Wayne Shorter obit

Wayne Shorter, jazz saxophonist and composer, has died at age 89

 

He was not on the list.

Wayne Shorter, a Grammy-winning saxophonist and composer who helped shaped the sound of contemporary jazz, has died, according to his publicist.

 

He was 89.

 

Shorter died Thursday in Los Angeles, his publicist Cem Kurosman with Blue Note Records told CNN in an email. No cause of death was shared.

Shorter was nominated for 23 Grammy Awards during his career and won 12 times. His first Grammy nomination was in 1973. His most recent win was in January for best improvised jazz solo performance for “Endangered Species.”

Shorter began playing the clarinet at age 16 but later turned his focus to the tenor sax before entering New York University in 1952.

Upon graduating in 1956, he played with jazz pianist Horace Silver until he was drafted into the Army. He served for two years, per the artist’s biography on Bluenote.com.

Shorter came to prominence in the late 1950s as a member of, and eventually primary composer for, Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. In the 1960s, he joined Miles Davis's Second Great Quintet, and then co-founded the jazz fusion band Weather Report. He has recorded over 20 albums as a bandleader.

Many Shorter compositions have become jazz standards, and his music has earned worldwide recognition, critical praise, and commendation. Shorter won 12 Grammy Awards. He was acclaimed for his mastery of the soprano saxophone since switching his focus from the tenor in the late 1960s and beginning an extended reign in 1970 as Down Beat's annual poll-winner on that instrument, winning the critics' poll for 10 consecutive years and the readers' for 18. The New York Times' Ben Ratliff described Shorter in 2008 as "probably jazz's greatest living small-group composer and a contender for greatest living improviser". In 2017, he was awarded the Polar Music Prize.