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Wallace Roney

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Wallace Roney
Roney at Pori Jazz festival in 2012
Background information
BornPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
GenresJazz
OccupationMusician
InstrumentTrumpet
Years active1975–present
Websitewww.wallaceroney.com

Wallace Roney is an American jazz (hard bop and post-bop) trumpeter.[1]

Roney took lessons from Clark Terry and Dizzy Gillespie and studied with Miles Davis from 1985 until the latter's death in 1991. Wallace credits Davis as having helped to challenge and shape his creative approach to life as well as being his music instructor, mentor, and friend; he was the only trumpet player Davis personally mentored.

Biography

Roney was born in Philadelphia and attended Howard University and Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts, after graduating from the Duke Ellington School of the Arts of the D. C. Public Schools, where he studied trumpet with Langston Fitzgerald of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. Found to have perfect pitch at the age of four, Wallace began his musical and trumpet studies at Philadelphia's Settlement School of Music. He studied with trumpeter Sigmund Hering of the Philadelphia Orchestra for three years. Hering regularly presented Wallace at recitals at the Settlement School, and with the Philadelphia Brass Ensemble, during his studies in Philadelphia.

When he entered the Duke Ellington School, oney had already made his recording debut at age 15 with Nation and Haki Mahbuti, and at that time met, among others, Bill Hardman, Valery Ponomarev, Woody Shaw (who befriended him), Johnny Coles and Freddie Hubbard. He played with the Cedar Walton Quartet featuring Billy Higgins, Sam Jones, and Philly Joe Jones at 16 years of age with the encouragement of his high school teacher. Wallace had attained distinction as a gifted local performer in the Washington, D.C area. In 1979 and 1980, Roney won the Down Beat Award for Best Young Jazz Musician of the Year, and in 1989 and 1990 the Down Beat Magazine's Critic's Poll for Best Trumpeter to Watch.

Roney spent years scrounging for work. Early in his career in the '80s, he was at one point homeless; he lived frugally, sleeping on the floors of friends' apartments and generally "wearing out my welcome", as he recalled to Washington Post writer James McBride. In 1983 his future began to look brighter—at least temporarily. While taking part in a tribute to Miles Davis at the Bottom Line in Manhattan, he met his idol. "He [Davis] asked me what kind of trumpet I had," Roney told Time magazine, "and I told him none. So he gave me one of his." Throughout two years, 1984 and 1985, he was forced to play in Latin dance and reception bands, as the New York clubs, once a prominent part of the jazz scene, had mostly disappeared. But in 1986, he received a pair of calls, in the same month, to tour with drummers Tony Williams and Art Blakey, after which Roney became one of the most in-demand trumpet players on the professional circuit.

In 1986, he succeeded Terence Blanchard in Blakey's Jazz Messengers. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, he was an integral part of Williams's quintet. In 1991, Roney played with Davis at the Montreux Jazz Festival. After Davis's death that year, Roney toured in memoriam with Davis alumni Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams and recorded an album, A Tribute to Miles, for which they won a Grammy Award. He has been an integral part of bands with Blakey, Elvin Jones, Philly Joe Jones, Walter Davis Jr., Herbie Hancock, Tony Williams, Jay McShann, David Murray and McCoy Tyner, as well as a featured soloist with Ornette Coleman, Sonny Rollins, Curtis Fuller, Carole King, Joni Mitchell and Dizzy Gillespie.

Roney learned his craft directly from Miles Davis. Critics have taken Roney to task for sounding too similar to his idol. Wrote critic Ron Wynn,

"[Roney's] trumpet tone, timbre, approach, phrasing, and sound so closely mirror that of Miles Davis in his pre-jazz/rock phase that he's been savaged in many places for being a clone and unrepentant imitator... It's a classic no-win situation; he does sound tremendously like Davis and can't be completely absolved from critical charges of imitation. But he's also a fine, evocative player on ballads and can be fiery and explosive on up-tempo tunes."[2]

Roney recorded his debut album as a leader, Verses, on Muse Records in 1987. A number of albums on Muse, Warner Bros. Records and Concord Records/Stretch Records followed, and by the time he turned 40 in 2000 Roney had been documented on over 250 audio recordings. His two most recent albums are Mystikal (2005) and Jazz (2007), on HighNote Records.

Personal life

Wallace Roney is the son of Wallace Roney, U.S. Marshal and President of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 102, grandson of Philadelphia musician Roosevelt Sherman, and older brother of tenor and soprano saxophonist Antoine Roney.

Roney and his wife, jazz pianist Geri Allen have been residents of Montclair, New Jersey.[3]

Movie credits

  • 2001 - The Visit - Jordan Walker-Perlman - music arrangement
  • 1996 - Love Jones - music arrangement

Discography

As leader

Muse Records
Warner Bros.
Concord Jazz
Savoy Records
  • 2003 - No Job Too Big or Small with Eric Allen, Geri Allen, Cindy Blackman, Donald Brown, Ron Carter, many others
Highnote

As sideman

With Geri Allen

With Kenny Barron

With Art Blakey

With Chick Corea

  • Remembering Bud Powell (Concord, 1997)

With Dizzy Gillespie

With Helen Merrill

  • Brownie-A Homage To Clifford Brown (Verve, 1994)

WIth Superblue

  • Superblue 2 (1989, Blue Note)

With Tony Williams

  • Civilization (1986, Blue Note)

With Powerhouse

  • In an Ambient Way (2015, Chesky Records)

References

  1. ^ Allmusic
  2. ^ Rovi
  3. ^ Staudter, Thomas. "Making Jazz and Family, Home and the Road Work Together", The New York Times, September 9, 2001. Accessed September 18, 2017. "Her luggage already packed for a late afternoon flight to San Francisco, Geri Allen, a jazz pianist, still had several precious hours remaining before her departure out of Newark, so she was filling the morning in the company of three children, ages 3 to 11. Ms. Allen's husband, Wallace Roney, a trumpeter, had returned home after midnight from an evening rehearsal at Carnegie Hall, and to respect his need to sleep, mother and children romped in the yard until growling stomachs sent them back inside to the breakfast table.... Ms. Allen and Mr. Roney have lived in their three-story frame house in Montclair, a short trip from Manhattan, since 1991."
  • Official site
  • [1] - All About Jazz
  • [2] - Fulfilling the Promise
  • [3] - Following in Miles Davis' Footsteps
  • [4] - Enote Biography
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