Musician Spotlight: John Coltrane

John William Coltrane is one of the most recognizable names in jazz. As an American jazz, saxophonist, clarinetist, and composure, Coltrane certainly was a talented individual. Coltrane helped to pioneer the uses of modes and he became one of the individuals to be at the forefront of free jazz.

Who was John Coltrane?

Born on September 23rd, 1926, in Hamlet, North Carolina and he had a pretty rough few years losing his father, grandparents, and aunt within a few months of each other. In June 1943, Coltrane moved to Philadelphia and that September, his mother bought him his first-ever saxophone, an alto. He played the clarinet and also the alto horn in a community band and then when onto alto saxophone in high school.

He is known to be one of the most influential and renowned saxophonists in music history and that’s saying something!

What genre did Coltrane cover?

Coltrane covered a lot of bebop and hard bop early on in his career. As mentioned above though, he led free jazz and also dabbled in the avant-garde jazz. A lot of his music further down the line took a more spiritualist direction and with the genres he covered, he worked and appeared on the albums of many other musicians from trumpeter Miles David to pianist Thelonious Monk who each had their own style too. This contributed to Coltrane’s mix.

Major accomplishments

Again Coltrane had plenty of success with record labels, including Atlantic Records and Impulse Records. His discography is expansive as a leader on the tracks but he also had plenty of releases where he was sideman too.

Working with some of the other notable jazz musicians and composers of their time, Coltrane won many awards and honors. He was inducted in the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame in 1965 and in 1972, A Love Supreme sold over half a million copies in Japan. He was awarded a posthumous Grammy in 1982 for the album Bye Bye Blackbird and in 1997, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Awards.

These are just a few of his awards and honors that clearly show the incredible appreciation that the music industry has for his work in jazz.

What instruments did Coltrane use?

Coltrane was clearly a talented individual who could pick up a lot of instruments over his lifetime. Obviously, his childhood passion came from a saxophone but he had training on the alto horn and clarinet too.

You can see him performing with his saxophone here:

He also had an interest in drums as well as switching to metal mouthpieces on the tenor saxophone. Coltrane experimented with the flute during his live performances and studio recordings also. He had a prototype Yamaha alto saxophone that was given to him by the company as an endorsement and this can be heard being played on live albums that were recorded in Japan.

The musical talents seemed to pass down to his children too, with one of them also being a saxophonist.