Born on May 18th, 1956, Maryland multi-instrumentalist Gregg Karukas tried his hand at drumming, guitar and brass before finding his calling as a contemporary jazz pianist. First enlisting in local Bowie-based big band High School Starliners, he later joined saxophonist Tim Eyermann’s group East Coast Offering, and eventually became a founding member of jazz group The Rippingtons, playing keys on their 1987 debut album, Moonlighting. The same year, he founded his own label, Nightowl, through which he promptly released his first solo album, The Night Owl (1987). With a cohort of lauded accompaniers including guitarist Ken Navarro, saxophonist Gary Meek and singer Jeff Pescetto joining him on the record, it signalled the beginning of a fruitful and virtually non-stop run of albums in the decade that followed. Whilst self-releasing a further five LPs via Nightowl in the ‘90s, Karukas also collaborated with Brazilian composer Dori Caymmi on his 1993 album Kicking Cans and recorded parts for Disney’s Ducktales and Chip and Dale’s Rescue Rangers soundtracks. By 1998, he had inked a deal with Polygram, with whom he released his seventh album, 1998’s Blue Touch. The album was his first of many to enter the Billboard Jazz Albums Chart, peaking at number 22. Moving between various labels in the early 2000s before returning to his own imprint, Karukas picked up a GRAMMY Award for Best New Age Album in 2013 for his contributions to Omar Akram’s Echoes of Love. In 2015, he topped the Billboard Smooth Jazz Songs chart for the first time with “Rio Drive”, a collaboration with Brazilian jazz heavyweight Ricardo Silveira and fellow Americans Shelby Flint and Ron Boustead.
