2024-09-25 07:58:32
At the age of 95, the famous American jazz saxophonist Benny Golson, the author of the songs Killer Joe, Whisper Not and Along Came Betty, died. The musician associated with the style called hard bop also performed twice in the Czech Republic, first in 2010 at the invitation of the then president Václav Klaus at the Prague Castle, and the second time nine years later at the Jazz Dock club.
The artist died after a short illness at home in Manhattan, New York, the AP agency reported, citing his agent.
Benny Golson toured for more than seven decades. During that time, he managed to collaborate with some of the biggest stars of the genre, such as trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, vibraphonist Lionel Hampton or saxophonist John Coltrane. He belonged more to the traditionalists. He criticized avant-gardists or players who he said prioritize technique over content.
Golson made a particularly significant mark as an author. Among other things, he composed the song I Remember Clifford, written in 1956 after his friend and trumpeter Clifford Brown died in a car accident aged just 25. Golson’s composition Killer Joe was already recorded by Quincy Jones in 1969, while Miles Davis recorded his Stablemates.
A native of Philadelphia, Golson learned piano from the age of nine, and picked up the saxophone for the first time at fourteen. While still a high school student, he began performing, among others alongside his childhood friend John Coltrane. By the time Golson entered Howard University in Washington, he was already composing. “I didn’t just want to play tenor, I also wanted to write,” he explained.
He first drew attention to himself in Dizzy Gillespie’s big band or as a member of drummer Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers group. Her award-winning 1958 record Moanin’ featured six tracks, four of which Golson wrote. A year earlier, trumpeter Lee Morgan released an album on which all five of Golson’s compositions are featured, the New York Times points out.
Saxophonist Benny Golson in his youth. | Photo: bennygolson.com
In 1959, Golson founded his best-known group, the six-piece Jazztet, with trumpeter Art Farmer. It lasted in this form for three years and helped, among other things, launch the career of pianist McCoy Tyner, who then headed straight from Golson to the better-known John Coltrane.
In the next decade, Golson moved to Los Angeles, where, like Quincy Jones at the time, he primarily composed, among other things, music for the television series Mannix or the original Mission: Impossible from 1966. In the role of arranger, he worked for singers Peggy Lee and Dusty Springfield or a jazz singer Lou Rawls.
In the 1970s, after a long hiatus, Golson began performing regularly as a saxophonist again. In the early 1980s, together with Art Farmer, they renewed their Jazztet, with which they also went on a world tour with moderate success.
Since then, the musician has performed regularly, until the last few years. In June 2010, he was a guest of the series Jazz at the Castle, organized by the then president Václav Klaus. On the terrace of the Equestrian Hall of the Prague Castle, the saxophonist was accompanied by pianist Kirk Lightsey, double bassist Gilles Naturel and drummer Doug Sides.
In November 2019, when he was 90 years old, Benny Golson came to Prague’s Jazz Dock club, where he was accompanied by pianist Antonio Faraò, double bassist Ira Coleman and drummer Mike Baker.
In 2019, Benny Golson performed with a quartet at the Jazz Dock club in Prague. He was 90 years old then. | Video: Jazz Dock
But shortly after, the coronavirus pandemic began, during which Golson definitively stopped performing, the AP agency notes. According to her, at this time, the saxophonist, who published an autobiography in 2016, gave an interview to the authors of the documentary called Benny Golson: Looking Beyond The Horizon.
According to his agent Jason Franklin, the musician saw the rough cut a few weeks ago and praised it. “It made him happy,” said an agent who worked for him for more than a quarter of a century.
Benny Golson had dozens of studio albums under his own name. In 2004, he also played himself in Steven Spielberg’s The Terminal.
In this comedy-drama, the hero, played by Tom Hanks, flies from a fictional Eastern European country to New York just to get Golson’s autograph. His goal is to have the signatures of all the jazz musicians who appeared in Art Kane’s famous 1958 photo of New York’s Harlem called A Great Day in Harlem.
“It was the very first time that so many musicians had gathered for one photo. Moreover, at ten in the morning. I thought it would be sold out quickly, but in the end we were there for a good six hours, maybe more,” Golson recalled in an interview with Czech Radio jazz. “It helped my career, I started recording a lot,” he praised the photo.
Of the total of 57 musicians captured in this image, only saxophonist Sonny Rollins, who celebrated his 94th birthday earlier this month, is still alive after Golson’s death.
It was the scene from the movie The Terminal that well-known Hollywood actor Steve Martin remembered on Sunday when he commented on Golson’s death on the social network X. “Thanks for all the great music,” he wrote.
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