Canadian Smooth Jazz Awards honours guitarist Earl Klugh

Release Date: Nov. 3, 2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The Canadian Smooth Jazz Awards’ Nominating Committee is pleased to announce Earl Klugh as the recipient of the 2009 ‘George Benson Lifetime Achievement Award.’ Klugh, a Jazz legend, first gained recognition at 15 when he played with Jazz innovator Yusef Lateef. Two years later Klugh was discovered by George Benson who says, “I heard him play the acoustic guitar and I knew that if he was successful, he'd be one of a kind.” Benson, who has remained close friends with Klugh since 1971 adds, “He had that finger style technique down pat, he had a lot of sentimentality to his playing and he's very believable so it wasn't just technique with him.” The Jazz giants recorded the duo album Collaboration in 1987.

Klugh has also recorded with a previous “Lifetime Achievement Award” winner, Bob James, who received the award in 2006.
The pair recorded three albums together, One on One (1979), Two of a Kind (1982) and Cool (1992).

The guitarist’s ground breaking albums include Heart String(1979), Late Night Guitar(1980), Soda Fountain Shuffle (1985), Life Stories(1987) and Move (1994).

Mary Kirk, producer of the Canadian Smooth Jazz Awards and Music Director for Canada’s first Smooth Jazz station, Wave 94.7FM says, “We are delighted that the Benson Award will be recognizing Earl’s trailblazing contributions to the popularity of the Smooth Jazz format around the world, especially at a time that coincides with the release of his wonderful new album, The Spice of Life.”

“Earl Klugh is one of the few guitarists on the planet who can please both Jazz purists and music fans who don’t even like the genre,” says John Beaudin, co-chair of the awards and president of Smoothjazznow.com. “He’s an incredibly talented technical guitarist but his sense of melody and emotion is also what grabs fans,” he adds.

Klugh will receive the award and perform on April 24, 2009 at the Awards Show in Mississauga, Ontario at the 1300 seat Living Arts Centre.

The Canadian Smooth Jazz Awards is presented by Wave 94.7 in Toronto and Smooth Jazz Now.com. Introduced in 2005, the first Lifetime Achievement Award was presented to guitar legend, George Benson, after whom it was named.   Nominations include International Vocalist, Instrumentalist, and Group.   Canadian categories include Album, Original Composition, Wind Instrumentalist, Guitarist, Keyboardist, Drummer, Broadcaster and Male and Female Vocalists. Previous winners include Warren Hill, Michael Buble, Diana Krall, Carol Welsman, Marc Jordan, Amy Sky and Jesse Cook.  Award winner, Alexander Zonjic, will be the hilarious host of the show for the 5th consecutive year.

List of Lifetime Achievement Award Winners                       
2005 – George Benson
2006 – Bob James
2007 – Spyro Gyra
2008 – Lee Ritenour
2009 – Earl Klugh

For more information, contact:

Mary Kirk of Wave 94.7 Toronto/Hamilton at mary@wave947.fm
or
John Beaudin of Smooth Jazz Now at johnb@smoothjazznow.com

Official Awards Website www.canadiansmoothjazzawards.com