In 2019, Toots Thielemans will have his own metro station in Brussels
Toots Thielemans, the internationally famous Belgian jazz musician, who died on 22 August 2016 at the age of 94, will soon have his own metro station. It is the present-day Anneessens station, undergoing renovation, that will be renamed after the artist in 2019. It is the third Brussels figure who will be granted this honour, after Jacques Brel and Eddy Merckx.
Jean-Baptiste Thielemans, born on 29 April 1922, grew up in the working-class neighbourhood of Brussels known as Les Marolles, where his parents managed a café. It was here that an accordionist attracted the child's attention. His father, who had noticed the young boy's interest, offered him an accordion when he was three years old and introduced him to his unfailing love for music. During the Occupation, he developed a passion for jazz, discovered Louis Armstrong and learned to play the guitar by listening to records by Django Reinhardt, his first idol. After the Liberation, he started to play in small bands. He was given the nickname "Toots" after the saxophonist Toots Mondello and the songwriter Toots Camarata, two famous figures at the time. In 1950, he joined Benny Goodman, the famous New York clarinettist, for a tour in London.
However, it was in the United States, where he emigrated in 1952, that his career really took off playing with one of the virtuosos of the alto saxophone: Charlie Parker. A reference for the harmonica and a leading figure in the jazz world, he played with Ella Fitzgerald, Quincy Jones, Bill Evans, Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, Larry Schneider, Oscar Peterson and many more. Toots was also a harmonica soloist for a number of films including Midnight Cowboy and Jean de Florette.