Lou Bennett

Initially performing in the bop idiom on piano, Lou Bennett later moved to organ and developed into a dependable performer by the close of the 1950s. Inspired by Jimmy Smith’s virtuosic approach, he set the piano aside in 1956 and spent the next three years, from 1957 through 1959, crisscrossing the East and Midwest with his organ trio. Bennett relocated from the United States to Paris in 1960, where he recorded and appeared at the city’s Blue Note club with Jimmy Gourley and fellow expatriate Kenny Clarke; the latter became a regular collaborator alongside Rene Thomas. His only subsequent journey back to America took place when he performed at the 1964 Newport Jazz Festival. Throughout the 1980s he fronted his own ensemble.