A Brief Look Into
The Life and Music of
JOHN COLTRANE
John Coltrane was born in born in Hamlet, North Carolina on September 23, 1926. John Coltrane was an only child. His father, John was a tailor who played the violin and ukulele, and his mother Alice played piano and sang in the church choir. This was a great environment to foster his love of music. Coltrane soon moved with his family to the town of High Point, where his grandfather was the pastor of the A.M.E. Zion Church. His family was very religious and this instilled in him a deep devotion in religion. At the age of twelve Coltrane's received his first instrument a clarinet which he played for hours on end, that same year Coltrane?s father died. A year after Coltrane?s father died his mother decided to move away to North to Atlantic City to find a work.
Young Coltrane stayed in North Carolina with relatives. By his senior year, he had learned to play a borrowed alto saxophone and was getting recognition from his classmates and even the locals. Work was hard to find in most of the Southern states in 1943, so when John Coltrane graduated he and two friends decided to move to Philadelphia, where one of the friends' brothers already lived.
Coltrane would live in Philadelphia off and on until about 1957. His decision to migrate north was a common one, and Coltrane did indeed find work as a laborer in a sugar-refining factory. A couple of months later he enrolled in the Ornstein School of Music on 19th and Spruce Streets. In Philadelphia John
Coltrane could hear a lot of the blues and jazz which weren't often broadcast in the South further extending his experience and horizons. He continued to
practice his sax alone in his room until he was drafted into the Navy band in 1945.
He returned to Philadelphia in 1946 after being discharged. At this point in his life Coltrane was totally committed to becoming a professional musician. Coltrane worked a variety of jobs through the late forties until in 1947 he joined Eddie Vinson's jazz band, switching reluctantly to play the tenor sax to do so. The group toured extensively, particularly in the South and southwest. It?s at this point that he started to drink excessively to top off his already heavy smoking habit. A short while after that he joined many other ...
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...deas of his day and
found his own particular niche which was influenced by Indian and African music, and his style continues to influence musicians today. One can only wonder what sorts of jazz music Coltrane may have explored beyond 17th of July 1967. His music lives on in the many recording, and in the music of those who worked with him.
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http://www.firstcut.com/9613/g1.html
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