Kamasi Washington

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Kamasi Washington 2017

Kamasi Washington (born February 18, 1981 in Los Angeles ) is an American tenor saxophonist . The musician is mainly active in jazz , but also in other genres and works as a sideman and arranger .

Life

Kamasi Washington, the son of saxophonist Rickey Washington, grew up in Inglewood, California . At the age of 13 he decided to play the saxophone, having previously played several other instruments. After attending the Hamilton High School Academy of Performing Arts , he studied ethnomusicology at the University of California in Los Angeles. There he played together with his childhood friend Stephen Bruner ( Thundercat , Bass), his brother Ronald Bruner Jr. (drums) and Cameron Graves (piano) in the jazz formation Young Jazz Giants , which released an album with the same title in 2004.

In the years that followed, Washington regularly self-published music and made a name for himself as a sideman in the Los Angeles music scene. As a saxophonist he can be heard on publications by Gerald Wilson and Harvey Mason, among others ; he also played with McCoy Tyner , Raphael Saadiq , George Duke and toured with Snoop Dogg . Together with Thundercat he played on the album You're Dead! by Flying Lotus and a few months later on Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly , to which he also contributed string arrangements.

Kamasi Washington at the INNtöne Jazzfestival 2018

In May 2015, Brainfeeder , Washington's debut album as a band leader, was released on the Flying Lotus label. The triple album The Epic is almost three hours long and is played by a ten-piece band, a 32-piece orchestra and a ten-piece choir. In addition to numerous original compositions, Washington also interprets the Cherokee jazz standard and Claude Debussy's Clair de Lune . Thundercat and his brother Ronald Bruner Jr. can be heard again in the band, which includes two bassists and two drummers. On the 2017 EP Harmony of Difference he deals with counterpoint . The album was created as part of the multimedia project Whitney Museum of American Art 2017 Biennial with a film by AG Rojas and paintings by his sister Amani Washington.

In addition to his projects as a band leader and feature artist, Kamasi Washington is part of two bands. Washington has been part of the avant-garde punk group Throttle Elevator Music since 2012. In summer 2020 he also released an album with Dinner Party, a "supergroup of neo-jazz and hip-hop musicians [Kamasi Washington, Robert Glasper , Terrace Martin and 9th Wonder ]" ( ByteFM ).

Washington names jazz classics like John Coltrane , Charlie Parker and Wayne Shorter as important influences, but at the same time expresses the hope that his music like that of Kendrick Lamar, Flying Lotus and Thundercat could open new doors for jazz.

Discographic notes

Chart positions
Explanation of the data
Albums
The Epic
  DE 32 
platinum
platinum
06/05/2015 (8 weeks)
  CH 41 05/31/2015 (3 weeks)
Harmony of Difference
  UK 85 October 12, 2017 (1 week)
Heaven and Earth
  DE 4th 06/29/2018 (8 weeks)
  AT 13 07/06/2018 (3 weeks)
  CH 8th 07/01/2018 (4 weeks)
  UK 13 07/05/2018 (2 weeks)
  US 115 07/07/2018 (1 week)

under his own name

  • The Epic (2015),
  • Harmony of Difference (2017)
  • Heaven and Earth (2018)

as a sideman

Web links

Commons : Kamasi Washington  - Collection of Images

supporting documents

  1. ↑ Jazzvespers All Saints Church program ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.allsaints-pas.org
  2. ↑ a b allmusic.com , viewed May 5, 2015.
  3. ↑ a b c Chris Barton: Kamasi Washington expands jazz's boundaries on new album The Epic , Los Angeles Times on May 4, 2015, seen May 5, 2015.
  4. ↑ Patrick Jarenwattananon: First Listen: Kamasi Washington, The Epic , National Public Radio on April 26, 2015, viewed May 5, 2015.
  5. ↑ Jeff Weiss: To Inglewood Saxophonist Might Have Made the Best Jazz Record of the Year , LA Weekly April 29, 2015, seen May 5, 2015.
  6. ↑ Booklet for the CD.
  7. ↑ Throttle Elevator Music | Biography & History. Retrieved July 11, 2020 (American English).
  8. ↑ Terrace Martin, Kamasi Washington, Robert Glasper and 9th Wonder invite you to the "Dinner Party" - ByteFM. In: ByteFM Blog - News and reviews from our editorial team. July 10, 2020, accessed on July 11, 2020 (German).
  9. ↑ Chart sources: Germany / AT / Switzerland / UK / US .
  10. ↑ Awards: DE ( Jazz Award ).
  11. ↑ Michael Rüsenberg meeting
  12. ^ Adrian Kreye: The power of counterpoint Süddeutsche Zeitung , October 11, 2017.
personal data
SURNAME Washington, Kamasi
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American jazz musician (tenor saxophone)
DATE OF BIRTH 18th February 1981
PLACE OF BIRTH Los Angeles , California , USA