"[1] Eaton was born in Washington, D.C.[2] He first learned about jazz from his father, a journalist who played the piano every evening after work.
[1] Also in 1988, Eaton has performed as headliner in the East Room of the White House for President Reagan, and both as soloist and with artists as Zoot Sims, Benny Carter, Duke Ellington, Clark Terry, and Wild Bill Davison.
[6] Eaton is known for a CD series project John Eaton Presents the American Popular Song in cooperation with the Wolf Trap Foundation for the Performing Arts, the operational partner of the Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts.
This includes thirteen separate recorded broadcast programs in concert and conversation with jazz bassist Jay Leonhart.
Each program focuses on major artists, composers or collaborators in American music, including Richard Rodgers, Harold Arlen, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, Julie Styne, Irving Berlin, Kurt Weill and Vernon Duke, and Hoagy Carmichael and Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Harry Warren, Jimmy Van Heusen, Frank Loesser, The Beatles, and Bob Dylan.