FAREWELLS

yndon Van “Lyn” Christie, an Australian emigrant who served for more than 25 years as the house bassist at the Village Gate in New York, died March 28 in Yonkers, N.Y. He was 91. Christie was trained as a physician and practiced medicine in Australia, New Zealand, and the U.S., but music was his principal lifelong passion. In 1965, he moved to America, where he found work with Ahmad Jamal, Chet Baker, Jaki Byard, Tal Farlow, Toshiko Akiyoshi, and many others. His connection with the Village Gate lasted from 1967 until the club’s closing in 1994. He also pursued a parallel career as an orchestral bassist, and in his later years established himself as a music educator, becoming director of jazz studies at the Music Conservatory of Westchester.