Described by The New York Times as the “hardest swinging piano player of all time”, Dave McKenna’s rare genius on the piano went largely unnoticed by the music world, until now. Dave McKenna was born and raised in Woonsocket, Rhode Island. At a young age, he played with jazz-giants like Gene Krupa, Bobby Hackett, and Stan Getz. He went on to have an extensive recording career and played with the likes of Louis Armstrong and Tony Bennett, to name a few. He traveled the world playing some of the most prestigious clubs and festivals during the peak of the jazz movement in the 1950s/60s. However, Dave’s quiet personal life and his rocky relationship with the music industry caused his career to loose traction with the mainstream. He preferred laying low, playing small restaurants and clubs around New England. Longtime Boston Globe writer Jack Thomas interviewed McKenna many times, dating back to the early 1980s. These interviews captured McKenna in his most intimate, most vulnerable state. Luckily, Jack recently unearthed these recorded interviews with McKenna on cassette tapes, which will serve as a through line for this film. It’s McKenna, for the first time, in his own words.
