Gigi Gryce
| Gigi Gryce | |
|---|---|
Gigi Gryce
|
|
| Background information | |
| Birth name | George General Grice Jr. |
| Also known as | Basheer Qusim |
| Born |
November 28, 1925 Pensacola, Florida, U.S. |
| Died | March 14, 1983 (aged 57) Pensacola, Florida |
| Genres | Jazz |
| Occupation(s) | Musician, arranger, composer, educator |
| Instruments | Alto saxophone, flute |
| Website | www |
Gigi Gryce (born George General Grice Jr.; November 28, 1925 – March 14, 1983) was an American jazz saxophonist, flautist, clarinetist, composer, arranger, and educator.
While his performing career was relatively short, much of his work as a player, composer, and arranger was quite influential and well-recognized during his time. However, Gryce abruptly ended his jazz career in the 1960s. This, in addition to his nature as a very private person, has resulted in very little knowledge of Gryce today. Several of his compositions have been covered extensively ("Minority", "Social Call", "Nica's Tempo") and have become minor jazz standards. Gryce's compositional bent includes harmonic choices similar to those of contemporaries Benny Golson, Tadd Dameron and Horace Silver. Gryce's playing, arranging, and composing are most associated with the classic hard bop era (roughly 1953–1965). He was a well-educated composer and musician, and wrote some classical works as a student at the Boston Conservatory. As a jazz musician and composer he was very much influenced by the work of Charlie Parker and Thelonious Monk.
George General Grice Jr. was born in Pensacola, Florida on November 28, 1925.
His family's strong emphasis on music, manners, and discipline had a tremendous effect on him as a child and into his later career. Grice's parents were of modest means, his mother a seamstress and his father the owner of a small cleaning and pressing service. The family belonged to the African Methodist Episcopal Church and attended services diligently. Especially as the Great Depression began to take its toll on the family's financial welfare, the Grices did their best to instill the value of discipline and hard work in their children.
Music was very much emphasized in the Grice household. The family had a piano in the house, which Gigi and his siblings (four older sisters and one younger brother) were encouraged to play. Mostly church music was performed in the Grice home, while pop and jazz was mostly frowned upon. (Later, however, when Gigi pursued jazz as a career, his mother and older sisters would support him personally and financially.) Many of the Grice children were encouraged to pursue vocal performance at church, school, and other community; for a time the family even held weekly recitals in their home.
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