In Passing

Kansas City, Mo.

Jay McShann, jazz pianist

Jay McShann, whose robust, blues-flavored style of jazz piano helped shape the Kansas City sound of the 1930s, and who launched the career of jazz great Charlie Parker, died Thursday in Kansas City, Mo. McShann, believed to be 90, had been suffering from a respiratory ailment.

After learning piano in his native Oklahoma and performing across the Southwest early in his career, McShann came upon Kansas City’s vibrant music scene in the mid-1930s.

In a city filled with now-legendary musicians – Count Basie, Lester Young, Mary Lou Williams and Big Joe Turner – McShann established himself as a leading pianist and bandleader.

McShann, nicknamed “Hootie,” began his career as a fleet-fingered pianist in the mode of Thomas “Fats” Waller and Earl “Fatha” Hines. In Kansas City, he absorbed the energetic, blues-drenched style of Pete Johnson and other boogie-woogie masters. McShann worked in the same lively vein for the rest of his 75-year career, which continued until months before his death.

Aberdeen, Miss.

Moses Hardy, 113, World War I vet

Moses Hardy, believed to be the second-oldest man in the world and the last black U.S. veteran of World War I, has died at age 113, according to family members.

Evelyn Davis, 68, one of Hardy’s eight children, said her father died Thursday at a nursing home in Aberdeen. He would have been 114 on Jan. 6.

“He had been doing great. He didn’t suffer and he wasn’t sick – he died of old age,” said Davis. “He knew everybody and those he knew, he always knew them when they came in to visit.”

Robert Young, senior consultant for gerontology for Guinness World Records, said research by his group and others had been unable to locate any other surviving black WWI veterans. He said only about 10 to 12 American veterans of that war remain.

Young said Hardy had been No. 6 on Guinness’ list of the world’s oldest people. He said Elizabeth Bolden, at 116, of Memphis, Tenn., is believed to be the oldest person, while the oldest man on the list is 115-year-old Emiliano Mercado del Toro of Puerto Rico.

Warsaw, Poland

Leon Niemczyk, Polish actor

Polish actor Leon Niemczyk, who starred in Roman Polanski’s “Knife in the Water” and hundreds of other films, has died at the age of 82.

Niemczyk, considered a master of supporting roles, died Nov. 29 of lung cancer at his home in the central city of Lodz, said close friend Jerzy Wozniak, the head of the city’s Film and Theater School.

Niemczyk appeared in more than 400 movies in Poland and in scores of foreign films, including this year’s David Lynch film “Inland Empire,” a performance he gave soon after learning he was terminally ill. He was diagnosed with lung cancer after fainting a year ago on a set in Lodz.

He made a name for himself in 1962 in “Knife in the Water,” Polanski’s first feature film, playing Andrzej – a bored, ambitious man in a story loaded with psychological drama.

He remained active until recently, playing in scores of television series.