Today is the birthday of another of the great musicians of the last 20 years, who I discovered last year when I listened to his album Earfood– what’s new!! It’s what happens when you’re paying more attention to the past and not the present. Anyway, today is the 45th birthday of trumpeter Roy Hargrove. From All About Jazz….
Trumpeter Roy Hargrove was born in Waco, TX on October 16, 1969. Inspired by the gospel music he heard in church on Sundays and the R&B and funk music that played on the radio, Roy began learning the trumpet in the fourth grade. By junior high school, he was playing at an advanced level of proficiency. At 16, he was studying music at Dallas’s prestigious Booker T. Washington School for the Visual and Performing Arts.. Midway through his junior year, Roy was “discovered” by Wynton Marsalis, who was conducting a jazz clinic at the school. Impressed, Marsalis invited Roy to sit in with his band at Ft. Worth’s Caravan of Dreams Performing Arts Center. Subsequently, Hargrove was able to return to the venue over a period of the next three months, sitting in with Dizzy Gillespie, Herbie Hancock, Freddie Hubbard and Bobby Hutcherson. Word of Roy’s talent reached Paul Ackett, founder and Director of The North Sea Jazz Festival who arranged for him to perform there that summer. This led to a month-long European Tour.
Wow! And as they say he has never looked back, and has become of his generation’s premier players in jazz!
Every album Roy has released on Verve has been different from the one preceding it. And the same can be said of the array of talents who have invited him to grace the stage and/or their recordings – from jazz legends Sonny Rollins and Jackie McLean to song stylists Natalie Cole, Diana Krall and Abbey Lincoln. From pop veterans Diana Ross, Steve Tyrell and Kenny Rankin to younger stars John Mayer and Rhian Benson to the crème de la crème of jazz divas: Carmen McRae and the late, great Shirley Horn. Hargrove was also commissioned by the Lincoln Jazz Center to compose the piece “The Love Suite: In Mahogany,” which was performed in 1993. He is also a superstar of the international touring scene with his quintet, RH Factor, and as a soloist.
Those are some big names, Roy must be something great and I guess the following proves it
During his tenure on the Verve label alone, he has recorded an album with a hand- picked collection of the world’s greatest tenor saxsophonists (With The Tenors Of Our Time), an album of standards with strings (Moment to Moment) and, in 2003, introduced his own hip hop/jazz collective The RH Factor with the groundbreaking CD Hard Groove (swiftly followed by the limited edition EP,Strength). Hargrove has also won Grammy® Awards for two vastly different projects. In 1997, Roy’s Cuban-based band Crisol — including piano legend Jesus “Chucho” Valdes and wonder drummer Horatio “El Negro” Hernandez, and guitar virtuoso Russell Malone – won the Best Latin Jazz Performance Grammy for the album Habana. And in 2002, Hargrove, Herbie Hancock and Michael Brecker won Best Instrumental Jazz Album, Individual or Group, for their three-way collaboration, Directions In Music. Read More
Chucho Valdés! I almost went on a learning expedition to find our more about him back on the; 9th of October, which was the day he was born in 1941.You can read about him here and there’s more to read about Roy here at All About Jazz! Now let’s get to the music. The band that interests me from above is Crisol, So here’s the band performing “Una Mas” Yo quiero mas! Oh and Happy Birthday Roy!!
