Cunliffe, Oles, and Erskine

Bill Cunliffe is a jazz pianist, composer and Grammy Award-winning arranger. He got his start playing and arranging for the great Buddy Rich, and was the 1989 winner of the Thelonious Monk International Piano Competition. Upon moving to Los Angeles, he performed with the Clayton Brothers and the Clayton Hamilton Jazz Orchestra for ten years. Cunliffe’s film work includes the score for “On the Shoulders of Giants,” Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s homage to the Harlem Rens basketball team of the 1920s and ’30s.

Cunliffe was awarded a Grammy for Best Instrumental Arrangement for “West Side Story Medley,” on the album “Resonance Big Band Plays Tribute to Oscar Peterson” (Resonance Records, 2009).

His latest release is Cabin In The Sky”(2018), a duo project with the acclaimed harmonica artist Hendrik Meurkens.

In addition to his work as jazz studies professor at Cal State Fullerton, Cunliffe teaches at the Skidmore Jazz Institute and the Vail Jazz Workshop.