscar because it was the unity. A lot of these stories are stories that he told me, not that I was here for. And this would have been probably in the 50s. He was playing at a nightclub in Las Vegas the day they started for the week. The club owner said, Okay, you’re not allowed to come into the club. You have to stay in the dressing room if you want anything to eat in between sets. Let us know. We’ll bring it to you. But you can’t, you can’t come in the club. And then one day that. Week, Frank Sinatra came into the club. He was performing down the street and and he told the audience, he said, Okay, I’m ending early because I want to go hear Oscar Peterson at the at this other club. He’s so I’m leaving, and that’s where I’m going. And so a lot of the audience followed him there, but he went in the club, and he had a table right in the front row, and was there for Oscar set. And then said to the maitre d, tell Oscar to come on out here. I want him to have a drink with me. So the manager went back to Oscar’s dressing room and said, Mr. Sinatra, would like you to come out and have a drink with him. And Oscar said, Well, no, I’m not allowed to go out there, so he’ll have to come back here. And the club owner said, Well, no, Mr. Sinatra wants you to come out, so it’s okay. And Oscar said, Well, no, you told me that I am not allowed to come out there, and so I’m not going out there. And Oscar refused to go out there. Sinatra had a fit, you know, was very angry with the management of the club. Went to the dressing room to see Oscar and said, This is going to change, because Frank Sinatra was also a staunch advocate of civil rights. But even as years went on, he would, he would speak out, whenever faced with discrimination, or if he witnessed discrimination, he spoke out. He did a huge campaign in Ontario. Well, actually went across the country, kind of but started in Ontario with Roy McMurtry, when Roy was attorney general, because Oscar said in an interview, at one point, I don’t see representation in television commercials. The car companies people in their commercials are all white. I buy cars. Other people who have darker skin tones buy cars. And Roy heard that interview and called him and said, Will you work with me on this? And that’s how they became good friends, and that was in the 70s. So they did a whole campaign, and they met with management of all the car companies and said, you know, you need to be more aware of this, and you need to portray other people in your commercials. And that kind of was a breakthrough for television and for commercials.

Angela Misri: Are there any performances or career moments that stand out to you as defining?

Kelly Peterson: Well, the major defining moment was his appearance at Carnegie Hall in 1949 it’s another fairy tale kind of story, but a true story of Norman grand being in Montreal ahead of a concert for jazz of the Philharmonic that was going to be in Montreal and he had not met Oscar before, and Oscar and his trio were playing at the Alberta lounge. Well, Norman was in a taxi on his way to the airport to leave to go to New York. Was listening to music in the taxi, and loved the pianist who was playing, and said to the taxi driver, what radio station is that I want to call them and find out what record that is. And the driver said, Well, it’s not a record. It’s coming live from the Alberta lounge. It’s the Oscar Peterson trio. And Norman said, Well, forget the airport. Take me there. And they went to the club, and Norman walked into the club, and Oscar knew who he was. And Norman said, you know, I want you to come to New York. We have a concert at Carnegie Hall in September, and I want you to come, and you’ll know if you’re going to make it or not if you play at Carnegie Hall, and you see how that goes. And Oscar said, Well, I don’t know if I’m ready. Norman said, Yeah, well, now’s your chance to try it out. And then they had to work out this elaborate scheme, because Oscar didn’t have a visa to work in the United States. And then there was also the whole thing with the union and and registering and all this. So Norman said to Oscar, when you go through immigration, you just tell them that you’re a guest. You’re just coming to go to the concert. And then we make that even more legit, because you sit in the audience. You’re a guest at the concert. I’m going to have you sitting in the audience, and then I will call you up on stage

Norman Granz Footage: Now for the second set, we have a surprise for everybody, something which we couldn’t advertise because we ourselves didn’t know was going to happen. Up in Canada, there’s been a very wonderful piano player, and all the bands have traveled through Canada have heard him and raved about him. Today, he joined in the audience here of our concert, and I saw him in the audience, and I prevailed join our group. I think it’s very wonderful. It’s something you want to hear because we think he’s going to be one of the coming giants of jazz in Canada. It’s his first impression in the United States, Oscar Peterson.

Kelly Peterson: Oscar played two songs, and the next day, all the reviews were about Oscar. His career blasted off. Few months later, he was out on tour with Jazz at the Philharmonic, with his own trio playing but also playing in the rhythm section for everyone else, and his life changed dramatically. And then the other thing is, there were certain moments that were extremely meaningful to Oscar, being appointed to the Order of Canada and then promoted to companion in 1984 and that meant a tremendous amount to him in. Receiving the premium imperiali in Japan, which is an the equivalent of the Nobel Prize, and it’s for the arts. Having those recognitions meant a lot to him, but also so did all the audiences and the children became his fans. And, you know, I remember at a club, a seven year old boy saying, I’m looking for Oscar Peterson. Where is he? I need to talk to Oscar Peterson. All those things touched him so deeply, because he really was just a gentle, humble soul, but with this magnificent force behind him,

Angela Misri: He cared deeply about mentoring young musicians. How did you see that side of him in action?

Kelly Peterson: He taught master classes continually. If he were on tour and were performing at a university during a jazz festival or something, he would have a master class with students. He loved going to elementary schools and talking about music with the children, because he adored children so much. And he also believed that, you know, music education is so important and critical, not only to train musicians, but for everyone, because it has an impact on how we learn everything and how we enjoy life. And music is just part of life and so important. So he believed in talking about music, teaching music to anyone who was interested. He was adjunct faculty at York University and at Humber College. He loved sharing what he knew and helping guide musicians after every concert, he would stay and sign autographs and talk to whomever was waiting to talk to him. And sometimes drivers would try and get him to move, and he’d say, no, no, we’re staying. These people want to see me. They’re the people who buy my records. They’re the people who come to my concerts. And young musicians would come and they would ask him questions, and he would talk to them about, you know, practice studies, and give them some ideas and some exercises, and give them some things to listen to and to listen for, but always encouraging

Angela Misri: As we mark what would have been his 100th birthday, what do you hope people remember most about Oscar?

Kelly Peterson: That’s a really good question. What I hope they remember is that the music was always joyful. He was filled with joy when he played and when he shared the music. He could be playing the most somber ballad, but there was joy in it, and he wanted to share that with everyone who listened. I think I also would hope that people would remember his integrity and his advocacy for people who were marginalized, and that they would help to they would continue those efforts, because he did that and and to realize that, you know, you give back and and also, when he first went to New York, his mother said to him, I want the same son. I’m sending to New York to come back to me, and he lived his whole life that way. He always wanted to be the son his mother knew so that she could be proud of him, which basically meant he always tried to be the best person he could be. And I think that’s a legacy that we all can strive for. We don’t have to have a vast talent and be sharing that on but just in our daily lives and and I think remembering Oscar in that way is important. It took me some time after Oscar died to figure out what I was supposed to do after being entrusted with this legacy. You know, he trusted me to manage it, and that was challenging. But once I figured out that I wanted to find ways to share more of his music, his compositions, first, and I produced a recording. I’d never done anything like that before, but it was successful and fun and exhilarating, and it worked! Bonus! And that’s called, that was 10 years ago. It’s called Oscar With Love. It was for his 90th birthday. And then that prompted me working, well, creating a record label, sort of, called Two Lions Records. Plus, our daughter was only 16 when he died, and I needed to be there for her. And Celine has grown into her own as a manager of certain artists. And she also produces concerts. This year, particularly, she’s been producing what we’ve called the Oscar Peterson Centennial Quartet. And they’re playing Oscar’s music and representing his legacy and sharing stories and music all over. In Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick. And all of that is really exciting to see the recognition. You know, I’ve just always believed that Oscar’s music will outlive us all, and it’s wonderful to have younger people come and say, Oh my God, you know about Oscar, and then strive to be like him.

Angela Misri: Thank you, Kelly. We really appreciate you taking the time. Thank you for listening to Canadian Time Machine. This podcast receives funding from the Government of Canada and is created by The Walrus Lab. This episode was produced by Jasmine Rach and edited by Nathara Imenes. Amanda Cupido is the executive producer for more stories about historic Canadian milestones and the English and French transcripts of this episode. Visit the walrus.ca/canadian Heritage. There’s also a French counterpart to this podcast called Voyages dans l’histoire canadienne, so if you’re bilingual and you want to listen to more. You can find that wherever you get your podcasts.