Roland Alexander

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Roland Alexander (September 25, 1935^[1] – June 14, 2006) was an American post-bop jazz musician from Boston, Massachusetts. He grew up with his parents and sister Gloria in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Alexander played tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone, and piano. He graduated with a bachelor's degree from the Boston Conservatory in 1958 with a Major in composition, he was in the same graduating class with Kenneth Arthur McIntyre, later known as Ken Makanda MacIntyre. Roland was a prolific composer and arranger who wrote and played for many of the better known bands in Boston during the 1950s, i.e. Sabby Lewis, Preston 'Sandy' Sandiford, Richie Lowery, Jaki Byard and many more. He co-led a group called the Boston All Stars that featured Trumpeter Joe Gordon, and after Joe Gordon left to play with Dizzy Gillespie's band Joe was replaced by a few of the more innovative trumpet soloists in the area, like Wajid Lateef (Crazy Wilbur Lucaw), & Gordon Wooly. He then moved to New York City in 1958. In addition to two solo releases, he played and recorded with John Coltrane, Howard McGhee, Max Roach, Sonny Rollins, Roy Haynes, Philly Joe Jones, Blue Mitchell, Sam Rivers, Archie Shepp, and Mal Waldron.

Discography

As leader

1961 Pleasure Bent (Prestige Records, with Marcus Belgrave)
1978: Live at the Axis (Kharma Records, with Malachi Thompson and Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre)

As sideman

With Eric Gale

Black Rhythm Happening (Blue Note, 1969)

With Abdullah Ibrahim

African Space Program (Enja, 1973)

With Charlie Persip

Charles Persip and the Jazz Statesmen (Bethlehem, 1960)

With Max Roach

Drums Unlimited (Atlantic, 1965)

With James Spaulding

Songs of Courage (Muse, 1991)

References

↑ Kennedy, Gary (2002). "Alexander, Roland (E.)". In Barry Kernfeld. The new Grove dictionary of jazz, vol. 1 (2nd ed.). New York: Grove's Dictionaries Inc. p. 29. ISBN 1561592846.

Roland Alexander at Allmusic

Authority control	WorldCat VIAF: 45952104 LCCN: n92010179 ISNI: 0000 0001 1443 1125 GND: 135301726

Persondata
Name	Alexander, Roland
Alternative names
Short description	Musician
Date of birth	September 25, 1935
Place of birth
Date of death	June 14, 2006
Place of death

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike; additional terms may apply for the media files.