Yusef Lateef

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Dr. Yusef Lateef (born William Emanuel Huddleston, October 9, 1920) is an American jazz musician. He plays principally on tenor saxophone and flute. He is known for his innovative blending of "Eastern" music with American jazz. He also plays the oboe, bamboo flute, shanai, shofar, arghul, sarewa, and koto.

Contents 1 Early life 2 Career 3 Higher education and Islam 4 Selected discography 5 External links

[edit] Early life

Yusef Lateef was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee. In 1925, Lateef and his family moved to Detroit, Michigan where Lateef's musical career would begin. Throughout his early life Lateef came into contact with a number of accomplished jazz musicians including Milt Jackson, Paul Chambers, Elvin Jones, and Kenny Burrell. Lateef was a proficient saxophonist by the time of his graduation from high school at age 18, at which point he launched his professional career and began touring with a number of swing bands. In 1949, at this stage using the name William Evans, Lateef was invited by Dizzy Gillespie to tour with his world-renowned orchestra.

[edit] Career

Lateef first began recording as a leader in 1957 for Savoy Records, a non-exclusive association which continued until 1959; the earliest of Lateef's album's for the Prestige subsidiary New Jazz overlap with them.

By 1961, with the recording of Into Something, Lateef's dominant presence within a group context had emerged. His "Eastern" influences are clearly audible in all of these recordings; while they remain within the bounds of approachability for most Western ears, his tendency to make use of instrumentation from outside western music is very conspicuous. During this period he made numerous contributions to other people's albums and was a member of Cannonball Adderley's Quintet for two years (1962-64).

Lateef's sound has been claimed to have been a major influence on the saxophonist John Coltrane, whose later period free jazz recordings contain similarly "Eastern" traits. For a time (1963-66) Lateef was signed to Coltrane's label, Impulse. He had a regular working group during this period, with trumpeter Richard Williams and Mike Nock on piano. They enjoyed a residency at Pep's Lounge during June 1964; an evening of which has been issued on LP and CD.

In 1992, Lateef founded YAL Records, his own label for which he records today. In 1993, Lateef was commissioned by the WDR Radio Orchestra to compose The African American Epic Suite, a four part work for orchestra and quartet based on themes of slavery and disfranchisement in the United States. The piece has since been performed by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.

Lateef has expressed a dislike of the terms "jazz" and "jazz musician" as musical generalizations. As is so often the case with such generalizations, the use of these terms do understate the breadth of his sound. For example, in the 1980s, Lateef experimented with new age and spiritual elements. His 1987 album Yusef Lateef's Little Symphony won the Grammy award for Best New Age Album. His core influences, however, are clearly rooted in jazz, and in his own words: "My music is jazz." [1]

[edit] Higher education and Islam

In 1950, Lateef returned to Detroit and began his studies in composition and flute at Wayne State University. It was during this period that Lateef converted to Ahmadiyya Islam and changed his name to the form it holds today.

In 1960, Lateef again returned to school. At the Manhattan School of Music in New York, Lateef pursued further studies in flute. He received a Bachelor's Degree in Music in 1969 and a Master's Degree in Music Education in 1970. Starting in 1971, he taught courses in autophysiopsychic music at the Manhattan School of Music, and he became an associate professor at the Borough of Manhattan Community College in 1972.

In 1975, Lateef completed his dissertation on Western and Islamic education and earned a Ph.D. in Education from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Lateef has written and published a number of books including a novella entitled A Night in the Garden of Love and the short story collections Spheres and Rain Shapes. Along with his record label YAL Records, Lateef owns Fana Music, a music publishing company. Lateef publishes his own work through Fana, which includes Yusef Lateef's Flute Book of the Blues and many of his own orchestral compositions.

[edit] Selected discography

• Jazz Mood (1957)
• Prayer to the East (1957)
• Cry! - Tender (1959)
• Eastern Sounds (1961)
• Live at Pep's (1964)
• The Golden Flute (1966)
• The Blue Lateef (1968)
• Hush 'N' Thunder (1972)
• Part of the Search (1974)
• The Doctor is In... And Out (1974)
• Ten Years Hence (1975)
• Autophysiopsychic (1978)
• B-Flat recordings with Lionel and Stéphane Belmondo (2005)

[edit] External links

• Official website of Yusef Lateef
• Yusef Lateef at the All Music Guide
• A Fireside Chat With Yusef Lateef - an interview by Jazz Weekly

Persondata
NAME	Lateef, Yusef
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Lateef, Dr. Yusef; Huddleston, William Emanuel
SHORT DESCRIPTION	American jazz musician
DATE OF BIRTH	October 9, 1920
PLACE OF BIRTH	Chattanooga, Tennessee
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH