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Vince Guaraldi

Vincent Anthony Guaraldi (né Dellaglio, July 17, 1928 – February 6, 1976) was an American jazz pianist best known for composing music for animated television adaptations of the Peanuts comic strip. His compositions for this series included their signature melody "Linus and Lucy" and the holiday standard "Christmas Time Is Here". Guaraldi is also known for his performances on piano as a member of Cal Tjader's 1950s ensembles and for his own solo career. Guaraldi's 1962 composition "Cast Your Fate to the Wind" became a radio hit and won a Grammy Award in 1963 for Best Original Jazz Composition. He died of a heart attack on February 6, 1976, at age 47, moments after concluding a nightclub performance in Menlo Park, California.

Early career
Guaraldi was born in San Francisco's North Beach area, a place that became very important to his blossoming musical career. His last name changed to "Guaraldi" after his mother, Carmela (née Marcellino; 1908–1999), divorced his biological father (whose last name was Dellaglio) and married Tony Guaraldi, who adopted the boy. Growing up, Guaraldi was influenced by both of his maternal uncles, Joe and Maurice "Muzzy" Marcellino, both of whom headed jazz big bands in San Francisco for many years. Guaraldi graduated from Lincoln High School, briefly attended San Francisco State College, and served in the United States Army as a cook in Korea from 1946 to 1948.

Guaraldi's first recording was an unreleased demo made with Tom Hart in mid-1951. Guaraldi's first official recording was made in November 1951 with Cal Tjader's Mambo Trio. The songs—"Chopsticks Mambo", "Vibra-Tharpe", "Three Little Words" and "Lullaby of the Leaves"—were released in December 1953 on the 10-inch LP record, The Cal Tjader Trio. By summer 1954, Guaraldi had formed his first trio, with Eddie Duran (guitar) and Dean Reilly (double bass), and regularly performed in the house band at the hungry i jazz club in San Francisco, backing the singer Faith Winthrop.

Guaraldi's first recorded debut as a group leader occurred in August 1955 during a live session held at the Black Hawk. Of the tracks recorded, two of them ("Ginza" and "Calling Dr. Funk" the former recorded as part of the Ron Crotty Trio) were original compositions. The sessions were eventually released by Fantasy Records in March 1956 on Modern Music from San Francisco. Fantasy was impressed enough with Guaraldi to offer him an exclusive contract in April 1956, yielding his debut album, Vince Guaraldi Trio, which featured Duran and Reilly sans drummer. At the time, Guaraldi was subsequently appearing with Woody Herman's Third Herd, delivering energetic performances on a regular basis−a sharp contrast from the quiet recordings featured on his debut release.

Guaraldi then reunited with Tjader in August 1956 and was an integral part of two bands that the vibraphonist assembled. The first band played mainly straight jazz and included Al Torre (drums), Eugene Wright (bass) and Luis Kant (congas and bongos). The second band was formed in the spring of 1958 and included Al McKibbon (bass), Mongo Santamaría (congas and bongos) and Willie Bobo (drums and timbales). Reed men Paul Horn and Jose "Chombo" Silva were also added to the group for certain live performances and recordings.

Guaraldi recorded his follow-up album, A Flower Is a Lovesome Thing in April 1957, again featuring Duran and Reilly and again without a drummer. The album, released in October 1957, did not perform well, and Fantasy did not retain Guaraldi.

Mainstream success
Guaraldi left the group early in 1959 to pursue his own projects full-time. He might have remained a well-respected but minor jazz figure had Guaraldi not written an original number to fill out his covers of Antonio Carlos Jobim/Luiz Bonfá tunes on his 1962 album, Jazz Impressions of Black Orpheus, inspired by the French/Brazilian film Black Orpheus. Fantasy Records released "Samba de Orpheus" as a single, trying to catch the building bossa nova wave, but it was destined to sink without a trace when radio DJs began turning it over and playing the B-side, Guaraldi's "Cast Your Fate to the Wind". A gentle, likeable tune, it stood out from everything else on the airwaves and became a hit, spending 19 weeks on the Top 100 chart and peaking at No. 22—an unusual feat for a jazz instrumental. Guaraldi ultimately won a Grammy for Best Original Jazz Composition. Guaraldi never minded taking requests to play it when he appeared live. "It's like signing the back of a check," he once remarked. When asked by San Francisco Chronicle jazz critic Ralph J. Gleason if he felt like he sold out with the song, Guaraldi responded, "I feel I bought in." Guaraldi later commented, "I don't think I'm a great piano player, but I would like to have people like me, to play pretty tunes and reach the audience. And I hope some of those tunes will become standards. I want to write standards, not just hits." Fantasy quickly capitalized on Guaraldi's unexpected success by releasing In Person, a live album recorded at the Trident in Sausalito, California in December 1962. Guaraldi then recorded an album called Vince Guaraldi, Bola Sete and Friends with guitarist Bola Sete, Fred Marshall (bass) and Jerry Granelli (drums). This began a period of collaboration between Guaraldi and Sete where Guaraldi began experimenting with bossa nova-influenced music as well as with the electric piano. An appearance on Ralph Gleason's television series Jazz Casual drew greater attention to the Guaraldi/Sete collaboration (the episode was posthumously released on CD in 2001), followed by the January 1965 release of From All Sides. A live performance recorded at the El Matador jazz club in Spring 1965 was released in October 1966 on Live at El Matador.

Guaraldi decided to experiment with combining Latin jazz and orchestral instrumentation on his next release, The Latin Side of Vince Guaraldi (1964). For the album's orchestrations, Guaraldi turned to Jack Weeks, son of bandleader Anson Weeks, who had previously worked with Guaraldi peers Cal Tjader and Dave Brubeck. This experimentation may have led to the loss of Fred Marshall, who left the group in 1964 citing "personal differences" after Guaraldi purportedly threw a cup of coffee at Marshall during the 17th Berkeley Jazz Festival. Shortly after this time, Guaraldi was invited to compose a "jazz mass" with the Eucharist chorus of San Francisco's Grace Cathedral. Utilizing his Latin influences from his bossa nova days with Sete, Guaraldi composed a number of pieces with waltz tempos and jazz standards. The performance was recorded on May 21, 1965, and released that September as At Grace Cathedral.

Guaraldi's relationship with Fantasy Records began to sour by 1965 after it was learned he was receiving only five percent of every record sale while Fantasy retained the remaining 95 percent. Guaraldi sued in early 1966 in an effort to sever all relationships with the label; Fantasy promptly countersued. Fantasy executive Saul Zaentz became president in 1967, eventually buying the company from original owners Max and Soul Weiss in December of that year. The sale of Fantasy Records to Zaentz resulted in both Guaraldi and the label dismissing the twin lawsuits, leaving Guaraldi a free agent. In 2011, 35 years after Guaraldi's death, Fantasy Records and its parent company Concord Music were sued by Guaraldi's children for engaging in "a system" of "serving false and deceptive statements while underreporting units sold and underpaying royalties." Their lawsuit, filed in December 2011, claimed a private accountant uncovered a discrepancy of at least $2 million for the years 2005–2010 alone. When asked if the alleged wrongdoing goes back decades further, the Guaraldi family's attorney Alan Neigher responded, "Well, we hope it does."

During the period of flux with Fantasy in 1967, Guaraldi formed his own record label, D & D (named after his children, David and Dia), and released his only album on the label in December 1967, Vince Guaraldi with the San Francisco Boys Chorus.

A Boy Named Charlie Brown and A Charlie Brown Christmas
In 1963, while searching for music to accompany a planned Peanuts documentary entitled A Boy Named Charlie Brown, television producer Lee Mendelson heard "Cast Your Fate to the Wind" on the radio while driving across the Golden Gate Bridge. Mendelson then contacted Ralph J. Gleason, who put him in touch with Guaraldi. Mendelson offered Guaraldi the job of composing the score for the documentary, which Guaraldi gladly accepted. Within several weeks, Mendelson received a call from an excited Guaraldi who wanted to play a piece of music he had just written. Mendelson, not wanting his first exposure to the new music to be marred by the poor audio qualities of a telephone, suggested coming over to Guaraldi's studio. Guaraldi enthusiastically refused, saying "I’ve got to play this for someone right now or I’ll explode!" He then began playing the yet-untitled "Linus and Lucy" for Mendelson, who agreed the song was perfect for Charles Schulz's Peanuts characters. Reflecting on the song in 2008, Mendelson said, "it just blew me away. It was so right, and so perfect, for Charlie Brown and the other characters. I have no idea why, but I knew that song would affect my entire life. There was a sense, even before it was put to animation, that there was something very, very special about that music."

The documentary soundtrack, entitled Jazz Impressions of A Boy Named Charlie Brown, was recorded by Guaraldi's current trio (with bassist Monty Budwig and drummer Colin Bailey) in October 1964 and released in December of that year. Although the documentary was ultimately shelved due to Mendelson's inability to secure sponsorship, Schulz and Mendelson retained Guaraldi for the upcoming Peanuts Christmas special, A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965). The soundtrack album was recorded by the Vince Guaraldi Trio, this time featuring drummer Jerry Granelli and bassist Fred Marshall, and contained the songs "Christmas Time Is Here", "Skating", and "Linus and Lucy". Both the seasonal television special and accompanying soundtrack were very successful.

Derrick Bang, Guaraldi historian and author of Vince Guaraldi at the Piano, commented that, "the importance of Jazz Impressions of A Boy Named Charlie Brown and its successor, the score to the Christmas special, cannot be overstated; rarely has an entertainment icon been so quickly—and firmly—welded to a musical composition...indeed, to an entire body of work from one individual. Guaraldi defined the Peanuts sound, and it's just as true today as it was in the 1960s. The compositions themselves are uniformly sparkling; it's as if the jazz pianist and his trio were waiting for this precise inspiration." Mendelson concurred: "There's no doubt in my mind, that if we hadn't had that Guaraldi score, we wouldn't have had the franchise we later enjoyed."

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown
All involved with A Charlie Brown Christmas initially regarded the stunning success of the project as something of a one-time fluke, but the second official Peanuts television special—Charlie Brown's All Stars!—was televised in June 1966 to similarly high ratings and acclaim. It was at this point that Schulz, Mendelson and animator Bill Melendez focused on creating another holiday blockbuster in the vein of A Charlie Brown Christmas, eventually titled It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Guaraldi spent most of summer 1966 composing cues for the Halloween-themed special, strongly encouraging Mendelson to consider making "Linus and Lucy", which had been featured prominently in the Christmas special, the unofficial Peanuts theme. Guaraldi did not include the song in the music score for Charlie Brown's All Stars! and worked to correct that oversight by featuring it throughout It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Melendez responded to Guaraldi's suggestion by beginning the special with a lengthy cold open sequence sans dialogue, employing only music and sound effects to convey Linus and Lucy's search for a pumpkin. Guaraldi recorded a fresh version of "Linus and Lucy" for the opening sequence as a sextet, featuring Budwig and Bailey, as well as trumpeter Emmanuel Klein, guitarist John Gray, and flautist Ronnie Lang. Lang's flute counterpoint was featured throughout the new version of "Linus and Lucy", resulting in the song ultimately becoming the Peanuts franchise signature melody.

Guaraldi went on to compose scores for twelve additional Peanuts animated television specials, as well as the feature film A Boy Named Charlie Brown and the documentary Charlie Brown and Charles Schulz (both 1969). Despite the wealth of Peanuts material Guaraldi recorded, only A Charlie Brown Christmas and A Boy Named Charlie Brown (both the unaired documentary and feature film) received official soundtrack releases during his lifetime.

"I have always felt that one of the key elements that made A Charlie Brown Christmas was the music," said Mendelson in 2010. "It gave it a contemporary sound that appealed to all ages. Although Vince had never scored anything else and although I was basically a documentary film maker at the time, we started to work together on the cues because we both loved jazz and we both played the piano. So he would bring in the material for each scene and we would go over it scene by scene. Most of the time, the music worked perfectly. But there were times we would either not use something or use it somewhere else. We went through this same process on all sixteen shows. Although there was always some left over music, most of the time what he wrote and performed is what went on the air."

Later years
Guaraldi's final three albums released during his lifetime were recorded for Warner Bros.-Seven Arts after spending nearly two years trying to extricate himself from Fantasy Records. Warner signed Guaraldi to a three-record deal in early 1968, insisting that his inaugural release consist of Peanuts material. This was done in part to fill the void left by a lack of soundtrack albums to accompany the successful television specials Charlie Brown's All Stars!, It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, You're in Love, Charlie Brown and He's Your Dog, Charlie Brown. Guaraldi responded with new renditions of eight of his most popular scores from those programs on his first release, Oh Good Grief!.

Guaraldi was then given complete artistic control over his second self-produced Warner effort, The Eclectic Vince Guaraldi, resulting in an unfocused and overindulgent album that was not well received by either critics or consumers. At Warner's insistence, arranger Shorty Rogers was recruited to produce Guaraldi's final album, Alma-Ville. Though deemed a focused improvement over the previous album, Warner did not promote the album, ultimately choosing not to retain Guaraldi at the end of their three-record deal. Both The Eclectic Vince Guaraldi and Alma-Ville gradually fell into obscurity, while Oh Good Grief! remained a steady seller due to the perpetual popularity of the Peanuts franchise.

After working on the soundtrack for the Peanuts feature film A Boy Named Charlie Brown (1969), Guaraldi ceased releasing any new material. In his review of The Complete Warner Bros.–Seven Arts Recordings, The Recoup critic Joseph Kyle lamented, "frustrated and unable to secure a record deal, he spent the remainder of his life as a live performer, recording more soundtrack material, and banking on the goodwill his Peanuts compositions earned him." Guaraldi's sound also evolved into a more fusion jazz/rock sound, as he largely traded the piano for Hammond B-3 and Fender Rhodes electric keyboards. His live performances included musicians who specialized in funk and soul as well as traditional jazz. Posthumous releases Oaxaca (recorded 1970–71), Live on the Air (recorded February 1974), and North Beach feature both studio and live performances recorded during this period of transition.

All Peanuts soundtracks scored after Play It Again, Charlie Brown (1971) feature Guaraldi favoring electric keyboards over traditional piano as well. You're a Good Sport, Charlie Brown (1975), Guaraldi's penultimate music score, fused his fusion jazz style with the funk, disco and pop music that was popular at the time coupled with the use of Minimoog and ARP String Ensemble synthesizers.

Guaraldi biographer and historian Derrick Bang put the musician's later years in perspective, saying, "As jazz clubs were closing in the 1960s, with the advent of rock 'n' roll—a development that put many jazz musicians out of work—Guaraldi embraced the enemy, adjusting his style and approach to include electric keyboards. By the mid-'70s, he had become a respected veteran in what remained of the declining Northern California jazz club scene."

The amount of wealth Guaraldi accumulated from his perpetual Peanuts scoring opportunities plus royalties from previous work allowed him to live comfortably in Mill Valley, California. He continued to perform at small, local clubs out of a desire to do so rather than financial necessity. The monumental success garnered from Guaraldi's Peanuts work resulted in lucrative offers coming in from all over the U.S., all of which he declined. "Once the Peanuts music became famous, Vince could have gone out and done a whole lot more," Mendelson said. "But he was very provincial; he loved San Francisco, and he liked hanging out and playing at the local clubs. He never branched out from there; he never really wanted to. He'd get offers, but he'd tell me, 'I just want to do this; I'm having a good time, and I'm satisfied with it.'" Eddie Duran concurred, saying that "he did talk at times about moving to Los Angeles, but I think he really dug staying in the area, because he was sure of himself. When you're sure of where you are as an artist, you don't seek to go other places and prove it."

Death and impact
Guaraldi died on February 6, 1976, at age 47 after suffering a massive heart attack. The evening before, he had dined at Mendelson's home and was reportedly not feeling well, complaining of indigestion-like chest discomfort. "He was about to do his first cruise. He'd be able to play Peanuts music on the ship, and he was excited about that. We talked about the cruise and the Peanuts shows, and I said that I didn't know what the next one would be yet, but that we wouldn't start until he got back. But he also said he wasn't feeling well, and had gone to see the doctor. The doctor thought Vince might have a diaphragmatic hernia, and that they might have to deal with it."

The following morning, on February 6, Guaraldi awoke with a bad cold and remained in bed throughout the day. That afternoon, Guaraldi finished recording the soundtrack for It's Arbor Day, Charlie Brown at Wally Heider Studios in San Francisco with bassist Seward McCain and drummer Jim Zimmerman. "We had just come back from a concert we did up in the mountain", recalled Zimmerman, "and Vince had been skiing, and up there carrying on like nothing was bothering him. But once we were back in the studio, he started complaining that his stomach was bothering him."

That evening, after concluding the first set at Butterfield's Nightclub in Menlo Park, California, with his interpretation of the Beatles' "Eleanor Rigby", Guaraldi and Zimmerman returned to the room in which they were staying that weekend at the adjacent Red Cottage Inn, to relax before the next set. Zimmerman commented, "Vince was feeling sick to his stomach. He got up to go to the bathroom...and went down on the floor. I tried to bring him around but wasn't successful. It happened so fast." McCain commented, "Vince headed for the bathroom but never made it. When Vince fell and hit the floor, Jim [Zimmerman] got me. We went back and tried to revive him, but it didn't work." Zimmerman added, "It is very romantic to think of someone going out just after they play. I wish he hadn't."

Guaraldi was rushed to Stanford Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival at 11:07 p.m. The official cause of death was certified as "acute myocardial infarction, due to or as a consequence of coronary arteriosclerosis with thrombosis and generalized arteriosclerosis."

Pianist George DeQuattro recalled years later, "I saw him about a week before he passed away. Vince seemed really fine. But he had seen a doctor because he had stomach problems, and was feeling ill and tired. The doctor told him it might just be ulcers, and prescribed some dumb medicine and told him to forget about it. But it wasn't that, and it's really a shame. That would never happen today." In his 2012 biography, Vince Guaraldi at the Piano, author Derrick Bang wrote, "as time passed, Guaraldi's friends, family and colleagues would begin to wonder if a stomach aneurysm—or something else—had played a role in that heart attack", adding that Guaraldi's "complaint of a painful stomach ache clearly hadn't been taken seriously enough."

Guaraldi's death was a blow to his friends, family, and colleagues. "It was totally unexpected," said Mendelson. "The day before the funeral, Carmella [Guaraldi's mother] called and said that they wanted to use the Peanuts music. I said, 'Oh, God, I don't think that's a good idea.' I begged her not to do it, but she was a strong woman. And they did play it, and I just fell apart; everybody broke up. She was sitting right behind me. I guess it was the right thing to do, but that made the funeral very hard. It was not an easy day; he was so young. It was one of the saddest days of my life." Peanuts animator Bill Melendez added, "He was a real good guy and we miss him."

"I was in New York, and Vince Lateano told me", said drummer Mike Clark in 2010. "It was the last thing I could think of, that Guaraldi would die. It blew my mind. I'm still saddened, when I think of him, because he was such an energized person, and he seemed to have an endless supply of good fortune. It seemed everything he touched turned into money or opportunity. I simply couldn't believe it."

Rev. Charles Gompertz, who invited Guaraldi to perform at Grace Cathedral in 1965, commented in 1981, "I think part of Vince's problem was that he never really took very good care of himself. He stayed out late, he smoked, and he did a whole lot of things. He tried everything. I mean, when skateboards first came out, he was the first kid on his block to get one, only as a kid he happened to be about 30. He pushed himself to the limit, whether musically or physically. He saw himself as a very youthful person, but he didn't do any of the physical things you have to do to prepare yourself to live like that." His mother Carmella Guaraldi added, "When it happened down at Butterfield's, when the end finally came, he went the way he would have wanted to go, with the piano."

Guaraldi is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, California.

Personal life
Guaraldi married his high school girlfriend, Shirley Moskowitz, on February 1, 1953. She initially filed for divorce on April 21, 1966, which was eventually withdrawn. Moskowitz filed a second time in June 1968, which took effect on December 8, 1970. The union produced two children: David Anthony Guaraldi (b. August 11, 1955) and Dia Lisa (b. February 16, 1960). Guaraldi had a long-term affair with Gretchen Glanzer, later Katamay, with whom he appeared on the cover of his 1964 album, The Latin Side of Vince Guaraldi. The two were also shown sitting together on the back of the Grateful Dead album Aoxomoxoa, amid two dozen friends of the band.

Legacy
A book-length biography of Guaraldi was published in March 2012. Vince Guaraldi at the Piano, by author and Guaraldi archivist Derrick Bang, chronicles Guaraldi's career and role in the Northern California jazz scene, and also includes a complete discography and filmography, as well as an appendix of quotations from Guaraldi's former sidemen.

Jazz musician David Benoit has often credited Guaraldi and the Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack for his interest in jazz. In 1985, Benoit recorded a cover of Guaraldi's "Linus and Lucy" for an album called This Side Up, which enjoyed considerable radio airplay and helped launch the smooth jazz genre. He released "Cast Your Fate to the Wind" on the album Waiting for Spring in 1989.

New Age pianist George Winston released a Guaraldi tribute album in 1996 titled Linus and Lucy: The Music of Vince Guaraldi. Winston performed many Peanuts songs that had not been released by Guaraldi. "I love his melodies and his chord progressions", Winston said of Guaraldi. "He has a really personal way of doing voicings. His music is part of our culture and we know it even if we don’t know Vince. He had three bags: the Latin, the Peanuts, and the impressionistic 'Cast Your Fate to the Wind' stuff. And those three bags are all his." The album was very successful, leading Winston to record a follow-up, titled Love Will Come: The Music of Vince Guaraldi, Volume 2, released in early 2010. A third volume, entitled Count the Ways: The Music of Vince Guaraldi, Volume 3, remains unreleased.

Mendelson reflected on Guaraldi's contribution to the Peanuts franchise when Winston released his two tribute albums, saying "Several generations have now grown up with Vince Guaraldi's music. If people hear just one or two bass notes of the intro to 'Linus and Lucy', they cheer. The Peanuts programs and Vince's music were such a wonderful marriage. It's a shame it got cut off so soon, but people like George are perpetuating it, for which we are very appreciative."

In 2003, Guaraldi's son David began working to secure the necessary licenses to distribute some of his father's previously unreleased material. The first release, The Charlie Brown Suite & Other Favorites, featured an archived 1969 live performance of the seven-part "Charlie Brown Suite". Other releases include Oaxaca (2004), North Beach (2006), Vince Guaraldi and the Lost Cues from the Charlie Brown Television Specials, Volumes 1 (2007) and 2 (2008), Live on the Air (2008) and An Afternoon with the Vince Guaraldi Quartet (2011).

In 2010, a two-hour documentary entitled The Anatomy of Vince Guaraldi was screened at a variety of jazz and film festivals. The documentary highlighted newly discovered and restored footage of Guaraldi's appearances and recording sessions and featured new performances and insights from Winston, Dave Brubeck, Dick Gregory, Jon Hendricks, Leonard Maltin, Paul Krassner and surviving Guaraldi sidemen Eddie Duran, Dean Reilly, and Jerry Granelli. The documentary was co-produced by Toby Gleason (son of Ralph J. Gleason) and filmmaker Andrew Thomas. The Anatomy of Vince Guaraldi was the recipient of five "Best Documentary" awards, and was a special presentation at the Library of Congress and Monterey Jazz Festival. Gleason commented, "let's just agree that Vince Guaraldi re-invented the sound of the modern American Christmas."

In the original liner notes for Jazz Impressions of A Boy Named Charlie Brown, Ralph J. Gleason praised Guaraldi's Peanuts contributions, noting, "The hardest task an artist faces is not just to achieve self-expression; that almost comes by definition, even if it's difficult to hone that self-expression into something good enough to be art." Gleason continued: "It is another kind of thing altogether to look at, hear, feel and experience somebody else's artistic expression and then make something of your own which shows empathy, which relates to the other but which still has your own individual artistic stamp. That is what Vince Guaraldi achieved with his scores for Charlie Brown. He took his inspiration from the creations of Charles Schulz and made music that reflects that inspiration, is empathetic with the image and is still solidly and unmistakably Vince Guaraldi."

In his review of The Definitive Vince Guaraldi (2009), All About Jazz critic David Rickert credited Guaraldi for introducing many to the world of jazz music "before we even knew what it was. [Guaraldi]'s soundtracks for the Peanuts television specials were a novel idea in cartoon scoring, yet seemed to perfectly fit the deceptively sophisticated adventures of Charlie Brown and the rest of the Peanuts gang. His originals were some of the best jazz to come from the West Coast scene and a tribute to what can happen when a great muse hits a gifted composer."

Band members
Guaraldi used a variety of sidemen throughout his career. His main preference was playing as a trio, although this number would increase depending on the needs of a song, live performance or Peanuts soundtrack. The largest confluence of musicians occurred in 1969 for soundtrack recordings of It Was a Short Summer, Charlie Brown (decet) and A Boy Named Charlie Brown (nonet).

For bass/double bass, regular sidemen during the 1950s and 1960s included Monty Budwig, Dean Reilly, Fred Marshall and Tom Beeson. During the 1970s, Guaraldi performed with Koji Kataoka and primarily Seward McCain.

Guitarist Eddie Duran served steadily throughout the 1950s and 1960s, save for mid-1963–65 when Guaraldi teamed up with guitarist Bola Sete as a double act. During the 1970s, Guaraldi himself performed guitar when necessary but otherwise did not retain a sideman to fill the position.

Guaraldi's first two releases—Vince Guaraldi Trio (1956) and A Flower Is a Lovesome Thing (1957)—did not feature a drummer. Starting in 1961, Colin Bailey filled the role, followed by Jerry Granelli. Mike Clark became Guaraldi's regular drummer for live performances during the 1970s. Other drummers included Lee Charlton, John Rae, Al Coster, Eliot Zigmund, Glenn Cronkhite, Vince Lateano, Mark Rosengarden, and Jim Zimmerman.

The original Vince Guaraldi Trio consisted of Dean Reilly (bass) and Eddie Duran (guitar), appearing on Guaraldi's first two albums. The second lineup, considered the first of two "classic" trios, featured Monty Budwig (bass) and Colin Bailey (drums). This version of the classic trio appeared on Jazz Impressions of Black Orpheus and Jazz Impressions of A Boy Named Charlie Brown. The second of two classic trios featured Fred Marshall (bass) and Jerry Granelli (drums). This incarnation was featured on more albums than any other trio, including Vince Guaraldi, Bola Sete and Friends, Jazz Casual: Paul Winter/Bola Sete and Vince Guaraldi, The Latin Side of Vince Guaraldi, From All Sides and A Charlie Brown Christmas.

As leader/co-leader
Additional sources:

As sideman

 * 1953 The Cal Tjader Trio (Guaraldi's first recorded session)
 * 1956 Introducing Gus Mancuso (Cal Tjader)
 * 1957 Jazz at the Blackhawk (Cal Tjader Quartet)
 * 1957 Cal Tjader (Cal Tjader Quartet)
 * 1957 Conte Candoli Quartet
 * 1957 Frank Rosolino Quintet
 * 1957 Jazz Erotica (Richie Kamuca)
 * 1958 Mas Ritmo Caliente (Cal Tjader)
 * 1958 Cal Tjader-Stan Getz Sextet (all-star studio session that includes a long/extended version of Guaraldi's piece "Ginza")
 * 1958 Latin Concert (Cal Tjader Quintet – all-star group with Mongo Santamaría, Willie Bobo and Al McKibbon)
 * 1959 A Night at the Blackhawk (Cal Tjader Sextet)
 * 1959 Latin For Lovers (Cal Tjader with Strings)
 * 1959 Tjader Goes Latin (Cal Tjader)
 * 1959 Latinsville! (Victor Feldman)
 * 1960 Little Band Big Jazz (Conte Candoli All Stars)
 * 1974 Jimmy Witherspoon & Ben Webster — Previously Unissued Recordings (a 1967 session from the Verve Records archive; the "Black Orpheus" incarnation of Guaraldi's trio supports the two leaders recorded live from "The Jazz Workshop" in San Francisco, CA.)
 * 2008 Live at the Monterey Jazz Festival 1958–1980 (Guaraldi performs on four tracks in 1958 with Cal Tjader's group featuring Santamaria, Bobo, McKibbon, and guest clarinetist Buddy DeFranco at the festival's inaugural year)
 * 2012 The Cal Tjader Quintet Live at Club Macumba San Francisco 1956 (previously unreleased live performance with the Tjader quintet, featuring between-session audio)

title: Vince Guaraldi


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Rollo (disambiguation)

Rollo was the founder and first ruler of the Viking principality in what soon became known as Normandy.

Rollo may also refer to:

Places

 * Rollo Department, Burkina Faso
 * Rollo, Burkina Faso, a town in Rollo Department
 * Rollo, Illinois, United States, an unincorporated community
 * A common nickname for the city of Rovaniemi, Finland

Other uses

 * Rollo (record producer), an English music producer
 * Rollo (name), including lists of people and characters with the given name or surname
 * Clan Rollo, a Scottish clan
 * Lord Rollo, a title in the Peerage of Scotland
 * "Rollo," a part of Frank Zappa's "Don't Eat the Yellow Snow" suite
 * An Italian roll cake

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Rollo (disambiguation)


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Western Christianity

Western Christianity is one of two subdivisions of Christianity (Eastern Christianity being the other). Western Christianity is composed of the Latin Church and Western Protestantism, together with their offshoots such as the Old Catholic Church, Independent Catholicism and Restorationism.

The large majority of the world's 2.3 billion Christians are Western Christians (about 2 billion: 1.2 billion Latin Catholic and 1.17 billion Protestant). One major component, the Latin Church, developed under the bishop of Rome. Out of the Latin Church emerged a wide variety of independent Protestant denominations, including Lutheranism and Anglicanism, starting from the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century, as did Independent Catholicism in the 19th century. Thus, the term "Western Christianity" does not describe a single communion or religious denomination, but is applied to distinguish all these denominations collectively from Eastern Christianity.

The establishment of the distinct Latin Church, a particular church sui iuris of the Catholic Church, coincided with the consolidation of the Holy See in Rome, which claimed primacy since Antiquity. The Latin Church is distinct from the Eastern Catholic Churches, also in full communion with the Pope in Rome, and from the Eastern Orthodox Church and Oriental Orthodox Churches, which are not in communion with Rome. These other churches are part of Eastern Christianity. The terms "Western" and "Eastern" in this regard originated with geographical divisions mirroring the cultural divide between the Hellenistic east and Latin West, and the political divide between the Western and Eastern Roman empires. During the Middle Ages adherents of the Latin Church, irrespective of ethnicity, commonly referred to themselves as "Latins" to distinguish themselves from Eastern Christians.

Western Christianity has played a prominent role in the shaping of Western civilization. With the expansion of European colonialism from the Early Modern era, the Latin Church, in time along with its Protestant secessions, spread throughout the Americas, much of the Philippines, Southern Africa, pockets of West Africa, and throughout Australia and New Zealand. Thus, when used for historical periods after the 16th century, the term "Western Christianity" does not refer to a particular geographical area, but is rather used as a collective term for all these.

Today, the geographical distinction between Western and Eastern Christianity is not nearly as absolute as in Antiquity or the Middle Ages, due to the spread of Christian missionaries, migrations, and globalisation. As such, the adjectives "Western Christianity" and "Eastern Christianity" are typically used to refer to historical origins and differences in theology and liturgy, rather than present geographical locations.

While the Latin Church maintains the use of the Latin liturgical rites, Protestant denominations and Independent Catholicism use a wide variety of liturgical practices.

The earliest concept of Europe as a cultural sphere (instead of simply a geographic term) appeared during the Carolingian Renaissance of the 9th century, which included territories which practiced Western Christianity at the time.

History
For much of its history, the Christian church has been culturally divided between the Latin-speaking West, whose centre was Rome, and the Greek-speaking East, whose centre was Constantinople. Cultural differences and political rivalry created tensions between the two churches, leading to disagreement over doctrine and ecclesiology and ultimately to schism.

Like Eastern Christianity, Western Christianity traces its roots directly to the apostles and other early preachers of the religion. In Western Christianity's original area Latin was the principal language. Christian writers in Latin had more influence there than those who wrote in Greek, Syriac, or other languages. Although the first Christians in the West used Greek (such as Clement of Rome), by the fourth century Latin had superseded it even in the cosmopolitan city of Rome, as well as in southern Gaul and the Roman province of Africa. There is evidence of a Latin translation of the Bible as early as the 2nd century (see also Vetus Latina).

With the decline of the Roman Empire, distinctions appeared also in organization, since the bishops in the West were not dependent on the Emperor in Constantinople and did not come under the influence of the Caesaropapism in the Eastern Church. While the see of Constantinople became dominant throughout the Emperor's lands, the West looked exclusively to the see of Rome, which in the East was seen as that of one of the five patriarchs of the Pentarchy, "the proposed government of universal Christendom by five patriarchal sees under the auspices of a single universal empire. Formulated in the legislation of the emperor Justinian I (527–565), especially in his Novella 131, the theory received formal ecclesiastical sanction at the Council in Trullo (692), which ranked the five sees as Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem."

Over the centuries, disagreements separated Western Christianity from the various forms of Eastern Christianity: first from East Syriac Christianity after the Council of Ephesus (431), then from that of Oriental Orthodoxy after the Council of Chalcedon (451), and then from Eastern Orthodoxy with the East-West Schism of 1054. With the last-named form of Eastern Christianity, reunion agreements were signed at the Second Council of Lyon (1274) and the Council of Florence (1439), but these proved ineffective.

Historian Paul Legutko of Stanford University said the Catholic Church is "at the center of the development of the values, ideas, science, laws, and institutions which constitute what we call Western civilization". The rise of Protestantism led to major divisions within Western Christianity, which still persist, and wars—for example, the Anglo-Spanish War of 1585–1604 had religious as well as economic causes.

In and after the Age of Discovery, Europeans spread Western Christianity to the New World and elsewhere. Roman Catholicism came to the Americas (especially South America), Africa, Asia, Australia and the Pacific. Protestantism, including Anglicanism, came to North America, Australia-Pacific and some African locales.

Today, the geographical distinction between Western and Eastern Christianity is much less absolute, due to the great migrations of Europeans across the globe, as well as the work of missionaries worldwide over the past five centuries.

Original sin
Original sin, also called ancestral sin,   is a Christian belief in a state of sin in which humanity has existed since the fall of man, stemming from Adam and Eve's rebellion in the Garden of Eden, namely the sin of disobedience in consuming the forbidden fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Theologians have characterized this condition in many ways, seeing it as ranging from something as insignificant as a slight deficiency, or a tendency toward sin yet without collective guilt, referred to as a "sin nature", to something as drastic as total depravity or automatic guilt of all humans through collective guilt.

Filioque clause
Most Western Christians use a version of the Nicene Creed that states that the Holy Spirit "proceeds from the Father and the Son", where the original text as adopted by the First Council of Constantinople had "proceeds from the Father" without the addition of either "and the Son" or "alone". This Western version also has the additional phrase "God from God" (Deum de Deo), which was in the Creed as adopted by the First Council of Nicaea, but which was dropped by the First Council of Constantinople.

Date of Easter
The date of Easter usually differs between Eastern and Western Christianity, because the calculations are based on the Julian calendar and Gregorian calendar respectively. However, before the Council of Nicea, various dates including Jewish Passover were observed. Nicea "Romanized" the date for Easter and anathematized a "Judaized" (i.e. Passover date for) Easter. The date of observance of Easter has only differed in modern times since the promulgation of the Gregorian calendar in 1582; and further, the Western Church did not universally adopt the Gregorian calendar at once, so that for some time the dates of Easter differed between the Eastern Church and the Roman Catholic Church, but not necessarily as between the Eastern Church and the Western Protestant churches. For example, the Church of England continued to observe Easter on the same date as the Eastern Church until 1753.

Even the dates of other Christian holidays often differ between Eastern and Western Christianity.

Lack of essence–energies distinction
Eastern Christianity, and particularly the Eastern Orthodox Church, has traditionally held a distinction between God's essence, or that which He is, with God's energies, or that which He does. They hold that while God is unknowable in His essence, He can be known (i.e. experienced) in His energies. This is an extension of Eastern Christianity's apophatic theology, while Western Christians tend to prefer a view of divine simplicity, and claim that God's essence can be known by its attributes.

Western denominations
Today, Western Christianity makes up close to 90% of Christians worldwide with the Catholic Church accounting for over half and various Protestant denominations making up another 40%.

Hussite movements of 15th century Bohemia preceded the main Protestant uprising by 100 years and evolved into several small Protestant churches, such as the Moravian Church. Waldensians survived also, but blended into the Reformed tradition.

Bishop of Rome or the pope
Relevant figures:
 * Clement of Rome (fl. c. 96), one of the apostolic fathers of the church.
 * Pope Leo I
 * Gregory the Great

The Reformers
Relevant figures:
 * Jan Hus (c. 1369–1415), one of the most relevant theologians in the 14th century.
 * Martin Luther (1483–1546), the most famous reformer and theologian in the Reformation and in the 15th century.
 * Hans Tausen, Bishop of Ribe (1494–1561), leading theologian of the Reformation in Denmark and Holstein.
 * Laurentius Petri, Archbishop of Uppsala and all Sweden (1499–1573), along with his brother Olaus Petri were regarded as the main Lutheran reformers of Sweden, together with the king Gustav I of Sweden.
 * Primož Trubar (1508–1586), mostly known as the author of the first Slovene language printed book, the founder and the first superintendent of the Protestant Church of the Duchy of Carniola, and for consolidating the Slovenian language.
 * John Calvin (1509–1564)
 * John Knox (1514–1572)
 * Ferenc Dávid (1520–1579) founder of the Unitarian Church of Transylvania who laid the foundation for what would become the nontrinitarian movement.
 * Mikael Agricola, bishop of Turku (1554–1557), he became the de facto founder of literary Finnish and a prominent proponent of the Protestant Reformation in Sweden, including Finland, which was a Swedish territory at the time. He is often called the "father of literary Finnish".

Archbishop of Canterbury and primate of all England
Relevant figures:
 * Augustine of Canterbury (597–604)
 * Thomas Cranmer (1533–1555), one of the major reformers in England
 * Matthew Parker (1504–1575),(Parker was one of the primary architects of the Thirty-nine Articles)

Archbishop of Lyon and primate of the Gauls
Relevant figures:
 * Irenaeus of Lyon (died c. 202)

Patriarch of Aquileia
Relevant figures:
 * Chromatius of Aquilea

title: Western Christianity


text:
Eastern Christianity

Eastern Christianity comprises Christian traditions and church families that originally developed during classical and late antiquity in the Eastern Mediterranean region or locations further east, south or north. The term does not describe a single communion or religious denomination. Eastern Christianity is a category distinguished from Western Christianity, which is composed of those Christian traditions and churches that originally developed further west.

Major Eastern Christian bodies include the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Oriental Orthodox Churches, along with those groups descended from the historic Church of the East (also called the Assyrian Church), as well as the Eastern Catholic Churches (which are in communion with Rome and maintain Eastern liturgies), and the Eastern Protestant churches. Most Eastern churches do not normally refer to themselves as "Eastern", with the exception of the Assyrian Church of the East and its offshoot, the Ancient Church of the East.

The Eastern Orthodox are the largest body within Eastern Christianity with a worldwide population of 220 million, followed by the Oriental Orthodox at 60 million. The Eastern Catholic Churches consist of about 16–18 million and are a small minority within the Catholic Church. Eastern Protestant Christian churches do not form a single communion; churches like the Ukrainian Lutheran Church and Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church have under a million members. The Assyrian Church of the East and the Ancient Church of the East, descendant churches of the Assyria-based Church of the East, have a combined membership of approximately 400,000.

Historically, Eastern Christianity was centered in the Middle East and surrounding areas, where Christianity originated. However, after the Muslim conquest of the Levant in the 7th century, the term Eastern Church increasingly came to be used for the Greek Church centered in Constantinople, in contrast with the (Western) Latin Church, centered on Rome, which uses the Latin liturgical rites. The terms "Eastern" and "Western" in this regard originated with geographical divisions in Christianity mirroring the cultural divide between the Hellenistic East and the Latin West, and the political divide of 395 AD between the Western and Eastern Roman Empires. Since the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century, the term "Eastern Christianity" may be used in contrast with "Western Christianity", which contains not only the Latin Church but also forms of Protestantism and Independent Catholicism. Some Eastern churches have more in common historically and theologically with Western Christianity than with one another.

Because the largest church in the East is the body currently known as the Eastern Orthodox Church, the term "Orthodox" is often used in a similar fashion to "Eastern", to refer to specific historical Christian communions. However, strictly speaking, most Christian denominations, whether Eastern or Western, regard themselves as "orthodox" (meaning "following correct beliefs") as well as "catholic" (meaning "universal"), and as sharing in the Four Marks of the Church listed in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed (381 AD): "One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic".

Eastern churches (excepting the non-liturgical dissenting bodies) utilize several liturgical rites: the Alexandrian Rite, the Armenian Rite, the Byzantine Rite, the East Syriac Rite (also known as Persian or Assyrian Rite), and the West Syriac Rite (also called the Antiochian Rite).

Families of churches
Orthodoxy by Country.svg and Oriental Orthodoxy in the world by country Eastern Christians do not all share the same religious traditions, but many do share cultural traditions. Christianity divided itself in the East during its early centuries both within and outside of the Roman Empire in disputes about Christology and fundamental theology, as well as through national divisions (Roman, Persian, etc.). It would be many centuries later that Western Christianity fully split from these traditions as its own communion. Major branches or families of Eastern Christianity, each holding a distinct theology and dogma, include the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Oriental Orthodox communion, the Eastern Catholic Churches and the Assyrian Church of the East.

In most Eastern churches, parish priests administer the sacrament of chrismation to infants after baptism, and priests are allowed to marry before ordination. The Eastern Catholic Churches recognize the authority of the Pope of Rome, but some of them who have originally been part of the Orthodox Church or Oriental Orthodox churches closely follow the traditions of Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy, including the tradition of allowing married men to become priests.

The Eastern churches' differences from Western Christianity have to do with theology, as well as liturgy, culture, language, and politics. For the non-Catholic Eastern churches, a definitive date for the commencement of schism cannot usually be given (see East–West Schism). The Church of the East declared independence from the churches of the Roman Empire at its general council in 424, which was before the Council of Ephesus in 431, and so had nothing to do with the theology declared at that council. Oriental Orthodoxy separated after the Council of Chalcedon in 451 but did not immediately form separate patriarchates until 518 (in the case of the Syriac Patriarchate of Antioch) and 536 (in the case of the Coptic Patriarchate of Alexandria).

Since the time of the historian Edward Gibbon, the split between the Church of Rome and the Orthodox Church has been conveniently dated to 1054, though the reality is more complex. This split is sometimes referred to as the Great Schism, but is now more usually called the East–West Schism. This final schism reflected a larger cultural and political division which had developed in Europe and Southwest Asia during the Middle Ages and coincided with Western Europe's re-emergence from the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.

The Ukrainian Lutheran Church developed within Galicia around 1926, with its rites being based on the Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom, rather than on the Western Formula Missae.

Eastern Orthodox Church

The Eastern Orthodox Church is a Christian body whose adherents are largely based in Western Asia (particularly Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, and Palestine) and Turkey, Eastern Europe, the Balkans and the Caucasus (Georgia, Abkhazia, Ossetia etc.), with a growing presence in the Western world. Eastern Orthodox Christians accept the decisions of the first seven ecumenical councils.

Eastern Orthodox Christianity identifies itself as the original Christian church (see early centers of Christianity) founded by Christ and the Apostles, and traces its lineage back to the early Church through the process of apostolic succession and unchanged theology and practice. Characteristics of the Eastern Orthodox Church include the Byzantine Rite (shared with some Eastern Catholic Churches) and an emphasis on the continuation of Holy Tradition, which it holds to be apostolic in nature.

The Eastern Orthodox Church is organized into self-governing jurisdictions along geographical, national, ethnic or linguistic lines. Eastern Orthodoxy is thus made up of fourteen or sixteen autocephalous bodies. Smaller churches are autonomous and each have a mother church that is autocephalous.

All Eastern Orthodox are united in doctrinal agreement with each other, though a few are not in communion at present, for non-doctrinal reasons. This is in contrast to the Catholic Church and its various churches. Members of the latter are all in communion with each other, parts of a top-down hierarchy (see primus inter pares). The Eastern Orthodox reject the Filioque clause as contrast to Catholics. The Catholic Church was once in communion with the Eastern Orthodox Church, but the two split after the East–West Schism and are no longer in communion.

It is estimated that there are approximately 240 million Eastern Orthodox Christians in the world. Today, many adherents shun the term "Eastern" as denying the church's universal character. They refer to Eastern Orthodoxy simply as the Orthodox Church.

Oriental Orthodoxy
Oriental Orthodoxy refers to the churches of Eastern Christian tradition that keep the faith of the first three ecumenical councils of the undivided Christian Church: the First Council of Nicaea (AD 325), the First Council of Constantinople (381) and the Council of Ephesus (431), while rejecting the dogmatic definitions of the Council of Chalcedon (451). Hence, these churches are also called the Old Oriental churches. They comprise the Coptic Orthodox Church, the Malankara Orthodox Church (India), the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church, the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, the Syriac Orthodox Church and the Armenian Apostolic Church.

Oriental Orthodoxy developed in reaction to Chalcedon on the eastern limit of the Byzantine Empire and in Egypt, Syria and Mesopotamia. In those locations, there are also Eastern Orthodox patriarchs, but the rivalry between the two has largely vanished in the centuries since the schism.

Church of the East
Historically, the Church of the East was the widest reaching branch of Eastern Christianity, at its height spreading from its heartland in Persian-ruled Assyria to the Mediterranean, India, and China. Originally the only Christian church recognized by Zoroastrian-led Sassanid Persia (through its alliance with the Lakhmids, the regional rivals to the Byzantines and its Ghassanid vassal), the Church of the East declared itself independent of other churches in 424 and over the next century became affiliated with Nestorianism, a Christological doctrine advanced by Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople from 428 to 431, which had been declared heretical in the Roman Empire. Thereafter it was often known in the West, possibly inaccurately, as the Nestorian Church. Surviving a period of persecution within Persia, the Church of the East flourished under the Abbasid Caliphate and branched out, establishing dioceses throughout Asia. After another period of expansion under the Mongol Empire, the church went into decline starting in the 14th century, and was eventually largely confined to its founding Assyrian adherent's heartland in the Assyrian homeland, although another remnant survived on the Malabar Coast of India.

In the 16th century, dynastic struggles sent the church into schism, resulting in the formation of two rival churches: The Chaldean Catholic Church, which entered into communion with Rome as an Eastern Catholic Church, and the Assyrian Church of the East. The followers of these two churches are almost exclusively ethnic Assyrians. In India, the local Church of the East community, known as the Saint Thomas Christians, experienced its own rifts as a result of Portuguese influence.

Assyrian Church of the East
The Assyrian Church of the East emerged from the historical Church of the East, which was centered in Mesopotamia/Assyria, then part of the Persian Empire, and spread widely throughout Asia. The modern Assyrian Church of the East emerged in the 16th century following a split with the Chaldean Church, which later entered into communion with Rome as an Eastern Catholic Church.

The Church of the East was associated with the doctrine of Nestorianism, advanced by Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople from 428 to 431, which emphasized the disunion between the human and divine natures of Jesus. Nestorius and his doctrine were condemned at the Council of Ephesus in 431, leading to the Nestorian Schism in which churches supporting Nestorius split from the rest of Christianity.

Many followers relocated to Persia and became affiliated with the local Christian community there. This community adopted an increasingly Nestorian theology and was thereafter often known as the Nestorian Church. As such, the Church of the East accepts only the first two ecumenical councils of the undivided Church—the First Council of Nicaea and the First Council of Constantinople—as defining its faith tradition, and rapidly took a different course from other Eastern Christians.

The Church of the East spread widely through Persia and into Asia, being introduced to India by the 6th century and to the Mongols and China in the 7th century. It experienced periodic expansion until the 14th century, when the church was nearly destroyed by the collapse of the Mongol Empire and the conquests of Timur. By the 16th century it was largely confined to Iraq, northeast Syria, southeast Turkey, northwest Iran and the Malabar Coast of India (Kerala). The split of the 15th century, which saw the emergence of separate Assyrian and Chaldean Churches, left only the former as an independent sect. Additional splits into the 20th century further affected the history of the Assyrian Church of the East.

Saint Thomas Syrian Christians
The Saint Thomas Syrian Christians are an ancient body of Syrian Christians in Kerala, Malabar coast of India who trace their origins to the evangelical activity of Thomas the Apostle in the 1st century. Many Assyrian and Jewish communities like the Knanaya and the Cochin Jews assimilated into the Saint Thomas Syrian Christian community. By the 5th century the Saint Thomas Syrian Christians were part of the Church of the East (Nestorian Church). Until the middle of the 17th century and the arrival of the Portuguese, the Thomas Christians were all one in faith and rite. Thereafter, divisions arose among them, and consequently they are today of several different rites. The East Syriac Chaldean Rite (Edessan Rite) Churches among the Saint Thomas Syrian Christians are the Syro Malabar Church and the Chaldean Syrian Church. The West Syriac Antiochian Rite Churches among the Saint Thomas Syrian Christians are the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Church, the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, the Mar Thoma Syrian Church, the Syro Malankara Church and the Thozhiyur Church.

Eastern Catholic Churches
The twenty-three Eastern Catholic Churches are in communion with the Holy See at the Vatican whilst being rooted in the theological and liturgical traditions of Eastern Christianity. Most of these churches were originally part of the Orthodox East, but have since been reconciled to the Latin Church.

Many of these churches were originally part of one of the above families and so are closely related to them by way of ethos and liturgical practice. As in the other Eastern churches, married men may become priests, and parish priests administer the mystery of confirmation to newborn infants immediately after baptism, via the rite of chrismation; the infants are then administered Holy Communion.

The Syro-Malabar Church, which is part of the Saint Thomas Christian community in India, follows East Syriac traditions and liturgy. Other Saint Thomas Christians of India, who were originally of the same East Syriac tradition, passed instead to the West Syriac tradition and now form part of Oriental Orthodoxy (some from the Oriental Orthodox in India united with the Catholic Church in 1930 and became the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church). The Maronite Church claims never to have been separated from Rome, and has no counterpart Orthodox Church out of communion with the Pope. It is therefore inaccurate to refer to it as a "Uniate" Church. The Italo-Albanian Catholic Church has also never been out of communion with Rome, but, unlike the Maronite Church, it resembles the liturgical rite of the Eastern Orthodox Church.

Dissenting movements
In addition to these four mainstream branches, there are a number of much smaller groups which originated from disputes with the dominant tradition of their original areas. Most of these are either part of the more traditional Old Believer movement, which arose from a schism within Russian Orthodoxy, or the more radical Spiritual Christianity movement. The latter includes a number of diverse "low-church" groups, from the Bible-centered Molokans to the anarchic Doukhobors to the self-mutilating Skoptsy. None of these groups are in communion with the mainstream churches listed above. There are also national dissidents, where ethnic groups want their own nation-church, such as the Macedonian Orthodox Church and the Montenegrin Orthodox Church; both are domiciles of the Serbian Orthodox Church. There are also some Reformed Churches which share characteristics of Eastern Christianity, to varying extents.

"True Orthodox" churches
Starting in the 1920s, parallel hierarchies formed in opposition to local Orthodox churches over ecumenism and other matters. These jurisdictions sometimes refer to themselves as being "True Orthodox". In Russia, underground churches formed and maintained solidarity with the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia until the late 1970s. There are now traditionalist Orthodox in every area, though in Asia and Egypt their presence is negligible.

Eastern Protestant Churches
Eastern Protestant Christianity comprises a collection of heterogeneous Protestant denominations which are mostly the result of Protestant Churches adopting Reformation variants of Orthodox Christian liturgy and worship. Some others are the result of reformations of Orthodox Christian beliefs and practices, inspired by the teachings of Western Protestant missionaries. Denominations of this category include the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church , Ukrainian Lutheran Church, St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India, Evangelical Orthodox Church, etc.

Byzantine Rite Lutheranism
Byzantine Rite Lutheranism arose in the Ukrainian Lutheran Church around 1926. It sprung up in the region of Galicia and its rites are based on the Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom. The church suffered persecution under the Communist régime, which implemented a policy of state atheism.

Catholic–Orthodox ecumenism
Ecumenical dialogue since the 1964 meeting between Pope Paul VI and Orthodox Patriarch Athenagoras I has awoken the nearly 1,000-year hopes for Christian unity. Since the lifting of excommunications during the Paul VI and Athenagoras I meeting in Jerusalem there have been other significant meetings between Popes and Ecumenical Patriarchs of Constantinople. One of the most recent meetings was between Benedict XVI and Bartholomew I, who jointly signed the Common Declaration. It states that "We give thanks to the Author of all that is good, who allows us once again, in prayer and in dialogue, to express the joy we feel as brothers and to renew our commitment to move towards full communion".

In 2013 Patriarch Bartholomew I attended the installation ceremony of the new Catholic Pope, Francis, which was the first time any Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople had ever attended such an installation.

In 2019, Primate of the OCU Metropolitan of Kyiv and All Ukraine Epiphanius stated that "theoretically" the Orthodox Church of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church could in the future unite into a united church around the Kyiv throne. In 2019, the primate of the UGCC, Major Archbishop of Kyiv-Galicia Sviatoslav, stated that every effort should be made to restore the original unity of the Kyivan Church in its Orthodox and Catholic branches, saying that the restoration of Eucharistic communion between Rome and Constantinople is not a utopia.

Rejection of Uniatism
At a meeting in Balamand, Lebanon, in June 1993, the Joint International Commission for the Theological Dialogue between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church declared that these initiatives that "led to the union of certain communities with the See of Rome and brought with them, as a consequence, the breaking of communion with their Mother Churches of the East … took place not without the interference of extra-ecclesial interests"; and that what has been called "uniatism" "can no longer be accepted either as a method to be followed nor as a model of the unity our Churches are seeking" (section 12).

At the same time, the Commission stated:
 * 3) Concerning the Eastern Catholic Churches, it is clear that they, as part of the Catholic Communion, have the right to exist and to act in response to the spiritual needs of their faithful.
 * 16) The Oriental Catholic Churches who have desired to re-establish full communion with the See of Rome and have remained faithful to it, have the rights and obligations which are connected with this communion.
 * 22) Pastoral activity in the Catholic Church, Latin as well as Oriental, no longer aims at having the faithful of one Church pass over to the other; that is to say, it no longer aims at proselytizing among the Orthodox. It aims at answering the spiritual needs of its own faithful and it has no desire for expansion at the expense of the Orthodox Church. Within these perspectives, so that there will be no longer place for mistrust and suspicion, it is necessary that there be reciprocal exchanges of information about various pastoral projects and that thus cooperation between bishops and all those with responsibilities in our Churches, can be set in motion and develop.

Migration trends
There has been a significant Christian migration in the 20th century from the Near East. Fifteen hundred years ago Christians were the majority population in today's Turkey, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine and Egypt. In 1914 Christians constituted 25% of the population of the Ottoman Empire. At the beginning of the 21st century Christians constituted 6–7% of the region's population: less than 1% in Turkey, 3% in Iraq, 12% in Syria, 39% in Lebanon, 6% in Jordan, 2.5% in Israel/Palestine and 15–20% in Egypt.

As of 2011 Eastern Orthodox Christians are among the wealthiest Christians in the United States. They also tend to be better educated than most other religious groups in America, having a high number of graduate (68%) and post-graduate (28%) degrees per capita.

Role of Christians in Arabic culture
Scholars and intellectuals agree Christians have made significant contributions to Arab and Islamic civilization since the introduction of Islam, and they have had a significant impact contributing the culture of the Middle East and North Africa and other areas. Byzantine science played an important and crucial role in the transmission of classical knowledge to the Islamic world.

Christians, especially Nestorians, contributed to the Arab Islamic Civilization during the Umayyads and the Abbasids by translating works of Greek philosophers to Syriac and afterwards to Arabic. They also excelled in philosophy, science (such as Hunayn ibn Ishaq, Qusta ibn Luqa, Masawaiyh, Patriarch Eutychius, Jabril ibn Bukhtishu etc.) and theology (such as Tatian, Bar Daisan, Babai the Great, Nestorius, Toma bar Yacoub, etc.) and the personal physicians of the Abbasid Caliphs were often Assyrian Christians such as the long serving Bukhtishus. Many scholars of the House of Wisdom were of Christian background.

A hospital and medical training center existed at Gundeshapur. The city of Gundeshapur was founded in AD 271 by the Sassanid king Shapur I. It was one of the major cities in Khuzestan province of the Persian empire in what is today Iran. A large percentage of the population was Syriacs, most of whom were Christians. Under the rule of Khusraw I, refuge was granted to Greek Nestorian Christian philosophers including the scholars of the Persian School of Edessa (Urfa), also called the academy of Athens, a Christian theological and medical university. These scholars made their way to Gundeshapur in 529 following the closing of the academy by Emperor Justinian. They were engaged in medical sciences and initiated the first translation projects of medical texts. The arrival of these medical practitioners from Edessa marks the beginning of the hospital and medical center at Gundeshapur. It included a medical school and hospital (bimaristan), a pharmacology laboratory, a translation house, a library and an observatory. Indian doctors also contributed to the school at Gundeshapur, most notably the medical researcher Mankah. Later after Islamic invasion, the writings of Mankah and of the Indian doctor Sustura were translated into Arabic at Baghdad. Daud al-Antaki was one of the last generation of influential Arab Christian writers.

Arab Christians and Arabic-speaking Christians, especially Maronites, played important roles in the Nahda, and because Arab Christians formed the educated upper and bourgeois classes, they have had a significant impact in politics, business and culture, and most important figures of the Nahda movement were Christian Arabs. Today Arab Christians still play important roles in the Arab world, and Christians are relatively wealthy, well educated, and politically moderate.

title: Eastern Christianity