Dimitriades, Peter (1922-27th March 2015)

Violinist who studied at the Manhattan School of Music and Chicago Musical College and went on to an eclectic career that included working with several orchestras and classical ensembles and amassing an impressive discography as a session musician.

In 1964, he did a turn on the Tony Bennett album, Who Can I Turn To. Many of his recordings were in the R&B genre, including Artie Butler’s Have You Met Miss Jones?, Richard Barbary’s Soul Machine, and Freddie McCoy’s Soul Yogi, all released in 1968.

In 1970, he did Something with Tony Bennett, helped write Chapter Two with Roberta Flack, and delivered a solid performance on Herbie Mann’s Stone Flute. He also did some movie music, as evidenced by Roy Ayers’ score of 1973’s Coffy. In 1974, he performed on Janis Ian’s Stars and Dom Minasi’s When Joanna Loved Me. He played on Joe Beck’s self-titled album Beck and Can’t Take My Eyes Off You: Frankie Valli Greatest Hits in 1975. In 1976, he recorded The Man with the Sad Face with Stanley Turrentine and appeared on Webster Lewis’s On the Town and Joe Thomas’s Feelin’s from Within. He was in the studio with Patti Austin laying down tracks for Havana Candy in 1977, the same year that saw the release of The Brecker Brothers’ Don’t Stop the Music, Galdston & Thom’s American Gypsies, Dave Grusin’s One of a Kind, and John Tropea’s Short Trip to Space. He took a short trip down the yellow brick road in 1978 on the soundtrack of The Wiz, an even shorter trip down Sesame Street, On the Street Where We Live: Block Party, and appeared on David Spinozza’s eponymous Spinozza and Billy Cobham’s Simplicity of Expression…Depth of Thought. In 1979, he recorded the equally verbose Silver ‘n Strings Play the Music of Spheres with Horace Silver, went undercover with Carly Simon on Spy, appeared on Frank Sinatra’s boxed set, Trilogy, and got jiggy with the Muppets on Sesame Disco!.

He got Naughty with Chaka Khan in 1980, performed on the soundtrack of Fame, and was in the string section on Spyro Gyra’s Carnaval and Catching the Sun. In 1982, he re-united with Spyro Gyra on Incognito and appeared on Enchantment’s Enchanted Lady. The following year, he performed on Stevie Nicks’ The Wild Heart. In 1989, he accompanied Mandy Patinkin on his self-titled album of show tunes.

He played some show tunes live on Broadway in 1990 and 1991 in a production of George Gershwin’s Oh, Kay!. On 28^th June 1993, his daughter Tatiana got married to pianist Jonathan Bass. The following year, he appeared on The Brecker Brothers’ Don’t Stop the Music and celebrated the Yuletide with Luther Vandross on his album, This is Christmas. In 1996, he performed on the soundtrack of the Woody Allen musical, Everyone Says I Love You. Other artists and groups he has worked with include Backstreet Boys, Shirley Bassey, the Bax Quintet, Joe Beck, Breeze, Barbara Carroll, the Classic String Quartet, the Enesco Octet, the Kodaly Trio, Wynton Marsalis, Master Virtuosi of New York, Jimmy McGriff, the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Music Aeterna, the Radio Music Hall Orchestra, the Robert Shaw Chorale and Orchestra, Frank Sinatra, Jr., and Symphony of the Air.

He has served as the concertmaster of New York’s National Orchestra Association and occupied the principal violin chair with the Dallas Symphony.

In the field of musical education he taught at Simon’s Rock College and The Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Connecticut.

Peter died in March 2015 when he was 93 years old.

Frank Sinatra recordings
That’s What God Looks Like To Me (Stan Irvin/Lan O’Kun)
Reprise RPS 49233 (XNY2101S) (US 45)

Theme from “New York, New York” (Fred Ebb/John Kander)
Reprise RPS49233 (XNY 2103 S) (US 45)

Here’s Peaches & Herb with “Just Remind Me” from We’re Still Together on which Peter performed…

Sources:

Dimitriades, Peter (1922-27th March 2015)

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