This debut album would go on to become one of Billboard's Top 40 Jazz Albums of 1978. That album attracted the attention of locally based Amherst Records, who then re-released the first album with new artwork. The first eponymous album, self released in late 1977, reflected these personnel as well as some guests like Dave Samuels and Rubens Bassini, who would be part of Spyro Gyra recordings for years to come. Tom Schuman, who had been sitting in with the band since almost the beginning, when he was only sixteen, became a fixture in 1977 and the group had two keyboard players for a brief period until Jeremy Wall left the performing band in 1978.
Tom Walsh had moved to California and the drum chair was alternately taken by Tom Duffy, Ted Reinhardt and others. There were two main guitar players who appeared as part of the band around this time, Alfred "Fast Freddy" Rapillo (who would later go on to play for Rick James) and Rick Strauss. That led to more opening slots for national acts and performances in nearby cities, Rochester and Cleveland. He misspelled it 'Spyro Gyra,' advertised it that way, and it stuck.Īs the popularity of the group increased, the band played more places around town, becoming a regular at the Tralfamadore Cafe in its original location, in a basement under a non-descript storefront on Main Street.
As a joke, I remembered the paper and said, 'Spirogyra'. He recalls: Before a gig in a Buffalo club that was called Jack Daniels, the owner twisted my arm for a band name. The name Spyro Gyra is a misspelling of Spirogyra, a genus of green algae on which Beckenstein had written a college biology paper years earlier. It all came together, this oddball mix, until we found a middle ground, our own groove". Wall has commented that their sound was a "gutbucket of rhythmic tradition. Over a year, their work evolved into Spyro Gyra. In Beckenstein's description of the Buffalo club scene of the time: Not many people know it, but Buffalo was like a mini Chicago back then, with a smoking blues, soul, jazz, even rockabilly scene, of all things. An early regular on the Tuesday Night Jazz Jam scene was Buffalo percussionist Umbopha Emile Latimer. The other two musicians who were part of the nucleus were Buffalo natives Jim Kurzdorfer on bass and Tom Walsh on drums, although many people played in those early jam gatherings. Wall teamed up with Beckenstein, and the two started playing instrumental music-mostly covers of R&B songs-together. Although they headed in different directions during college-Beckenstein to the State University of New York in Buffalo and Wall to Cal Arts-they spent summers together playing outdoor concerts, and Wall moved to Buffalo soon after graduating.īeckenstein had been working in clubs in Buffalo since his junior year of college, backing various vocalists. Spyro Gyra emerged around Jay Beckenstein and keyboardist Jeremy Wall, who had met and formed a band during their high school years. With the exception of alto saxophonist, songwriter and founding bandleader Jay Beckenstein as well as keyboardist Tom Schuman, the personnel has changed somewhat over time, as well as between the studio and the live stage.
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