Woodshed Entertainment Collective

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updated on May 03 2008

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We are doubtless well aware that West Indians have been emigrating to the North American continent for generations.  But it may not be as well-known that West Indians also developed a rich heritage in the context of American Jazz. 

Jazz scribes have made that connection before.  However, an article published in All About Jazz on March 01, 2008 really brought the point home.  Richard Van Pelt was actually speaking to the imminent Monty Alexander expose with the Lords of the West Indies at Jazz at Lincoln Center, but delved into the subject of how Jazz became infused with Jamaican Mento and Trinidadian Calypso - or the other way around if you prefer - and how it came about that West Indian musicians would make a mark on the American Jazz landscape.     

Van Pelt writes, ”Through the years…myriad Jazz artists with West Indian roots made key contributions to Jazz, bringing both subtle and explicit West Indian musical expressions.” 

Following is a list of names of “…West Indian musicians whose careers included Jazz.”  They are either from the West Indies or whose familial roots can be traced back to the Caribbean isles.  Excluded for the time being are the tremendous numbers of Cuban émigrés whom we will add, with your help, over time.

• Rupert Cole: Trinidadian alto saxophonist who apparently pushed off for New York from Barbados.  Cole worked with Sam Manning, Don Redman (in the 1930s) and Louis Armstrong in the 1940s;
• Blue Mitchell: Bahamian trumpeter;   
• Fats Navarro: Bahamian trumpeter; born of mixed Cuban-Black-Chinese parentage;
• Wynton Kelly: Jamaican trumpeter;
• Kenny Drew: Jamaican pianist; 
• Oscar Peterson: Canadian pianist born to St. Croix father and St. Kitts mother;
• Carmen McRae: pianist with a Jamaican lineage;
• Art Taylor: Jamaican drummer who gigged with Howard McGhee and Thelonious Monk, associated with Coleman Hawkins and Bud Powell and recorded with Miles Davis Monk; 
• Connie Kay: drummer with Montserrat heritage; replaced Kenny Clarke in the Modern Jazz Quartet (MJQ);
• Randy Weston: pianist with a Jamaican mother and Panamanian father;
• Roy Haynes: the drummer’s parents moved to Roxbury, Massachusetts from Barbados;
• Dizzy Reece: Jamaica-born trumpeter;
• Sonny Rollins: parents were natives of the United States’ Virgin Islands;
• Joe “Tricky” Sam Nanton: West Indian trombonist with Duke Ellington

…and may I add the names of the new generation of West Indians who may well join the above pantheon of class acts. 

• Bobby Sanabria: Bobby is the son of Puerto Rican parents who was born and raised in the “Fort Apache” section of New York City’s South Bronx.  Now he enjoys the distinction of having been inducted into the Bronx Walk of Fame with the naming of a permanent street him after him on the Bronx’s famed Grand Concourse.  This, the highest honour achievable by a Bronxite, was done in 2006 for his contributions to music and the arts.  Sanabria is in the company of other illustrious Bronx notables such as Ray Barretto, and Eddie Palmieri, to name a few. 
• Dafnis Prieto: born in Santa Clara, Cuba, Prieto moved to New York in 1999 armed with a conservatory music education.  Since then, he has stuffed his resumé with the tutelage of such notables as Henry Threadgill, Andrew Hill, Steve Coleman, Eddie Palmieri, Chico and Arturo O’Farrill, D. D. Jackson, Michel Camilo, Chucho Valdez, Claudia Acuna and Brian Lynch and many others.  Now he is sharing some of that with contemporaries Yosvany and Yunior Terry and Avishai Cohen on his latest release ‘Taking the Soul for a Walk’ under his own Dafnison Music label.
• Rashawn Ross: this St. Thomas born trumpeter and arranger is eight years removed from a four-year Berklee college degree that positioned him for stints with some of the top names in Jazz such as Christian McBride, Roy Hargrove, Nicholas Payton and Ron Blake.  Ross does not, however, limit himself stylistically.  As such, he has performed with many other well-established acts representing a wide range of styles outside of Jazz.

              Rashawn Ross

• Celia Cruz: the most successful Cuban performer of the twentieth century, Cruz was associated with Tito Puente with whom she made eight albums, Johnny Pacheco, Fania All Stars and Ray Baretto;  
• Jon Lucien: born a Harrigan on Tortola, British Virgin Islands and raised on St. Thomas, USVI, Lucien had a storied career in spite of his associations with more established artists such as producer Dave Grusin, Weather Report of the recently departed Joe Zawinul and instrumentalist Andy Narell among many others; 
• Ralph MacDonald: this three-time Grammy winner is of Trinidadian parentage whose percussions were integral to the  Grover Washington Jr. sound two decades ago and who in more recent times has worked with saxophonist Tom Scott, and pannist Robert Greenidge among innumerable other Caribbean musicians;  

• Tessa Souter: New York-based vocalist born to Trinidad and British parents;
• “Soul Man” Dayve Stewart: Contemporary Jazz saxophonist who has a Caribbean background with a Cuban mother and a Jamaican father;
• Reginald Cyntje: born on the Commonwealth of Dominica in 1976.  When he was 6 months old, he moved with his family to St. Thomas, United States Virgin Islands;