Bassist Ernest McCarty, Jr.

Bassist Ernest McCarty, Jr. died December 11, 2025 at 84. He forged a broad career in jazz performance, composition and musical theatre over more than five decades. A Chicago native educated at DuSable High School under Captain Walter Dyett, McCarty rose from the South Side club scene to major national stages, joining Oscar Brown, Jr.’s band in 1962 and then touring worldwide as the steady upright bassist for pianist Erroll Garner until Garner’s death in 1977, anchoring performances alongside Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, and Ike & Tina Turner.

After moving to Pittsburgh in the 1990s, McCarty became a fixture of the region’s jazz and arts community, performing regularly with the Boilermaker Jazz Band and others and extending his creative reach into musical theatre and composition. He served as artistic director of New Horizon Theater, writing and scoring dozens of plays and musicals, including works about Dinah Washington and Eubie Blake, and was recognized for his contributions to theater and jazz in the Mid-Atlantic. McCarty also recorded a pair of albums on Blujazz in the 2010s, reinforcing his role not just as a sideman but as a leader with a late-career recording presence. His final show, A Dinah Washington Christmas, debuted on the night of his death.