"Although jazz musicians are used to improvising they need to be familiar with how another musician plays before they can really get something going; they have to listen and get their minds on the same track or they get a lot of hesitations and false starts. But when I started in on "Little Girl Blue", Al was right there with me from the first moment, as if we had been playing together all our lives. It was more than that even: it was as if we were one instrument split in two, I, the piano, Al, the guitar. I had never felt so much freedom in playing; knowing that someone knew where I was going and I knew where he was going. It was like telepathy - we couldn't loose each other. And Al had perfect pitch, too, so I never had to tell him what key to play."

NINA SIMONE - Quoted from her autobiography "I Put A Spell On You"

"Al Schackman and I met in the mid sixties in Paris, since then I have had many opportunities to hear him, especially when he worked with Nina Simone as her musical director.

To me Al Schackman is a peerless musician.

As a musical director, band leader, composer, arranger, guitarist, vibraphonist, he is among the most gifted musicians I have ever met in my life.."

MAURICE CULLAZ - President of The French Jazz Academy, Historian, and Producer at Radio France

"Pianist George Syran had a job playing with a trio in New Hope, Pennsylvania, for the summer, but he had another engagement for the weekend and wanted a substitute. He called me and asked if I would go.

The guitar player in the trio was Al Schackman a fabulous musician, whom I heard play at several sessions in New York….

Playing with Al Schackman was like having a Jam session and by the second night it wasn't even like a job anymore."

DAVID AMRAM - First resident composer for the New York Philharmonic Symphony under Leonard Bernstein - Quoted from his autobiography "Vibrations"