Kenny Garrett

Schooled in the jazz traditions and inspired by boundless post-be bop ambitions, saxophonist Kenny Garrett – born in Detroit, Michigan on October 9, 1960 - crafted his own signature sound in the 1980s and 1990s and continues to experiment with Asian, Middle Eastern and Turkish music. Kenny Garrett picked up his saxophone skills from his father, who played it as a hobby. Kenny Garrett was mentored by the great trumpet player Marcus Belgrave, before joining the Duke Ellington Orchestra (then run by Duke's son Mercer) at just 17. When the orchestra went to perform on Broadway, he stayed in New York and learned his trade playing with Freddie Hubbard, Woody Shaw, and Art Blakey. He released Introducing Kenny Garrett, his debut as a band leader, in late 1984. He also played and recorded three albums with Miles Davis during the last five years of the jazz legend's life and signed to Atlantic Records for his own breakthrough albums Prisoner of Love (1989) and African Exchange Student (1990). Well-established in the jazz world, he received wider recognition when he was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1997 for the album Songbook and again in 2006 for Beyond the Wall. He finally won a Grammy Award in 2010 for Best Instrumental Jazz Album for the live recording Five Peace Band. Known for his raucous, exuberant style of playing, Kenny Garrett was influenced by jazz greats like John Coltrane and Dizzy Gillespie but also soaked in the spirit of James Brown and Prince and has gone on to work with fellow saxophonist Pharaoh Sanders and make fusion records with multi-instrumentalist Marcus Miller. Further albums by Kenny Garrett include Sounds from the Underground (2012), Pushing the World Away (2013), Sounds from the Ancestors (2021), and Who Killed AI? (2024), which was a collaboration with electronica / pop artist and producer Svoy.

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