The Jazzcat

MICHAEL BRECKER MEMORIAL

General Admission

By NAHAL TOOSI

Associated Press Writer

January 13, 2007, 4:52 PM EST
 

NEW YORK — Michael Brecker, a versatile and much-studied jazz

saxophonist who won 11 Grammys over a career that spanned more than

three decades, died Saturday at age 57.

Brecker died in New York of leukemia, according to his longtime friend

and agent, Darryl Pitt.

In recent years, the saxophonist had struggled myelodysplastic syndrome,

a cancer in which the bone marrow stops producing enough healthy blood

cells. The disease, known as MDS, often progresses to leukemia.

Becker, who had a home in Hastings-on-Hudson, was born in 1949 in

Philadelphia and had won 11 Grammys for his work as a tenor saxophonist.

He was inspired to study the tenor saxophone by the work of jazz legend

John Coltrane, according to his Web site.

He and his brothers led a successful jazz-rock fusion group called the

Brecker Brothers. Throughout his career, he recorded and performed with

numerous jazz and pop music leaders, including Herbie Hancock and Joni

Mitchell, according to the site.

His technique on the saxophone was widely emulated and taught. Jazziz

magazine once called him “inarguably the most influential tenor stylist

of the last 25 years.”