For more than four decades, pianist and composer Joe Sample has been an integral, innovative and bestselling part of jazz history. With his new album "Soul Shadows" released on October 12 (on Verve), the first all solo piano recording of Joe Sample's illustrious career, he pays homage to the great American songwriters of the 20th century whose masterful works inspired his own development as one of the most diverse and popular Jazz performers of the last half century.

A founding member of the influential jazz funk combo The Crusaders (originally the Jazz Crusaders) and a pioneer of contemporary jazz piano, Joe Sample reaches back to the primary sources of Jazz and Soul music to create his personal interpretations of classics by such esteemed composers as Scott Joplin, Jelly Roll Morton, the Gershwins, Al Jolson, Duke Ellington, Fats Waller and others. While exploring these rich expressions of Americana, Sample acknowledges his own key role in carrying on these powerful legacies by including distinct reworkings of two of his own classics, "Soul Shadows" (which originally appeared on The Crusaders' Midnight Triangle in 1976) and "Spellbound."

Joe Sample "Soul Shadows" album is a multi-faceted 12 track set list includes such Great American Songbook chestnuts as Joplin's "The Entertainer," Ellington's "I Got It Bad and That' Ain't Good," Gershwin's "Embraceable You" & "I Got Rhythm," Waller's "Ain't Misbehavin'" & "Jitterbug Waltz," Morton's "Shreveport Stomp" and Jolson's "Avalon." But for Joe Sample, the collection is more than simply living and re-interpreting musical history-it's a true window into the heart and roots of the man and an insight into the role of the piano player in 20th Century American music. His approach to the songs and the genre perfectly reflect Joe Sample's belief that "if you played the piano in a stride or ragtime or a boogie-woogie manner, you wouldn't need a bass player, you didn't need a drummer. That's how I started playing in the first place. I've been a solo pianist since I was six years old playing in my mama's living room for her after-church teas."

Conceptually, the defining track on Soul Shadows is the Walter Donaldson-Sam Lewis-Joe Young composition "How You Gonna Keep 'Em Down on the Farm?" which opens the set. For Joe Sample, the album is something of a long overdue tribute to a chief personal influence slightly lesser known to the listening public-James Reese Europe, the first bona fide jazz big band leader whose Jazz orchestra entered Paris in 1918 as part of the famous Fighting 369th unit. Before returning to Harlem in 1919, Europe and his orchestra spread Jazz throughout England and Europe, introducing audiences to a sound and style that would change history. Joe Sample's father fought in World War I and told his son stories about Europe and hearing the song, which was a big hit during that time.

"As a young musician I wondered, where did our music come from?" says Joe Sample. "I've become a bit of a historian of jazz and all African American music, and recently discovered a biography of James Reese Europe. Reading that biography has given me a clearer understanding of why he has been so important not only to me, but to all of us."

Learning to play piano at age five, the Houston native's formative years found him firmly rooted in many different musical traditions, including gospel, soul, bebop, blues, Latin, and classical music. One of the many jazzmen who started out playing hard bop but went electric during the fusion era, (soon after attending Texas Southern University for three years,) Sample founded the Jazz Crusaders along with trombonist Wayne Henderson, tenor saxman Wilton Felder and drummer Stix Hooper. Relocating to and launching their storied career in Los Angeles, The Crusaders patterned themselves after Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, only without a trumpet and becoming renowned for their unique tenor/trombone front line.

In addition to his own recording, Joe Sample has toured and performed with numerous musical greats in all genres, including Marvin Gaye, Tina Turner, BB King, Eric Clapton, Joe Cocker, Randy Crawford (who sang on the 1979 Crusaders smash "Street Life"), Anita Baker, Andrae Crouch and many others.

By returning to the roots of his own musical influence, Joe Sample's "Soul Shadows" gives us a reflection and chronicle of traditional American music at its best .

Joe Sample "Soul Shadows" album tracklisting:
1. How You Gonna Keep 'Em Down On The Farm?
2. Ain't Misbehavin'
3. Avalon
4. Soul Shadows
5. I Got Rhythm
6. I Got It bad And That Ain't Good
7. Spellbound
8. It's A Sin To Tell A Lie
9. The Entertainer
10. Shreveport Stomp
11. Embraceable You
12. Jitterbug Waltz