Peterson, who was born in Montreal in 1925, was encouraged to play by his father, a sailor, and by his older brother, Fred, who began playing jazz piano at an early age. “He was just beginning to get into jazz,” Peterson later said. “It was different from the studies that I was doing. All I knew was that I wanted to play like that.

Ironically, if he was living today [Fred died at 16 years old], I would NOT be playing jazz piano, because he was better than me.” Peterson earned his professional stripes with Toronto big band leader Johnny Holmes, and first recorded in that city in 1945. In 1949, he was invited by impresario Norman Granz to participate as a special guest at a Jazz at the Philharmonic concert at Carnegie Hall.

In Granz, Peterson found a manager and producer whose appetite was as capacious as the pianist’s talent was prodigious. From 1950 forward, Granz recorded Peterson continually, both in his own trios and duos and with all the best-known names in jazz.