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Happy Birthday, Herbie Hancock!
04/12/2001 1:00 PM, Yahoo! Music
(4/12/01, 1 p.m. ET) -- Legendary keyboardist Herbie Hancock celebrates his 61st birthday today (April 12). Hancock remains busier than ever, having just returned from an international tour with saxophonist Wayne Shorter and appearing in an all-jazz segment on VH1 Divas Live: The One And Only Aretha Franklin--A Benefit Concert For VH1 Save The Music Foundation, which aired live from New York's Radio City Music Hall on Tuesday night (April 10).
Hancock has contributed piano to the forthcoming album by jazz saxophonist Michael Brecker; he is also a partner in the label Transparent Music, which has released albums by Soul Conversation, which features top guitarists JK and Mark Whitfield, and singer Vinicius Cantuaria.
Born in Chicago in 1940, Hancock began playing the piano at the age of seven and soloed with the Chicago Symphony at the age of 11. He attended Grinnell College in Iowa, and joined trumpeter Donald Byrd's band at the age of 21. It wasn't long before the young musician was offered a solo recording contract with Blue Note Records, and he immediately scored a huge hit with 'Watermelon Man' from his hit 1962 debut album, Takin' Off. The following year, trumpeter Miles Davis asked Hancock to join his quintet, which also included saxophonist Wayne Shorter, drummer Tony Williams, and bassist Ron Carter. Hancock played with this seminal ensemble for five years and he appears on such classic albums as Seven Steps To Heaven, Nefertiti, and My Funny Valentine. While with Miles, Hancock also released his own albums, including Maiden Voyage and Cantaloupe Island (the album that included the tune 'Cantaloupe Island,' which was later sampled by English group Us3 for its hit 'Cantaloop'.)
Hancock then formed an electric-funk group called the Headhunters, and in 1973 they released the classic self-titled album. It was a smash -- it sold more than a million copies and was the biggest-selling jazz album of its time. Throughout the '70s and into the '80s, Hancock continued to work electronically, and in 1983 he scored a massive hit with the hip-hop tune 'Rockit' from his album Future Shock. He continues to record both electronic and acoustic albums, which ranged from 1993's funky Dis Is Da Drum to his 1998 Grammy-winning album, Gershwin's World.
One of the music world's most progressive artists, Hancock is constantly exploring new forms of technology with which to create music. He has been experimenting with Surround Sound, re-recording many of his earlier albums in this format. Hancock told LAUNCH that while Surround sound is still mostly employed for movie viewing, musical projects should be experienced that way as well: "When we listen to records through two speakers, that's not natural, ya know. You could say, 'Oh, well, we only have two ears.' Yeah, but soon as you stop listening to the … Soon as you turn the record off, then when you have the natural environment, you're gonna hear through your windows on the left, you're gonna hear sirens, or a helicopter above to the right, and various things that are passing overhead. This is natural. So we're getting closer and closer in a sense to a possibility of having natural … having music in a natural, immersive environment."
-- Janine Coveney, Los Angeles
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