"Fats" Sadi Pol Lallemand (23 October 1927, Andenne – 20 February 2009 in Huy) was a Belgian jazz musician, vocalist and composer, playing vibraphone and percussion. He chose Sadi as an artist name as he had an aversion for his last name (which means "the German" in French. He had his own quartet and nonet. Sadi won the Belgian Golden Django for best French-speaking artist in 1996.

After World War II, he became a professional vibraphonist. He performed with Jacques Pelzer in The Bob Shots, then with among others Django Reinhardt, Kenny Clarke, Stéphane Grappelli and Don Byas when he was in Paris (from 1950 to 1961), also co-leading a quartet with pianist Martial Solal in 1955, which recorded the following year. He was also a member of The Kenny Clarke-Francy Boland Big Band. On his return to Belgium, he worked for RTBF, the TV channel of the French Community in Belgium. Sadi became seriously ill in January 1995 and subsequently appeared rarely on stage.

Victor-Marie Hugo (French pronunciation: [viktɔʁ maʁi yɡo]) (26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French poet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist^{[citation needed]} and exponent of the Romantic movement in France.

In France, Hugo's literary fame comes first from his poetry but also rests upon his novels and his dramatic achievements. Among many volumes of poetry, Les Contemplations and La Légende des siècles stand particularly high in critical esteem, and Hugo is sometimes identified as the greatest French poet. Outside France, his best-known works are the novels Les Misérables and Notre-Dame de Paris (also known in English as The Hunchback of Notre-Dame).

Though a committed royalist when he was young, Hugo's views changed as the decades passed; he became a passionate supporter of republicanism^{[citation needed]}, and his work touches upon most of the political and social issues and artistic trends of his time. He is buried in the Panthéon.

Hugo was the third, illegitimate, son of Joseph Léopold Sigisbert Hugo (1774–1828) and Sophie Trébuchet (1772–1821); his brothers were Abel Joseph Hugo (1798–1855) and Eugène Hugo (1800–1837). He was born in 1802 in Besançon (in the region of Franche-Comté) and lived in France for the majority of his life. However, he decided to live in exile as a result of Napoleon III's Coup d'état at the end of 1851.

Martial Solal (born August 23, 1927, Algiers, French Algeria) is a French jazz pianist and composer, who is probably most widely known for the music he wrote for Jean-Luc Godard's debut feature film À bout de souffle (1960).

Solal was the son of an opera singer and piano teacher, who learned the instrument from the age of six. After settling in Paris in 1950, he soon began working with leading musicians including Django Reinhardt and expatriates from the United States like Sidney Bechet and Don Byas. He formed a quartet (occasionally also leading a big band) in the late 1950s, although he had been recording as a leader since 1953. Solal then began composing film music, eventually providing over twenty scores.

In 1963 he made a much admired appearance at the Newport Jazz Festival in Rhode Island; the Newport '63 album purporting to be a recording of this gig is actually a studio recreation. At this time, his regular trio featured bassist Guy Pedersen and drummer Daniel Humair. From 1968 he regularly performed and recorded with Lee Konitz in Europe and the United States of America.

Ray Barretto (April 29, 1929 – February 17, 2006) was a Grammy Award-winning Puerto Rican jazz musician.

Barretto (whose surname is really "Barreto"; a mistake at the time Ray's birth certificate was filed gave his last name its formal spelling) was born in New York City of Puerto Rican descent. His parents moved to New York from Puerto Rico in the early 1920s, looking for a better life. He was raised in Spanish Harlem and at a very young age was influenced by his mother's love of music and by the jazz music of musicians such as Duke Ellington and Count Basie.

In 1946, when Barretto was 17 years old, he joined the Army. While stationed in Germany, Barretto met Belgian vibist Fats Sadi, who was working there. However, it was when he heard Dizzy Gillespie's "Manteca" with Cuban percussionist, Chano Pozo, that he realized his true calling in life.

In 1949, when Barretto returned home from military service, he started to visit clubs and participated in jam sessions, where he perfected his conga playing. On one occasion Charlie Parker heard Barretto play and invited him to play in his band. Later, he was asked to play for Jose Curbelo and Tito Puente, for whom he played for four years. Barretto developed a unique style of playing the conga and soon he was sought by other jazz band leaders. Latin percussionists started to appear in jazz groups with frequency as a consequence of Barretto's musical influence.

Carlos Wesley "Don" Byas (October 21, 1912 – August 24, 1972) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist, most associated with Bebop. He played with Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Art Blakey, and Dizzy Gillespie, among others, as well as lead his own band. He lived in Europe for the last 26 years of his life.

Don Byas was born in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Both of Byas' parents were musicians. His mother played the piano, and his father, the clarinet. Byas started his training in classical music, learning to play violin, clarinet and alto saxophone, which he played until the end of the 1920s. Benny Carter, who played many instruments, was his idol at this time. He started playing in local orchestras at the age of 17, with Bennie Moten, Terrence Holder and Walter Page. He founded and led his own college band, "Don Carlos and His Collegiate Ramblers", during 1931-32, at Langston College, Oklahoma.

Byas switched to the tenor saxophone after he moved to the West Coast and played with several Los Angeles bands. In 1933, he took part in a West coast tour of Bert Johnson’s Sharps and Flats. He worked in Lionel Hampton’s band at the Paradise Club in 1935 along with the reed player and arranger Eddie Barefield and trombonist Tyree Glenn. He also played with Eddie Barefield, Buck Clayton, Lorenzo Flennoy and Charlie Echols.