Steve Lacy, jazz saxophonist; made playing soprano his life
Last July, on his birthday, saxophonist Steve Lacy learned he had cancer. At first, he sent out word to musicians, who flooded him with calls and e-mails. But he asked that his students at New England Conservatory not be told.
"He said, `If we go into too much detail there will be a dark cloud hanging over the lessons,' " said Allan Chase, an NEC colleague. "He really wanted to teach."
After taking much of the fall semester off, Mr. Lacy returned to NEC this spring. He also remained active as a performer, playing Cambridge's Zeitgeist Gallery with a student trio as recently as April. But last month, Mr. Lacy's condition worsened. And the jazz legend -- known for five decades of innovative recordings and for introducing John Coltrane to the soprano saxophone -- died yesterday at New England Baptist Hospital. He was 69.
Before Mr. Lacy, the soprano was known as a difficult instrument rarely played by jazzmen. But Mr. Lacy, struck by the sound of the higher register and the challenge the instrument presented, embraced the soprano sax and devoted his life to it. From 1957's "Soprano Sax" to last year's "The Beat Suite," Mr. Lacy would record more than 50 albums under his own name.
"We're losing one of the most diversified musicians in the history of the music," said Nat Hentoff, jazz historian and longtime critic at the Village Voice. "He kept growing and evolving with the music. All the time, he kept his own voice."
Mr. Lacy was born Steven Morman Lackritz in New York City. Not particularly interested in school, he fell for jazz, hearing a Duke Ellington 78 and a record by saxophonist Sidney Bechet, one of the few musicians to play a soprano. Before long, Mr. Lacy had taken up the clarinet and saxophone and, in the early 1950s, moved to Boston to briefly study at the Schillinger House (later Berklee College) of Music.
He became a sideman, and, while his contemporaries, including Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane, were defining the deeper sound of the tenor saxophone, Mr. Lacy decided in 1954 to focus exclusively on the soprano. "The soprano is too interesting and too demanding and too problematic," Mr. Lacy said in a Globe interview in 2002. "And I loved it much more. It's like a jealous instrument. It wants your complete attention: `Don't mess with me.' "
Mr. Lacy made his first recording as a sideman in 1954. Over the next decade, he would play with, among others, trumpter player Miles Davis, pianist Thelonious Monk, and arranger Gil Evans. In the late 1950s, after one of his sets, Mr. Lacy was approached by Coltrane and asked a question about the range of the soprano sax. Soon after, trumpet player Don Cherry, a friend, called Mr. Lacy from a club and held up the receiver. Over the line, Mr. Lacy heard Coltrane playing the soprano. In 1960, Coltrane would play the instrument on his most famous recording, a version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's "My Favorite Things."
During the 1960s, as Coltrane established his career as an avant-garde giant, Mr. Lacy struggled to find gigs. He worked in a bookstore before finding a demand for his playing in Europe. In 1965, he left the United States and eventually settled in Paris. In Europe, he met his future wife, Irene Aebi, a singer who became the muse for what Mr. Lacy would call his "lit jazz," the setting of poems and literary texts to music. He reestablished his career during those years and continued to record through the decades, developing a rich catalog that couldn't be pigeonholed.
"Coltrane had `My Favorite Things.' Sonny Rollins had `St. Thomas.' Steve was never really noted for a particular tune," said saxophonist Joe Lovano. "He wasn't interested in making one record and selling a million copies. He once told me, `I'd rather make a million records and sell one each.' "
Mr. Lacy was recognized for his work. He was perennially named best soprano saxophone player by Down Beat magazine and, in 1992, was awarded a MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant.
Though he frequently performed in the United States, he remained in Europe until 2002, when he felt his bookings were drying up and NEC offered him a position.
"I can help these people," he said in 2002, explaining his reasons for returning. "I got so much from a lot of musicians that really helped me. Maybe not in school but in the university of Birdland and the Five Spot high school. I think I owe it to give that back."
Mr. Lacy leaves his wife. No funeral arrangements were available yesterday. New England Conservatory's Jazz Studies Department will present a memorial concert on Tuesday, Oct. 12 at 8 p.m. in Jordan Hall.
Geoff Edgers can be reached at gedgers@globe.com.
