Harold Land
Harold de Vance Land (born December 18, 1928 in Houston , Texas , † July 27, 2001 in Los Angeles , California ) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist and composer.
biography
Land grew up in San Diego and started out on the rhythm and blues scene. He made his first recordings as a leader in 1949 for Savoy Records. His career reached a high point in 1954/55 as a member of the quintet of Max Roach and Clifford Brown , to which he also contributed his own compositions. In 1955 he left the band (he was succeeded by Sonny Rollins before the quintet was dissolved in 1956 because of the death of Brown) and moved back to Los Angeles , where his family had lived since 1954 and his grandmother was just dying. From 1956 to 1958 he played in Curtis Counce's band . His album The Fox , published in 1958, enjoys cult status among hardbop connoisseurs. Initially at home in hardbop (and thus the counterexample for the thesis that there was no hardbop on the west coast), he played under the influence of John Coltrane in the 1960s . In Los Angeles he worked as a studio musician, played in Gerald Wilson's band (from 1955), in 1961 with the Jazz Giants of Shorty Rogers , led his own groups and was co-leader in groups with Red Mitchell (1961/2), Bobby Hutcherson (1969 to 1971), Blue Mitchell (1975 to 1978). In the 1980s he starred in the Timeless All Stars with Billy Higgins .
From 1996 he was professor in the Jazz Studies program at the University of California in Los Angeles.
In addition to the saxophone, he also played the flute and oboe. His son Harold Land junior , born in 1950, is a jazz pianist who also played in his father's various groups.
Discography (selection)
- The Harold Land Quintet , 1958
- Harold Land in the Land of Jazz , Contemporary Records / OJC 1958 (later published as Grooveyard , based on the piece by Carl Perkins on the album, with Rolf Ericson , Leroy Vinnegar , Frank Butler, Carl Perkins)
- The Fox with Elmo Hope (piano), Dupree Bolton (trumpet), Herbie Lewis (bass) and Frank Butler (drums) ( HiFi Jazz ; producer: David Axelrod ; 1959).
- West Coast Blues , Jazzland / OJC 1960 (with Wes Montgomery )
- A New Shade of Blue (Maintream 1971, reissue 2017), with Bobby Hutcherson , Bill Henderson , Buster Williams , Billy Hart , Mtume
Web links
- Works by and about Harold Land in the catalog of the German National Library
- Selected discography
- Marcus Woelfle : Harold in the land of jazz. In memoriam Harold Land , Obituary, Jazzzeitung , 2001/11
- Obituary in The Guardian
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Country, Harold |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | De Vance Land, Harold (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American tenor saxophonist and composer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 18, 1928 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Houston , Texas |
| DATE OF DEATH | July 27, 2001 |
| Place of death | Los Angeles , California |