Herbie Mann | |
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![]() Mann c. 1980 | |
Background information | |
Birth name | Herbert Jay Solomon |
Born | New York City, U.S. | April 16, 1930
Died | July 1, 2003 73) Pecos, New Mexico, U.S. | (aged
Genres | Jazz, bossa nova, disco, world music |
Occupation(s) | Musician, record label executive |
Instrument(s) | Flute, tenor saxophone, bass clarinet |
Years active | 1953–2003 |
Labels | Atlantic, Cotillion, Embryo, Kokopelli |
Website | www |
Herbert Jay Solomon (April 16, 1930 – July 1, 2003), [1] known by his stage name Herbie Mann, was an American jazz flute player and important early practitioner of world music. Early in his career, he also played tenor saxophone and clarinet (including bass clarinet), but Mann was among the first jazz musicians to specialize on the flute. His most popular single was "Hi-Jack", which was a Billboard No. 1 dance hit for three weeks in 1975.
Mann emphasized the groove approach in his music. Mann felt that from his repertoire, the "epitome of a groove record" was Memphis Underground or Push Push , because the "rhythm section locked all in one perception." [2]
Herbie Mann was born in Brooklyn, New York, New York, to Jewish parents Harry C. Solomon (May 30, 1902 – May 31, 1980), who was of Russian descent, and Ruth Rose Solomon (née Brecher) (July 4, 1905 – November 11, 2004), of Romanian descent who was born in Bukovina, Austria-Hungary but immigrated to the United States with her family at the age of 6. [3] [4] [5] Both of his parents were dancers and singers, as well as dance instructors later in life. [3]
He attended Lincoln High School in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn.
His first professional performance was playing the Catskills resorts at age 15. In the 1950s Mann was primarily a bop flutist, playing in combos with artists such as Phil Woods, occasionally playing bass clarinet, tenor saxophone and solo flute.
Mann was an early pioneer of the fusion of jazz and world music. In 1959, following a US State Department-sponsored tour of Africa, he recorded Flautista! , an album of Afro-Cuban jazz. In 1961, Mann toured Brazil, returning to the US to record with Brazilian musicians, including Antonio Carlos Jobim and guitarist Baden Powell. These albums helped popularize bossa nova in the US and Europe. He often worked with Brazilian themes. In the mid-1960s Mann hired a young Chick Corea to play in some of his bands. In the late 1970s and early 1980s Mann played duets at New York City's The Bottom Line and Village Gate clubs, with Sarod virtuoso Vasant Rai.
Following the 1969 hit album Memphis Underground , a number of smooth jazz records influenced by Southern soul, blues rock, reggae, funk and disco elicited criticism from jazz purists but allowed Mann to remain active during a period of declining interest in jazz. The musicians on these recordings are some of the best-known session players in soul and jazz, including singer Cissy Houston, guitarists Duane Allman, Larry Coryell, and Sonny Sharrock, bassists Donald "Duck" Dunn, Chuck Rainey, and Miroslav Vitous, and drummers Al Jackson, Jr. and Bernard Purdie. In this period Mann had a number of pop hits — rare for a jazz musician. According to a 1998 interview Mann had made at least 25 albums that were on the Billboard 200 pop charts, success denied most of his jazz peers." [6]
Mann provided the music for the 1978 National Film Board of Canada animated short Afterlife , by Ishu Patel.
In the early 1970s, he founded his own label, Embryo Records, distributed by Cotillion Records, a division of Atlantic Records. [7] Embryo produced jazz albums, such as Ron Carter's Uptown Conversation (1970); Miroslav Vitous' first solo album, Infinite Search (1969); Phil Woods and his European Rhythm Machine at the Frankfurt Jazz Festival (1971); and Dick Morrissey and Jim Mullen's Up (1976), which featured the Average White Band as a rhythm section; and the 730 Series, with a more rock-oriented style, including Zero Time (1971) by TONTO's Expanding Head Band. He later set up Kokopelli Records after difficulty with established labels. In 1996, Mann collaborated with Stereolab on the song "One Note Samba/Surfboard" for the AIDS-Benefit album Red Hot + Rio produced by the Red Hot Organization. Mann also played flutes on the Bee Gees' album Spirits Having Flown .
His last appearance was on May 3, 2003, at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.
In a review of Mann's Beyond Brooklyn (2004), his final recording (co-led with Phil Woods), critic George Kanzler proposed that Mann's status as an innovator had been overlooked:
Mann died on July 1, 2003, at the age of 73, after a long battle with prostate cancer. He died in his home in Pecos, New Mexico, survived by his wife, Susan Janeal Arison, and four children: Paul Mann, Claudia Mann, Laura Mann-Lepik and Geoffrey Mann.
In music, groove is the sense of an effect ("feel") of changing pattern in a propulsive rhythm or sense of "swing". In jazz, it can be felt as a quality of persistently repeated rhythmic units, created by the interaction of the music played by a band's rhythm section. Groove is a significant feature of popular music, and can be found in many genres, including salsa, rock, soul, funk, and fusion.
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Memphis Underground is a 1969 album by jazz flutist Herbie Mann, that fuses the genres of jazz and rhythm and blues (R&B). While Mann and the other principal soloists were leading jazz musicians, the album was recorded in Chips Moman's American Sound Studio in Memphis, a studio used by many well-known R&B and pop artists. The rhythm section was the house band at American Studios. The recording was engineered and produced by Tom Dowd.
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Push Push is a 1971 instrumental album by jazz flutist Herbie Mann, on his Embryo Records label with Atlantic, which features rock guitarist Duane Allman. The record explored a range of popular genres, such as R&B, rock and funk music to create what AllMusic calls a "generally appealing, melodic and danceable" album with an "impressive crew of musicians".
White Rabbit is an album by George Benson. The title track is a cover of the famous Great Society/Jefferson Airplane song by Grace Slick.This album was George Benson's second CTI Records project produced by Creed Taylor and was recorded nine months after Beyond the Blue Horizon.
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This is a Herbie Mann discography. Mann spent his early years recording for a number of jazz oriented record labels, and signed with Atlantic Records in 1961. He recorded with them through the 1960s and 1970s, including their subsidiary Cotillion Records, where he ran his own imprint, Embryo Records, in the 1970s, for his records as well as other musicians. Mann also ran two independent record labels, Herbie Mann Music in the 1980s, and during the 1990s, Kokopelli Records. Minor reissues are not noted.
Memphis Two-Step is a 1971 album by jazz flutist Herbie Mann. It was released on Mann's Embryo Records label, and distributed by Cotillion Records, a division of Atlantic Records.
Muscle Shoals Nitty Gritty is a 1970 album by jazz flutist Herbie Mann. It was released on Mann's Embryo Records label, and distributed by Cotillion Records, a division of Atlantic Records.
Stone Flute is an album by flautist Herbie Mann recorded in 1969 and becoming the first release on Mann's Embryo label.
Herbie Mann Returns to the Village Gate is a live album by American jazz flautist Herbie Mann recorded in 1961 for the Atlantic label but not released until 1963.
My Kinda Groove is an album by American jazz flautist Herbie Mann recorded for the Atlantic label and released in 1965.
Edward "Bruno" Carr was an American jazz drummer. Carr was a frequent collaborator with Ray Charles, and he recorded with Aretha Franklin. He was Herbie Mann's drummer from 1965 through 1969.