Steve Potts (born January 21, 1943 in Columbus, Ohio) is an American jazz saxophonist. Playing mainly alto sax and occasionally soprano, Potts is best known for his 30-year partnership with fellow saxophonist Steve Lacy.
A cousin of tenor saxophonist Buddy Tate, Potts studied architecture in Los Angeles and took lessons from saxophonist Charles Lloyd. Afterwards he went to New York where he was student of Eric Dolphy and performed with Roy Ayers, Richard Davis, Joe Henderson, Reggie Workman, and Chico Hamilton.
In 1970 he moved to Europe to live in Paris. He performed with Dexter Gordon, Johnny Griffin, Slide Hampton, Mal Waldron, Ben Webster, Hal Singer, Christian Escoudé, Boulou Ferré, and Oliver Johnson. Around 1973 he met Steve Lacy and played in his groups for 30 years. Potts also produced film scores.
With Chico Hamilton
With Steve Lacy
Steve Lacy was an American jazz saxophonist and composer recognized as one of the important players of soprano saxophone. Coming to prominence in the 1950s as a progressive dixieland musician, Lacy went on to a long and prolific career. He worked extensively in experimental jazz and to a lesser extent in free improvisation, but Lacy's music was typically melodic and tightly-structured. Lacy also became a highly distinctive composer, with compositions often built out of little more than a single questioning phrase, repeated several times.
Steve Swallow is an American jazz bassist and composer, known for his collaborations with Jimmy Giuffre, Gary Burton, and Carla Bley. He was one of the first jazz double bassists to switch entirely to electric bass guitar.
Cecil McBee is an American jazz bassist. He has recorded as a leader only a handful of times since the 1970s, but has contributed as a sideman to a number of jazz albums.
Enrico Rava, is an Italian jazz trumpeter. He started on trombone, then changed to the trumpet after hearing Miles Davis.
Steve Coleman is an American saxophonist, composer, bandleader and music theorist. In 2014, he was named a MacArthur Fellow.
Larry Eugene Carlton is an American guitarist who built his career as a studio musician in the 1970s and 1980s for acts such as Steely Dan and Joni Mitchell. He has participated in thousands of recording sessions, recorded on hundreds of albums in many genres, for television and movies, and on more than 100 gold records. He has been a member of the jazz fusion group the Crusaders, the smooth jazz band Fourplay, and has maintained a long solo career.
Reginald "Reggie" Workman is an American avant-garde jazz and hard bop double bassist, recognized for his work with both John Coltrane and Art Blakey.
Fred Hopkins was an American double bassist who played a major role in the development of the avant-garde jazz movement. He was best known for his association with the trio Air with Henry Threadgill and Steve McCall, and for his numerous performances and extensive recordings with major jazz musicians such as Muhal Richard Abrams, Arthur Blythe, Oliver Lake, and David Murray. He was a member of the AACM, and a frequent participant in the loft jazz scene of the 1970s. He also co-led a number of albums with the composer and cellist Diedre Murray. Gary Giddins wrote that Hopkins' playing "fused audacious power with mercuric reflexes." Howard Reich, writing in the Chicago Tribune, stated that "many connoisseurs considered [Hopkins] the most accomplished jazz bassist of his generation" and praised him for "the extraordinarily fluid technique, sumptuous tone and innovative methods he brought to his instrument."
George Duvivier was an American jazz double-bassist.
Ricky Ford is an American jazz tenor saxophonist.
Bobby Few was an American jazz pianist and vocalist.
Pheeroan akLaff is an American jazz drummer and percussionist. He began playing in his hometown of Detroit, Michigan and Ann Arbor, with R & B keyboardist Travis Biggs, funk keyboardist Nimrod “The Grinder” Lumpkin, The Ebony Set and The Last Days. He moved to New Haven, Connecticut, and formed a group with saxophonist/flautist/percussionist Dwight Andrews. He debuted with saxophonist Bill Barron in 1975, followed by a tenure in Leo Smith's ‘New Dalta Ahkri’ (1977-1979).
John Betsch is an American jazz drummer.
Daniel Humair is a Swiss drummer, composer, and painter.
Hot House is an album by Steve Lacy and Mal Waldron released on the RCA Novus label in 1991. It features duo performances of tunes written by Herbie Nichols, Tadd Dameron, Bud Powell, Thelonious Monk. Sidney Bechet, Duke Ellington along with two compositions by Waldron and one by Lacy.
Kent Carter is an American jazz bassist. His father, Alan Carter, founded the Vermont Symphony Orchestra. He is also the grandson of American artist, Rockwell Kent. He worked in Steve Lacy's group, played on the two Jazz Composer's Orchestra albums and released albums for Emanem Records.
Sweet Basil was a jazz club in New York City's Greenwich Village, located at 88 Seventh Avenue South. Founded in 1974 by Sharif Esmat, it was considered among the most prominent New York City jazz clubs of its day. Many jazz albums were recorded live at Sweet Basil, including Cecil Taylor's Iwontunwonsi, McCoy Tyner's Live at Sweet Basil (1989) and Solar: Live at Sweet Basil, and the Jean-Michel Pilc Trio's Together: Live at Sweet Basil. From 1981 to 1992, the club was owned by Phyllis Litoff and her husband Mel Litoff.
Live at Dreher, Paris 1981 is a live album by American jazz pianist Mal Waldron and soprano saxophonist Steve Lacy recorded in Paris in 1981 and released by the Hathut label. The four-CD box set combines recordings previously released on the LPs Snake Out in 1983, Herbe De L'oubli in 1986 and Let's Call This in 1986, with additional recordings from the concert series. The recordings were also released as two double-CD sets Live at Dreher, Paris 1981: Round Midnight Vol. 1 and Live at Dreher, Paris 1981: The Peak Vol. 2.
Irene Aebi is a Swiss singer, violinist and cellist. She is noted for her work with jazz saxophonist Steve Lacy, her husband, from the 1960s to his death in 2004.
Live at Sweet Basil is a live album by saxophonist Steve Lacy's Sextet, which was recorded in New York in 1991 and first released on the RCA Novus label in 1992.