Marzette Watts

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Marzette Watts (born March 9, 1938 in Montgomery , Alabama , † March 2, 1998 in Nashville , Tennessee ) was a tenor saxophonist of free jazz .

Live and act

Marzette Watts dealt with the fine arts early on; as a child he learned to play the piano and as a teenager he learned to play the saxophone and clarinet. He initially studied art at Alabama State College, but switched to music in 1957 under the impression of a Sonny Rollins' concert during a stay in New York City, where he moved in 1960. There he continued his studies at New York University with a degree in art education in 1962, then moved to Paris to study painting at the Sorbonne . He also played the saxophone as a street musician.

After his return to New York in 1963, Watts came into contact with the writer LeRoi Jones , the jazz musicians Marion Brown , Archie Shepp and Byard Lancaster , but also with visual artists such as Willem de Kooning and Mark Rothko . After a stay in Denmark in 1965, he lived in New York again and began to rehearse with a jazz group that included Clifford Thornton ; In 1966 the album Marzette & Company was released , which was released by ESP-Disk in 1971 and on which Byard Lancaster, Karl Berger , Juni Booth , Henry Grimes , JC Moses and Sonny Sharrock also participated. In 1968, under the direction of Bill Dixon , Watts recorded another album for Savoy Records , The Marzette Watts Ensemble . Thornton gave Watts a job as a music teacher at Wesleyan University in the late 1960s , where, in addition to teaching, he dealt with electronic music and produced experimental films. In the 1970s Watts worked as a sound engineer for loft jazz sessions and worked a. a. with recordings of Ronnie Boykins , Rashied Ali and Arthur Doyle . After moving to California, where he raised his five children, he worked as a film composer and experimental sound designer. He died in March 1998, shortly before his sixtieth birthday.

Discography

  • Marzette Watts & Company (ESP disk, 1966)
  • The Marzette Watts Ensemble (Savoy, 1968)

Lexical entries

  • Todd S. Jenkins: Free Jazz and Free Improvisation. To Encyclopedia. Vol. 2 Westport (CT), London: Greenwood Press 2004; ISBN 0-313-33314-9 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Instrumentation: George Turner (cornet), Marty Cook (trombone), Marzette Watts (tenor saxophone), Frank Kipers (violin), Bobby Few (piano), Joony Booth, Cevera Jeffers, Steve Tintweiss (bass), Tom Berge, JC Moses (Drums) Amy Schaeffer, Patty Waters (vocals), cf. Savoy Discography from 1966 at Jazzdisco.org
personal data
SURNAME Watts, Marzette
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American jazz musician and composer
DATE OF BIRTH March 9, 1938
PLACE OF BIRTH Montgomery, Alabama
DATE OF DEATH March 2, 1998
Place of death Nashville , Tennessee