{{short description|American singer}} {{Infobox musical artist | name = Bobby Tucker | image = Btandbh1948.jpg | caption = Bobby Tucker and Billie Holiday in 1948 | image_size = | birth_name = Robert Nathaniel Tucker | alias = Piano Man | birth_date = {{birth date|1923|1|8|mf=y}} | birth_place = Morristown, New Jersey, U.S. | death_date = {{Death date and age|mf=yes|2007|4|12|1923|1|8}} | death_place = Morristown, New Jersey, U.S. | origin = Harlem, New York, U.S. | instrument = Piano | genre = Jazz, swing | occupation = Pianist, composer, arranger | years_active = 1946–2007 | label = | associated_acts = Billie Holiday and Billy Eckstine | website = }}
'''Bobby Tucker''' (born '''Robert Nathaniel Tucker'''; January 8, 1923 – April 12, 2007)<ref name="hollywoodreporter">{{cite web |url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/unsung-hero-piano-backed-holiday-134848/ |title='Unsung hero' of the piano backed Holiday, Eckstine |author=Tony Gieske |date=April 25, 2007 |website=The Hollywood Reporter |access-date=November 9, 2021 }}.</ref> was a pianist and arranger during the jazz era from the 1940s into the 1960s. He is most famous for being Billie Holiday's accompanist from 1946 to 1949 and Billy Eckstine's from 1950 to 1993.<ref name="Clarke2009">{{cite book|author=Donald Clarke|title=Billie Holiday: Wishing on the Moon|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dU6avWcnQr8C&pg=PA148-IA12|year=2009|publisher=Da Capo Press, Incorporated|isbn=978-0-7867-3087-2}}</ref><ref name="Blackburn2010">{{cite book|author=Julia Blackburn|title=With Billie|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KDdAfT3-jkIC&pg=PT184|year=2010|publisher=Random House|isbn=978-1-4070-7387-3}}</ref>
==Music career==
===Billie Holiday=== On November 12, 1946, during Billie Holiday's stay at the Down Beat Club, Bobby Tucker was drafted to accompany Holiday because Eddie Heywood refused his opportunity. Billie's stay at the Down Beat was so successful due to Tucker's playing that she decided to keep him as her accompanist. The partnership lasted until 1949, where Tucker quit due to Holiday's abusive lover, John Levy, threatening him. (Not to be confused with John Levy the bass player and talent manager).
===Billy Eckstine=== After leaving Holiday in 1949, Bobby Tucker began playing for Billy Eckstine. Not much is known about this partnership, but there is a 1960 album, No Cover, No Minimum which features Tucker playing piano for Eckstine. On the 1959 album Basie/Eckstine Incorporated, on which Eckstine sang with the Count Basie Orchestra, Tucker is credited with the arrangements for eight of the eleven tracks, and he replaced Basie at the piano on most of the cuts as well.
In 1960 Tucker also released his own album under his own name, ''Too Tough''. In 1973 Tucker played for Billy Eckstine at the Hobart (Tasmania, Australia) Wrest Point Casino. From the time Tuck, as "Mr. B" called him, met Eckstine, they were very good friends till Eckstine's death in 1993. Eckstine called Tucker a brother he never had; as he would say, Tuck was his right tonsil. Tucker was more like part of the Eckstine family.
Tucker died of a heart attack at the age of 84, on April 12, 2007.<ref name="hollywoodreporter" />
== Further reading == * {{Grove Music Online|id=J457900|title=Bobby Tucker}}
== External links == {{commons category}} * {{AllMusic|artist|mn0000076010}} * {{Discogs artist}} * {{IMDb name}} * [http://people-vs-drchilledair.blogspot.com/2008/05/bobby-tucker-rip.html Bobby Tucker R.I.P.] *[http://sova.si.edu/record/NMAH.AC.1141?q=bobby+tucker&s=0&n=10&i=0 Bobby Tucker Archival Collection Finding Aid]
== Notes == {{reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Tucker, Bobby}} Category:1923 births Category:2007 deaths Category:American jazz pianists Category:American male jazz pianists Category:American jazz singers Category:20th-century American pianists Category:African-American pianists Category:20th-century African-American male singers Category:20th-century American male singers Category:20th-century American singers Category:20th-century American male pianists