Iconic jazz saxophonist Wayne Shorter died at age 89 in Los Angeles on Thursday March 2, the American daily reported. New York Times, citing his publicist. The American music giant has been one of the genre’s most influential composers.
With a career spanning over half a century, Wayne Shorter shaped jazz and its major changes, most notably in the 1960s and 1970s, both as a bandleader and alongside fellow giants Miles Davis, Art Blakey, Joni Mitchell and Carlos Santana.
His death was confirmed by his publicist Alisse Kingsley, nearby New York Times and the Washington Post, without citing the cause of death of this musician born in 1933 in Newark, near New York.
If he became a star with his album Speak No Evil of 1964, the one who was also a much admired composer had already made an impression as musical director of Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers and member of the Miles Davis Quintet, from 1964 to 1970. Within this, his mixture of both complex and melodic harmonies helped the trumpeter’s group to break the still very hermetic border between acoustic jazz, electric jazz and rock, with his compositions like ” Nefertiti » Or ” Sanctuary », exit in the legendary disc Bitches Brewin 1970.
He then marked the genre again with jazz fusion, in particular by founding the mythical group Weather Report, which had in its formation the legendary bassist Jaco Pastorius.
A saxophone at speech a little more dreamy »
” Even if he is not a leader, like John Coltrane or Charlie Parker, who suddenly showed the way, he contributed a lot to the history of jazzbelieves Franck Bergerot, journalist and author of several books on Miles Davis. He is a character, a poet, someone completely apart, who has contributed to great stories since he was the musical director of Art Blakey and an important composer. “, continues the historian.
In 1960, he was 26 when he was hired by Art Blakey in his Jazz Messengers: since then, and until his health suddenly deteriorated in early 2019, this tenor and soprano saxophonist had almost always remained at the top. Discreetly. ” She stood out against the more manly voices of hard bopnotes Franck Bergerot, citing the subgenre of jazz with which these great names have been associated. He embodied a kind of middle voice, a little more dreamy speech. »
This style, this slightly crooked phrasing, these never-conventional choruses, made up of suspensions, disconcerting changes of direction and tempo, will blossom fully with Miles Davis. The climate music advocated by the famous trumpeter, contrasting with the hard bop of Art Blakey more fits in, frees up spaces for him.
(more information to come)