Sam Yahel was born in Atlanta, Georgia, where he started playing the piano at the age of six. After growing up in Europe, Yahel moved to New York City in 1990 in order to enrol in The New School Jazz department. There he quickly expanded his horizons by taking up the Hammond organ. Shortly after, Yahel started to work a lot in and around Manhattan Area, specifically at a club near Harlem called "Angies" (later renamed "Smoke") and later at a downtown club "Smalls". During this time, he was doing a lot of playing with some great local musicians, including Peter Bernstein on guitar, Ryan Kisor on trumpet and Eric Alexander on saxophone. His first album "Searchin" is a poignant document of this productive period of development. <a href="https://www.last.fm/music/Sam+Yahel">Read more on Last.fm</a>. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.