David Murray has led a topsy-turvy career. Rather than starting out in acceptable, marketable music and evolving toward free jazz, he broke out in the 1970s playing the genre's wildest styles of avant-garde, then floated back toward a more palatable approach.
But that doesn't mean he ended up traditional or commercial. He has kept vestiges of the blistering fury of the late-'60s sax style, but has submerged them into smoother combinations of jazz and a wide range of different types of music. Under his own name, Murray has recorded his own jazz takes on funk, blues, rhythm and blues, gospel, African, Caribbean and even the Grateful Dead (1996's "Dark Star"). With more than 70 recordings to his credit over the past 25 years, he may well be one of modern jazz's most prolific players.
Some of his best work is with the World Saxophone Quartet, an improvisatory group formed in 1976 with the idea of updating the classical chamber-music tradition with all sax players -- no bass, no drums, no piano -- though they did add African drums for several early '90s releases, most notably "Metamorphosis."
But it is perhaps Murray's jazz takes on jazz that are the most satisfying. Last year's "Octet Plays Trane" is one of the better reinvestigations of John Coltrane's music. This year's "Like a Kiss That Never Ends," almost entirely filled with his own compositions, takes an approachable, swinging sound into moments of furious intensity, then back again. For his tour of Japan, Murray will be joined by a rhythm section of piano, bass and drums.
