Patti Bown

Bown was born in Seattle, the daughter of Augustus Bown and Edith Ruth Cahill Brown. She began playing piano at age two. Her sister Edith Bown Valentine was a classical pianist; another sister, Millie Bown Russell, became known for her work on diversity in STEM education.

Bown studied piano while attending the University in Seattle on a music scholarship. She played in local orchestras toward the end of the 1940s. From 1956, she worked as a soloist in New York City, playing early on in sessions with Billy Eckstine and Jimmy Rushing. She released an album under her own name, Patti Bown Plays Big Piano, in 1958 for the Columbia label. The next year she was invited by Quincy Jones to join an orchestra for the European tour of the musical Free and Easy. While there she also played with Bill Coleman in Paris. In the 1960s, she recorded with Gene Ammons, Oliver Nelson, Cal Massey, Duke Ellington, Roland Kirk, George Russell, and Harry Sweets Edison. Her musical compositions were recorded by Sarah Vaughan, Benny Golson, and Duke Ellington. She also recorded with soul musicians such as Aretha Franklin and James Brown. Between 1962 and 1964, she served as the musical director for the bands accompanying Dinah Washington and Sarah Vaughan.

In the 1970s, Bown worked as a pianist in orchestras on Broadway and composed for film and television. She played regularly at the Village Gate nightclub for many years and lived in Greenwich Village for the last 37 years of her life.

With Gene Ammons

• Up Tight! (Prestige, 1961)
• Boss Soul! (Prestige, 1961)
• Soul Summit Vol. 2 (Prestige, 1962)
• Late Hour Special (Prestige, 1962 [1964])
• The Soulful Moods of Gene Ammons (Moodsville, 1962)
• Sock! (Prestige, 1962 [1965])

With Billy Byers

• Impressions of Duke Ellington (Mercury, 1961)

With Art Farmer

• New York Jazz Sextet: Group Therapy (Scepter, 1966)

With Etta Jones

• Lonely and Blue (Prestige, 1962)

With Quincy Jones

• The Birth of a Band! (Mercury, 1959)
• The Great Wide World of Quincy Jones (Mercury, 1959)
• I Dig Dancers (Mercury, 1960)
• Quincy Plays for Pussycats (Mercury, 1959-65 [1965])

With Cal Massey

• Blues to Coltrane (Candid)

With Oliver Nelson

• Afro/American Sketches (Prestige, 1962)
• Fantabulous (Argo, 1964)
• The Spirit of '67 with Pee Wee Russell (Impulse!, 1967)
• Jazzhattan Suite (Verve, 1967)

With Cal Tjader

• Warm Wave (Verve, 1964)
• Hip Vibrations (Verve, 1967)

With Big Joe Turner

• Singing the Blues (BluesWay, 1967)

With Dave Van Ronk

• Songs for Ageing Children (Cadet, 1973)

With Roswell Rudd

• Blown Bone (Philips, 1979)

With Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson

• Cherry Red (BluesWay, 1967)

With Dinah Washington

• I Wanna Be Loved (Mercury, 1961)
• Dinah Washington Sings Fats Waller (EmArcy, 1957)

• Eugene Chadbourne, Patti Bown at Allmusic
• Wilson, John S. "Patti Bown on Piano". The New York Times, July 1, 1985.

• Patti Bown papers, 1940-2007, held by Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library.