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One of the finest trombonists of the late 20th and early 21st centuries,
Steve Turre is also one of its most diverse. He is also a composer, sideman, arranger, bandleader, and educator who introduced the jazz world to conch shells as a musical instrument in 1970 via his adept performances on them -- his 1993 album
Sanctified Shells is still discussed for its soulfulness and invention).
Turre's early apprenticeships with
Rahsaan Roland Kirk,
Ray Charles,
Woody Shaw,
Tito Puente,
Hilton Ruiz, and many others prepared him to be a recording artist and bandleader of distinction.
Turre has been a member of the Saturday Night Live Band since 1985 (and has served as its music director) and has taught jazz trombone at the Manhattan School of Music since 1988. He has recorded with a who's-who of jazz talent from
Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers,
Pharoah Sanders, and
Carmen Lundy to
Tribecastan,
Frank Wess,
Cedar Walton,
Stefon Harris, and pop musicians from
Paul Simon and
Carlos Santana to
Katy Perry and
David Byrne.
Turre's 1987 solo debut album Viewpoint featured
Jerry Gonzalez,
Idris Muhammad,
Mulgrew Miller, and more, making the jazz press aware of the arrival of a major talent. That album juxtaposed Latin jazz giants such as
Dave Valentin and
Manny Oquendo with saxophone master
Benny Golson and neo-bop standard bearer
Wynton Marsalis.
Turre's '90s recordings for the label,
Sanctified Shells,
The Rhythm Within,
Steve Turre, and
Lotus Flower, all placed on the jazz charts, establishing him as an international headliner. His bluesy tinge on the horn with his conch shells and innovative notions of rhythmic invention bridged seams between
Ellingtonian swing, bop, modal, and avant jazz, and Afro-Latin and Caribbean grooves. In the 21st century, he lit up the charts with an homage to former boss and mentor
Woody Shaw on 2012's
Woody's Delight, and the global jazz classic Colors for the Masters. He has won numerous readers' and critics' polls for Best Trombone and Best Miscellaneous Instrumentalist (shells).
Turre was born in Nebraska in 1948, but was raised by his Mexican-American parents in the San Francisco Bay area. There he absorbed daily doses of mariachi, blues, and jazz. He took up trombone in fourth grade at age ten, having previously studied violin. He won a football scholarship to California State University at Sacramento and studied music theory there for two years. While attending, he found time to play with the Escovedo Brothers salsa band before transferring to the University of North Texas College of Music. From 1968 through 1969 he completed his studies and played in a jazz group led by trumpeter
Hannibal Peterson. Also in 1968, he began his on-and-off apprenticeship with
Roland Kirk.
In 1970,
Turre relocated to California, and recorded with
Santana, and in 1972 he toured with
Ray Charles. This was the beginning of
Turre's real jazz education. He played tours with
Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers and the
Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra (both in 1973), and played trombone and electric bass regularly with
Chico Hamilton (1974-1976), while recording with
Woody Shaw and
Rahsaan Roland Kirk. It was
Kirk, an eternal sound explorer, who inspired
Turre to play exotic shells professionally. After
Kirk's death,
Turre toured with
McCoy Tyner,
Dexter Gordon,
Slide Hampton,
Poncho Sanchez,
Hilton Ruiz, and
Tito Puente, among others. In 1987, he joined
Dizzy Gillespie's United Nations Orchestra, and he also played regularly with
Lester Bowie's Brass Fantasy,
the Leaders, and the Timeless All-Stars.
Turre performed with his Sanctified Shells (a group featuring four trombonists doubling on shells, trumpeter
E.J. Allen, bass, drums, and several percussionists) at the 1995 Monterey Jazz Festival and has recorded as a leader for Stash, Antilles, Verve, and Telarc. His '90s recordings for Antilles all charted and became his calling card on world stages.
After a pair of albums for TelArc at the turn of the century (TNT and One4J), began his long relationship with Highnote in 2004 with the celebrated
Kirk tribute album
The Spirits Up Above.
Rainbow People, recorded in 2007 at Knoop Studios in New Jersey, appeared in 2008 from Highnote Records and featured a program of revisioned bop tunes by
Charlie Parker as well as originals, and was performed by a quintet that included drummer
Ignacio Berroa, pianist
Mulgrew Miller, bassist
Peter Washington, and trumpeter
Rodney Jones.
Delicious and Delightful followed in 2010. In early 2012,
Turre realized his longstanding ambition to cut a tribute album to the late
Woody Shaw, whose road and recording bands he had played with for eight years, from 1981-1989. The album,
Woody's Delight, featured the talents of alternating trumpet players
Wallace Roney,
Jon Faddis, Alfredo "Chocolate" Armenteros, and
Claudio Roditi; it also introduced a new star on the horn, 23-year-old
Freddie Hendrix. It placed inside the Top 50. In the summer of 2013,
Turre released
The Bones of Art, an album that showcased a multi-trombone frontline comprised of himself,
Frank Lacy,
Robin Eubanks, and
Steve Davis, to name a few, but it didn't chart. In 2015, he issued a collection of redone standards entitled
Spiritman for Smoke Sessions, and followed it with the charting Colors for the Masters the next year. The set featured drummer
Jimmy Cobb, bassist
Ron Carter, and pianist
Kenny Barron, and was comprised of tunes by
Thelonious Monk,
Antonio Carlos Jobim, and
Wayne Shorter among a handful of
Turre originals; it peaked at number 16. In 2017,
Turre was among the guests chosen to appear with the
United States Air Force Band for the album Airmen of Note. Other guests included
Cyrus Chestnut and
Terell Stafford. Two years later,
Turre realized another long-held goal and cut
The Very Thought of You for Smoke Sessions, a collection of ballads featuring
Barron, bassist
Buster Williams, drummer
Willie Jones III, tenor saxophonist
George Coleman, guitarist
Russell Malone, and strings, arranged by
Marty Sheller. ~ Scott Yanow