Jazz / Jazz-Funk, Fusion, Post-Bop, Crossover Jazz
Terence Blanchard - Musician, Trumpet, Synthesizer Programming
Aaron Parks Musician, Piano
Brice Winston Musician, Sax (Soprano), EWI, Sax (Tenor)
Bruce Lundvall Executive Producer
Burton Yount Art Direction, Design
Chris Cofoni A&R
Derrick Hodge Bass, Musician
Don Murray Engineer
Eli Wolf Artist Coordination
Glenn Pittman Assistant Engineer
Gordon Jee Creative Director
Gretchen Parlato Vocals, Musician
Herbie Hancock Musician, Producer, Piano
Howard Drossin Musician, Synthesizer Programming
Kendrick Scott Drums, Musician
Lionel Loueke Vocals, Guitar, Musician
Nitin Vadukul Concept, Photography
Robert Vosgien Mastering
Robin Burgess Associate Producer
Seth Presant Mixing Assistant
Shanieka D. Brooks Product Manager
Vincent Bennett Project Coordinator
From 1949 to 1975, Blue Note Records signed and/or recorded just about every trumpet-player-that-mattered in jazz: Fats Navarro, Clifford Brown, Miles Davis, Kenny Dorham, Lee Morgan, Freddie Hubbard, Donald Byrd, Don Cherry, Blue Mitchell. Fitting then, that now that the label is enjoying an artistic and commercial renaissance, it's no mere coincidence that its current roster includes one of the most celebrated, influential and gifted trumpeter/composers to walk the planet since those halcyon days: Terence Blanchard.
Two years ago, Blue Note released Blanchard's critically acclaimed album Bounce. This June (2005), the trumpeter-composer's second label release hits the shops. Produced by the artist and four-time Grammy winner Herbie Hancock, Flow heralds nothing less than the brilliant second act of Blanchard’s already extraordinary career. Flow is TB's rambunctiously heated answer to those unenlightened few who doubted that this chill master of the urbane film score (Mo’ Better Blues, Malcolm X, Barbershop) could get down. Indeed, Flow not only showcases Blanchard's prodigious instrumental and composing skills; it reveals him to be both a shrewd judge of young talent and a bandleader of Milesian dimension and magnitude as well.
Terence Blanchard
Active Decades: '80s, '90s and '00s
Born: Mar 13, 1962 in New Orleans, LA
Genre: Jazz
In the post-Wynton Marsalis era, jazz trumpeter Terence Blanchard has become a most prominent brass player, bandleader, recording artist, orchestrator of film scores, and leader in the mainstream post-bop community. Born on March 13, 1962, in New Orleans, LA, Terence Oliver Blanchard was an only child to parents Wilhelmina and Joseph Oliver Blanchard. He began playing piano by the age of five, switched to trumpet three years later, and played alongside childhood friend Marsalis in summer band camps. While in high school, he took extracurricular classes at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts with Roger Dickerson and Ellis Marsalis. From 1980 to 1982, Blanchard studied under Paul Jeffrey and Bill Fielder at Rutgers University in New Jersey while touring with Lionel Hampton's orchestra. In 1982 Blanchard replaced Wynton Marsalis under his recommendation in Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, working in that band up to 1986 as lead soloist and musical director. He then co-led a prominent quintet with saxophonist Donald Harrison, recording seven albums for the Concord, Columbia, and Evidence record labels in five years, including a stirring in-concert tribute to the Eric DolphyBooker Little ensemble.
In the 1990s, Blanchard became a leader in his own right, recording for the Columbia label, performing on the soundtracks to Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing and Mo' Better Blues, and composing the music for Lee's film Jungle Fever. In fact, Blanchard has written the score for every Spike Lee film since 1991, including Malcolm X, Clockers, Summer of Sam, 25th Hour, Inside Man, and the Hurricane Katrina documentary When the Levees Broke for HBO. With over 40 scores to his credit, Blanchard and Mark Isham are the most sought-after jazz musicians to ever compose for film. In the fall of 2000, Blanchard was named artistic director of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. Keeping up with his love of live performance and touring, Blanchard also maintains a regular studio presence, recording his own original music for the Columbia, Sony Classical, and Blue Note labels. Albums include The Billie Holiday Songbook (1994), Romantic Defiance (1995), The Heart Speaks (1996), the acclaimed Wandering Moon (2000), Let's Get Lost (2001), Bounce (2003), and especially Flow (2005), which was produced by pianist Herbie Hancock and received two Grammy nominations. Blanchard has been nominated for 11 Grammys and has won four in total, including awards for New York Scene with Blakey (1984) and the soundtrack A Tale of God's Will in 2007. In 2005, Blanchard was part of McCoy Tyner's ensemble that won the Grammy in the Best Jazz Instrumental Album category for Illuminations.
A quintessential sideman as well as leader, he has worked with prominent jazz players including Cedar Walton, Abbey Lincoln, Joanne Brackeen, Jay McShann, Ralph Peterson, Ed Thigpen, J.J. Johnson, Toots Thielemans, the Olympia Brass Band, Stevie Wonder, Bill Lee, Ray Brown, Poncho Sanchez, Dr. Billy Taylor, Dr. John, Lionel Loueke, Jeff Watts, and many others. Scarecrow Press published his autobiography, -Contemporary Cat. By April of 2007, the Monk Institute announced its Commitment to New Orleans initiative, which included the relocation of the program to the campus of Loyola University in New Orleans, spearheaded by Blanchard. During 2007, the Monterey Jazz Festival named Blanchard Artist-in-Residence, and the festival formed a 50th Anniversary All-Stars ensemble featuring the trumpeter, James Moody, Benny Green, Derrick Hodge, Kendrick Scott, and Nnenna Freelon. In 2008, Blanchard helped scored the hit film Cadillac Records. Signing with Concord Jazz in 2009, he released Choices -- recorded at the Ogden Museum of Art in Blanchard's hometown of New Orleans -- at the end of that summer.
---Michael G. Nastos, All Music Guide |
