Biography
Jazz composer and pianist Sandy Owen has released recordings both under his own name and as part of the ensemble Iliad. His first exposure to the piano came through his older brother’s lessons, prompting Owen to begin formal study before he turned ten. At twelve he assembled the surf band the Five Keys, recruiting brothers Ted on drums and Barry on saxophone. Exposure to the Ramsey Lewis Trio’s version of “The In Crowd” and to pianist Les McCann ignited a lasting passion for jazz by 1965. While enrolled at the University of California, Irvine, in the early seventies, he assembled Iliad with several local musicians. Although the group enjoyed regional success, it never secured a major-label deal, so the members launched their own imprint, Northern Lights Records, which issued Distances in 1975 and Sapphire House in 1978. During the late seventies Owen took on freelance work as a computer consultant yet kept composing, performing, and teaching. On his Ivory Records label he issued a series of albums throughout the eighties: Soliloquy in 1982; Euphonia, Montage, and Carols in 1984; Themes in Search of a Movie in 1985; Boogie Woogie Rhythm and Blues in 1986; Heart Crossings in 1988; and Night Rhythms in 1989, the last of which reached number five on the Gavin Report’s adult-alternative chart. After a relatively quiet stretch in the first half of the nineties, he returned with Gioia in 1996 and, five years later, with One Late Hour With a Steinway.