Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular Music
BUNCH, John
(b 1 December 1921, Tiptin IN; d 30 March 2010, Manhattan) Jazz pianist whose elegant style led to work with Benny Goodman, Tony Bennett and others, as well as an solo career. His first inspiration was Fats Waller, and he studied with George Johnson, a player in the Waller mode, but then he began to follow Teddy Wilson, one of swing's biggest stars, then playing with Goodman. Bunch made a successful transition from the swing era to bop in the 1940s, mainly by remaining true to himself: he never lost his admiration for Wilson.
By age 16 he was sitting in with professionals, and he was a working musician by the time WWII broke out. He joined the USAAF, became a bombardier, and was shot down in a B-17 over German in November 1944, spending the next six months in a POW camp. After the war, he wanted to go to music school, but lacked formal training, so majored in speech at Indiana University, but soon began studying bop, intrigued by its new complexities. His new inspiration was Bud Powell, and he worked in Indianapolis with modernists like guitarist Wes Montgomery. In the 1950s he went to Los Angeles, where he joined the Woody Herman band; he went with that band to New York and stayed there, finding work with Goodman. He also worked with Maynard Ferguson, Buddy Rich and Gene Krupa, and was Tony's Bennett's pianist and musical director for six years.
Though a brilliant improviser, his technique never called attention to itself; he did not become a household name perhaps because his personality resembled his playing in lacking flash and gimmicks. He once advised another musician never to try to play his best on a recording session: to put that kind of pressure on yourself is not the way to make a good record, and by laying back a bit, Bunch allowed all the other musicians to shine. The result was that if you saw Bunch's name on a record, it was going to be a good one. Another thing that held him back from front-row fame was that he was identified as a mainstream player, but saxophonist Harry Allen said that Bunch was always the most modern player on the bandstand. Like all the best ones, his art was timeless; George T. Simon described him as 'the Fred Astaire of the piano.'
He never made enough records to suit his fans, but in the 1970s they included a solo Plays Kurt Weil on Chiaroscuro, and several items on Famous Door: Here Swings The Judge with a Milt Hinton Sextet, and albums as a leader including John's Other Bunch with Scott Hamilton. He recorded with Warren Vaché on Concord Jazz and Challenge, and with Kenny Davern and Bob Haggart on Arbors. In later years he worked with a trio called New York Swing, with guitarist Bucky Pizzarelli and bassist Jay Leonhardt. They were based in New York but toured Europe, recording for various labels. His last gig was with that group, about a month before he died.