Biography
Mal Waldron was an American jazz pianist, composer and arranger. Born in New York City, he studied composition at Queens College and began working professionally in the early 1950s. He became house pianist for Prestige Records, accompanied Billie Holiday from 1957 to 1959, and recorded extensively with musicians including Charles Mingus, John Coltrane and Eric Dolphy.
Waldron composed scores for several films, including The Cool World (1964), for which his music was performed by the Dizzy Gillespie Quintet. He also wrote for modern ballet and later film projects such as Three Rooms in Manhattan (1965). He moved to Europe in 1965 and settled in Belgium, where he continued recording until his death in Brussels in 2002.
