Ron Carter
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Ron Carter (born May 4, 1937, Ferndale, Michigan) is an American jazz double-bassist. His unique sound and great swing have made him a long sought after studio man — his appearances on over 3,500 albums make him one of the most-recorded bassists in jazz history, along with Milt Hinton, Ray Brown and Leroy Vinnegar. He also has a large body of classical recorded work as well, and he contributed to the film score for Desperate Characters (1971).
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Early life
Carter started to play cello at the age of 10, but when his family moved to Detroit, he ran into difficulties regarding the racial stereotyping of classical musicians and instead moved to bass. Carter attended the historic Cass Technical High School. He played in the Eastman School of Music's Philharmonic Orchestra, and gained his bachelor's degree in 1959, and in 1961 a master's degree in double bass performance from the Manhattan School of Music. His first jobs as a jazz musician were with Jaki Byard and Chico Hamilton. His first records were made with Eric Dolphy (another former member of Hamilton's group) and Don Ellis, in 1960. Carter also worked during this time with Randy Weston, Thelonious Monk, Wes Montgomery, Bobby Timmons, Cannonball Adderley and Art Farmer. Carter is an acclaimed cellist who has performed on record numerous times with the cello, notably his own first date as leader, Where?, with Dolphy and Mal Waldron and a date also with Dolphy called Out There with George Duvivier and Roy Haynes and Carter on cello; its advanced harmonics and concepts for 1961 were reminiscent of the then current third stream movement on cello by Carter, for he is second probably only to Oscar Pettiford on the instrument in a jazz context.
Miles Davis
Carter came to fame via the second great Miles Davis quintet in the early 1960s, which also included Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter and Tony Williams. Carter joined Davis's group in 1963, appearing on the album Seven Steps to Heaven and the follow-up E.S.P.. The latter was the first album to feature the full quintet, and also featured three of Carter's compositions (the only time he contributed compositions to Davis's group). He stayed with Davis's regular group until 1968 (when he was replaced by Dave Holland), and participated in a couple of studio sessions with Davis in 1969 and 1970. Although he played electric bass occasionally during this period, he has subsequently eschewed that instrument entirely, and now plays only acoustic bass.
Carter also performed on some of Hancock, Williams and Shorter's recordings during the sixties for Blue Note Records. He was a sideman on many Blue Note recordings of the era, playing with Sam Rivers, Freddie Hubbard, Duke Pearson, Lee Morgan, McCoy Tyner, Andrew Hill and many, many others.
Later life
After leaving Davis, Carter was for several years a mainstay of CTI Records, making albums under his own name and also appearing on many of the label's records with a diverse range of other musicians, including Wes Montgomery, Herbie Mann, Paul Desmond, George Benson, Jim Hall, Nat Adderley, Antonio Carlos Jobim, J. J. Johnson and Kai Winding, Eumir Deodato, Esther Phillips, Freddie Hubbard, Stanley Turrentine, Kenny Burrell, Chet Baker, Johnny Frigo and many others.
Carter has also performed and recorded with Billy Cobham, Stan Getz, Coleman Hawkins, Joe Henderson, Horace Silver, Stanley Turrentine, Shirley Scott,Helen Merrill, Houston Person, The Rascals, Red Garland, Antonio Carlos Jobim and many other important jazz artists, and has recorded over 25 albums as a bandleader.
He appears on the alternative hip-hop group A Tribe Called Quest's influential album The Low End Theory on a track called "Verses from the Abstract". He also appears as a member of the jazz combo, The Classical Jazz Quartet.
Carter was Distinguished Professor Emeritus of the Music Department of The City College of New York, having taught there for twenty years, and received an honorary Doctorate from the Berklee College of Music, in Spring 2004.
Trivia
- Ron Carter is a pipe smoker and has been featured in a few advertisements for tobacco pipes, clothing lines, and basses.
- Ron Carter appears in the advertisements for a Tully's chilled coffee beverage in Japan.
Selected discography
As a leader
- Yellow & Green
- Pastels
- Anything Goes
- Piccolo
- All Blues
- Bass and I
- Stardust
- The Golden Striker
- Orfeu
- Telepathy
- New York Slick
- Blues Farm
- Standard Bearers
- Jazz, My Romance
- When Skies Are Grey
- Friends
- Holiday In Rio
- Mr. Bow Tie
- Ron Carter Plays Bach
- Uptown Conversation
- Carnival
- So What
- Peg Leg
- Meets Bach
- Spanish Blue
- Patrao
- Parade
- Guitar & Bass
- A Song For You
- Brandenburg Concerto
- Live At The Village Vanguard
- Eight Plus
- Dear Miles
As a sideman
- Herbie Hancock - Empyrean Isles, Maiden Voyage, Speak Like A Child, V.S.O.P., Third Plane
- Joe Henderson - Power To The People
- Sam Rivers - Fuchsia Swing Song, Contours
- Eric Dolphy - Out There (1960)
- Coleman Hawkins - Night Hawk (1961) with Eddie Davis and Tommy Flanagan
- Andrew Hill - Grass Roots, Lift Every Voice, Passing Ships
- Bobby Hutcherson - Components
- Wes Montgomery - So Much Guitar (1961), Tequila, California Dreaming
- Oliver Nelson - Sound Pieces
- Miles Davis - Quiet Nights (1962), Four and More, My Funny Valentine, Live At the Plugged Nickel, Miles Smiles, ESP, Miles In the Sky, Seven Steps To Heaven, The Sorcerer, Water Babies
- Wayne Shorter - Speak No Evil (1964), The All Seeing Eye
- The Rascals - "See" (1969)
- McCoy Tyner - The Real McCoy, Expansions, Trident, Counterpoints, Supertrios, Extensions (1970)
- Quincy Jones - Gula Matari (1970)
- Freddie Hubbard - Red Clay (1970), Empyrean Isles, First Light
- Donald Byrd - Electric Byrd (1970)
- Roberta Flack - First Take (1970), Quiet Fire (1971), Killing Me Softly (1973)
- Milt Jackson - Sunflower (1972)
- Billy Cobham - Spectrum (1973)
- New York Jazz Quartet - In Concert in Japan (1975)
- The Wiz (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (1978)
- Jim Hall - Alone Together (1986)
- Helen Merrill - Duets (1987)
- Harry Connick, Jr. - Harry Connick Jr. (1987)
- Johnny Frigo - Live from Studio A in New York City (1988)
- Twin Peaks (Television Series, 2nd Season) (1990)
- A Tribe Called Quest - The Low End Theory (1991)
- Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (Motion Picture Soundtrack) (1993)
- Austin Peralta - Maiden Voyage (2006)
- Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker (2001, Vertical Jazz) (deleted)
- The Classical Jazz Quartet Plays Bach (Vertical Jazz, 2002)
- The Classical Jazz Quartet Play Rachmaninov (May 16, 2006, Kind of Blue)
- The Classical Jazz Quartet Play Tchaikovsky (September 19, 2006)
- Christmas
