Every Thursday night, the J invites you to enjoy live music in the piano lounge while enjoying drinks and food from the Firehall Cafe. This week, we welcome Scot Ranney back to the Piano Lounge! Scot is a jazz pianist from Bellingham, Washington who plays and composes music full time. He began studying the piano as early as he could reach the keys, taught by his mother until age seven when he began private lessons. Scot had his start in jazz piano when Don Lanphere, a great be-bop sax player from the bop era, introduced him to Marc Seales, one of the great jazz pianists of our time and who is currently the jazz piano professor at University of Washington in Seattle. Early on in Scot’s professional career, he was given the opportunity to perform R&B in a nightclub in Seoul, Korea, which lead running bands throughout Asia for a number of years before returning to the states, where he began leading bands on the riverboat, the Queen of the West and performing as the house pianist at the prestigious Ritz-Carlton in Aspen, Colorado. When Scot is not living and performing in Asia, he plays jazz piano for concerts and events throughout the west coast, from Vancouver to San Diego. Performances are always free, but tips for the musicians are greatly appreciated.
