Keith Jarrett /

Keith Jarrett (born May 8, 1945, in Allentown, Pennsylvania) is an American pianist/composer who performs both jazz and classical music. Jarrett started his career with Art Blakey, moving on to play with Charles Lloyd and Miles Davis. Since the early 1970s he has enjoyed a great deal of success in jazz, jazz fusion, and classical music; as a group leader and a solo performer. His improvisations draw not only from the traditions of jazz, but from other genres as well, especially Western classical music, gospel, blues, and ethnic folk music. In 2003, Jarrett received the Polar Music Prize, the first (and to this day only) recipient not to share the prize with a co-recipient, and in 2004 he received the Léonie Sonning Music Prize. In 2008, he was inducted into the Down Beat Hall of Fame in the magazine's 73rd Annual Readers' Poll. Jarrett, who is of Hungarian and Scottish extraction, grew up in suburban Allentown, Pennsylvania, with significant early exposure to music. He possessed absolute pitch, and he displayed prodigious musical talents as a young child.