Jack Maeby grew up in upstate New York, where he began playing music professionally while in high school. At age 19, he signed a recording contract with a St. Louis-based record label. After a few years of touring the South and Midwest opening for acts such as The Doobie Brothers, Rod Stewart and Parliament/Funkadelic, Jack returned to Albany to back vocalist David Ward, a veteran of the King Curtis band. Through Ward, he was introduced to the late King Curtis' musical family, which included R&B legends Cornell DuPree, Gordon Edwards and Bernard Purdie.
Moving to New York City in the 1980's, Maeby built a career playing piano and organ behind acts such as Etta James, Otis Rush and Lowell Fulson. He was a keyboardist with the Uptown Horns band, accompanying Aaron Neville, Buster Poindexter and many other name attractions on their New York appearances. Jack was a regular member of NY Jazz and Blues Society honoree Danny Draher's band, played regularly with avant-garde jazz artist Marc Ribot and toured Europe with guitarist Joe Taino.
During his time in New York, Maeby was composer and musical director for a number of Off Broadway theater productions at La Mama Etc., CSC Repertory and the McCarter Theater. He began composing for film and television, garnering a Clio nomination for Original Music Scoring. His motion picture and TV work includes the films “Scandal”, Disney's “The Arabian Night” and “How the Toys Saved Christmas” and the long-running children's series, “The World of David the Gnome”.
After re-locating to Los Angeles in the mid-90's, Jack began writing fiction while touring Japan as musical director for a vocal group. He studied creative writing under novelist Claire Carmichael (aka Claire McNab), and was the recipient of a 2005 James Kirkwood Literary Award.
“The Thorazine Mirrorball” is Jack Maeby’s first published novel. He is at work on a sequel.
Awards:
Clio Nomination Original Music Scoring
James Kirkwood Literary Award
