Jeff Chaz is an electrifying blues guitarist based in New Orleans. Ironically, at one time the guitar bored him and he turned to other instruments like the trombone. Before he discovered that his true talent lay in the blues, he even made an attempt to play country music and found the genre to be a challenge for him. A native of Lake Charles, LA, Chaz was raised in Creole, LA. His father was a practicing physician who sometimes visited his patients by a type of canoe called a pirogue rather than by car, and they paid his fees with ducks and other foodstuffs. Despite this simple way of life, there was nothing provincial about the backwoods healer's taste in music. Thanks to him, Chaz grew up surrounded by the sounds of Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Jack Teagarden, and Duke Ellington. As a youngster, Chaz played the jazz trombone and later moved over to the trumpet. He also played in the school band and spent his high school years in California with his family. His grades suffered due to the extensive amount of time he devoted to playing local dances and weddings. Upon graduation, he played trombone with a traveling band and when the band's guitar-playing vocalist unexpectedly dropped out, the other group members tapped Chaz to take his place. When he went home to California, he enrolled as a music student in San Bernardino College. After an attempt to play country music, he realized that his desire rested with the blues and he took off for Memphis. There he played back road blues joints and even played some gospel. Since then, he has played guitar with Cab Calloway, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Albert King. He has taken home a Beale Street Blues Award during the awards' inaugural year, and has sung at the National Civil Rights Museum. By 1996, he was back in New Orleans and working at the Famous Door on Bourbon Street. ~ Linda Seida