Kilimanjaro -

Kilimanjaro was an American jazz-rock band from Vermont that released two albums between 1979 and 1982 on Philo Records.

Background

Kilimanjaro formed in 1978 in Burlington, Vt., when guitarist Paul Asbell assembled keyboardist Chas Eller, bassist Tony Markellis, and drummer Bill Kinzie as the Paul Asbell Quartet. Asbell soon renamed the quartet Kilimanjaro.

Asbell attended the University of Chicago in the late 1960s while playing blues clubs on the South Side. He appeared on the 1969 Muddy Waters album Fathers and Sons and sessions by John Lee Hooker, Earl Hooker, and Howlin’ Wolf. In Vermont, Asbell backed Big Mama Thornton at Goddard College and played a five-night engagement with Sonny Stitt.

Markellis started upright bass in the third grade and played bar gigs through high school. He studied anthropology and art at the University of Michigan, where he played with John Prine, Steve Goodman, and Bonnie Raitt. The David Bromberg Band hired Markellis in 1973 after he left Michigan a few credits short of graduation. Markellis traveled to Ferrisburgh, Vt., for Philo Records sessions with Mary McCaslin and other singer-songwriters at Earth Audio Studio.

Eller studied at the University of Vermont and joined Philo as a recording engineer. At the label’s North Ferrisburg facility, Asbell presented his material to Eller, who became keyboardist for the new quartet. Kinzie joined with 1976–78 credits on local-press albums by the Rockcastle River Company and singer/songwriter Paula Gills. He played drums and castanets on the 1979 sessions for Ornament of Hope, the second album by New Age Philo mainstays Do’a.

By the late 1970s, Kilimanjaro played recurring three-night monthly stands at Hunt’s, a 200-seat Burlington club. By September 1979, engineers Mike Couture and Eller completed the debut album sessions at the 16-track Earth Audio Techniques studio in North Ferrisburgh.

Discography: