An exceptionally talented virtuoso performer, Hubbard's rich full tone is never lost, even when he plays dazzlingly fast passages. As one of the greatest of hard bop trumpeters, he contrives to create impassioned blues lines without losing the contemporary context within which he plays. Although his periodic shifts into jazz-rock have widened his audience, he is at his best playing jazz. He continues to mature, gradually leaving behind the spectacular displays of his early years, replacing them with a more deeply committed jazz.
Great jazz trumpeter Freddie Hubbard dies at 70
By JOHN ROGERS, Associated Press Writer John Rogers, Associated Press Writer –
Tue Dec 30, 9:48 am ET
Hubbard died at Sherman Oaks Hospital, said his manager, fellow trumpeter David Weiss of the New Jazz Composers Octet. He had been hospitalized since suffering the heart attack a day before Thanksgiving.
A towering figure in jazz circles, Hubbard played on hundreds of recordings in a career dating to 1958, the year he arrived in New York from his hometown Indianapolis, where he had studied at the Arthur Jordan Conservatory of Music and with the Indianapolis Symphony.
Soon he had hooked up with such jazz legends as Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis, Cannonball Adderley and Coltrane.
"I met Trane at a jam session at Count Basie's in Harlem in 1958," he told the jazz magazine Down Beat in 1995. "He said, `Why don't you come over and let's try and practice a little bit together.' I almost went crazy. I mean, here is a 20-year-old kid practicing with John Coltrane. He helped me out a lot, and we worked several jobs together."
In his earliest recordings, which included "Open Sesame" and "Goin' Up" for Blue Note in 1960, the influence of Davis, Chet Baker and others on Hubbard is obvious, Weiss said. But within a couple years he would develop a style all his own, one that would influence generations of musicians, including Wynton Marsalis.
"He influenced all the trumpet players that came after him," Marsalis told The Associated Press earlier this year. "Certainly I listened to him a lot. ... We all listened to him. He has a big sound and a great sense of rhythm and time and really the hallmark of his playing is an exuberance. His playing is exuberant."
Hubbard played on more than 300 recordings, including some of the most important jazz albums of the 1960s, including Herbie Hancock's "Maiden Voyage," Coleman's "Free Jazz," Eric Dolphy's "Out to Lunch," Coltrane's "Ascension," Wayne Shorter's "Speak No Evil" and his own classic, "Ready for Freddie."
However, he enjoyed his biggest success in the 1970s with such albums for Creed Taylor's fusion-oriented CTI label as "Red Clay" and "First Light." The latter won him a Grammy in 1972 for best jazz performance by a group.
"Freddie made popular fusion records for CTI that reached a mass audience but were still artistic and unmatched," fellow trumpeter Chris Botti said Monday.
But Hubbard did not abandon straight-ahead acoustic jazz, also performing and recording in the 1970s with the group V.S.O.P., which included the members of Miles Davis' legendary 1960s quintet — Hancock, Shorter, Ron Carter and Tony Williams.
"I've played some things that I don't think too many cats can play that are alive today," Hubbard told the AP in June when he was in New York to perform at the Iridium jazz club to celebrate the release of his last album, "On the Real Side."
"Whatever they play, it's not going to surpass that," he said of his body of work. "You see, I played like a tenor saxophone, so a lot of the things with me are kind of different, kind of hard to play."
As a young musician, Hubbard became revered among his peers for a fiery, blazing style that allowed him to hit notes higher and faster than just about anyone else with a horn. As age and infirmity began to slow that style, he switched to a softer, melodic style and played a flugelhorn.
"I think that Freddie Hubbard probably is the greatest trumpet player ever — his sound and his phrasing and his approach to the instrument. His prowess on the instrument left him in a league of his own, like a Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods in sports," Botti said.
Frederick Dewayne Hubbard was born in Indianapolis on April 7, 1938. He grew up playing mellophone, trumpet and French horn.
After his early recordings for Blue Note, he joined Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers in the early 1960s, later playing in groups with Quincy Jones, George Duke and numerous others. His recordings would span such styles as bebop, fusion, free jazz and jazz-rock.
His career slowed in the 1980s, and he attributed that in part to a period of heavy drinking and partying with "the rock crowd."
In the 1990s, relentless touring, coupled with his hard style of playing, nearly ended his career when his lip became infected. He had to lay off for a period of time and eventually switch to a softer style.
"I played a very loose, elastic style of playing. I used a lot of slurs, different moves. I advise any young trumpeter not to do what I did, because that style could be hazardous to your health," he said last June.
He came back in the last decade, however, releasing "New Colors" in 2001 and "On The Real Side" in 2008, both with the New Jazz Composers Octet playing updated arrangements of some of his compositions, such as "Theme for Kareem."
In 2006, Hubbard was named a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master, the nation's highest jazz honor.
A memorial tribute is planned for next month in New York.
Open Sesame (Blue Note 1960)
Goin' Up (Blue Note 1960)
Hub Cap (Blue Note 1961)
with Willie Wilson Minor Mishap (Blue Note/Black Lion 1961)
Ready For Freddie (Blue Note 1961)
The Artistry Of Freddie Hubbard (Impulse! 1962)
Hub-Tones (Blue Note 1962)
Here To Stay (Blue Note 1962)
The Body And Soul Of Freddie Hubbard (Impulse! 1963)
Breaking Point (Blue Note 1964)
Blue Spirits (Blue Note 1965)
The Night Of The Cookers - Live At Club La Marchal, Vol. 1 (Blue Note 1965)
The Night Of The Cookers - Live At Club La Marchal, Vol. 2 (Blue Note 1965)
Backlash (Atlantic 1967)
High Pressure Blues (Atlantic 1968)
The Black Angel (Atlantic 1969)
The Hub Of Hubbard (MPS 1970)
Red Clay (CTI 1970)
Straight Life (CTI 1970)
Sing Me A Song (Atlantic 1971)
First Light (CTI 1972)
Sky Dive (CTI 1973)
In Concert, Vol. 1 (CTI 1973)
In Concert, Vol. 2 (CTI 1973)
Keep Your Soul Together (CTI 1974)
Polar AC (CTI 1974)
High Energy (Columbia 1974)
Liquid Love (Columbia 1975)
Gleam (Sony 1975)
Windjammer (Columbia 1976)
Bundle Of Joy (Columbia 1977)
Super Blue (Columbia 1978)
Here To Stay 1961/1962 recordings (Blue Note 1979)
The Love Connection (Columbia 1979)
Skagly (Columbia 1980)
Live At The North Sea Jazz Festival (Pablo 1980)
Mistral (Liberty 1980)
Outpost (Enja 1981)
Splash (Fantasy 1981)
Rollin' (MPS 1981)
Keystone Bop: Sunday Night (Prestige 1982)
Born To Be Blue (Pablo 1982)
with Oscar Peterson Face To Face (Pablo 1982)
Back To Birdland (Real Time 1983)
Sweet Return (Atlantic 1983)
with Woody Shaw Double Take (Blue Note 1985)
with Shaw The Eternal Triangle (Note 1987)
with Benny Golson Stardust (Denon 1987)
Life Flight (Blue Note 1987)
with Art Blakey Feel The Wind (Timeless 1988)
Times "Are Changin" (Blue Note 1989)
Topsy: Standard Book (Triloka 1990)
Bolivia (Music Masters 1991)
Live At Fat Tuesday's (Music Masters 1992)
Live At The Warsaw Jazz Festival (Jazzmen 1992)
MMTC (Music Masters 1995)
Blues For Miles 1992 recording (Evidence 1996)
Above And Beyond 1982 recording (Metropolitan 1999)
New Colors (Hip Bop 2001)
with Jimmy Heath Jam Gems: Live At The Left Bank 1965 recording (Label M 2001)
Compilations:
The Best Of Freddie Hubbard 1970-73 recordings (Columbia 1990)
Ballads 1960-64 recordings (Blue Note 1997)
*Courtesy of downbeat.com*
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