Sam T. Brown

Sam T. Brown (born January 19, 1939 in St. Louis , Missouri , † December 28, 1977 in Bloomington , Indiana ) was an American jazz guitarist who mainly played acoustic guitar.

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Brown, whose father was a musician, took piano lessons from the age of six. At the age of twelve he switched to the guitar, which he played in a dance band (with weekly appearances on the local television station). After attending the Mannes College of Music from 1958 to 1960, he attended master classes with Julian Bream and Gustavo Lopez . In 1961 he was a member of Chuck Speas' American Jazz Septet , then he worked with Miriam Makeba ; In 1965 he was involved in their joint album An Evening with Belafonte / Makeba with Harry Belafonte , which was awarded a Grammy . After joining Paul Winter's sextet in 1964 , he accompanied Ella Fitzgerald , with whom he also appeared on the Tonight Show . From the mid-1960s he worked with Gary McFarland and Gabor Szabo , before performing with the art rock band Ars Nova in 1968/69 . He has also worked for Duke Pearson , Mike Mainieri and Hubert Laws . Carla Bley hired him for her recording of Escalator over the Hill . He was also part of the first edition of Charlie Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra . He was later a member of the Thad Jones / Mel Lewis Orchestra .

In 1971 he played in Gary Burton's quartet and was involved in its recording with Keith Jarrett . In 1972 Jarrett brought him to his production Expectations ; he also worked with Jarrett and violinist Leroy Jenkins on Paul Motian's debut album Conception Vessel . In 1974 he played on Jarrett's Treasure Island and was then part of Herbie Mann's band . He has also recorded with Louis Armstrong , Paul Desmond , Bill Evans , Richard Davis and Bill Lee, and James Brown and Tim Hardin .

Leonard Feather , Ira Gitler : The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz. Oxford University Press, New York 1999, ISBN 0-19-532000-X .