Willie Ruff

Willie Henry Ruff Jr. ( born September 1, 1931 in Sheffield, Alabama) is an American jazz musician ( French horn, double bass) and composer who built as a high school teacher, the jazz program at Yale University.

Life and work

Ruff learned during his military service in the Lockbourne Air Force Base in Columbus ( Ohio) French horn, graduated in 1954 at Yale University, where he among other things, studied with Paul Hindemith, and played while studying with Benny Goodman. In 1955 he worked with Lionel Hampton, eventually formed with pianist Dwike Mitchell, the Mitchell - Ruff Duo and one of the founders of the WC Handy Music Festival. The bass - piano duo Mitchell / Ruff went on worldwide tours and one of the first formations of modern jazz from the U.S., the guest performances in Moscow at a concert at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory. In addition to recording under his own name in a duo / trio with Mitchell in 1957, he worked as a horn player in Gil Evans ' debut album, Gil Evans and Ten and the Evans / Miles Davis productions Miles Ahead (1957) and Porgy and Bess (1958 ) with.

Beginning of 1960 came the drummer Charlie Smith to Mitchell and Ruff, later replaced by Helcio Milito. The formation played at New York's Hickory House in 1966 and accompanied U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson during a trip to Mexico. Ruff had in the 1960s and early 1970s, also as a horn player in recordings of Milt Jackson ( Big Bags, 1962), Beaver Harris (360 ° Experience - A Well - Kept Secret, 1980), Bobby Hutcherson ( Head On, 1971), the Jazz Composer's Orchestra (1964 ), Quincy Jones / Roland Kirk, Blue Mitchell (Smooth as the Wind, 1961), Jimmy Smith, Sonny Stitt ( Top Brass, 1962), Lucky Thompson ( Lucky Meets Tommy, 1965), McCoy Tyner ( 1973) with. As a bassist, he was also at the Doors album Other Voices (1971 ) on the song "Ships w / Sails " involved.

Since 1971, Ruff was a member of the faculty of the Yale School of Music, where he taught music history, ethnomusicology, and arranging and 1972, the Duke Ellington Fellowship Program built. 1976/77 he held a visiting professor at Duke University, where he coordinated the Jazz program and the Duke Jazz Ensemble directed.

In addition to his teaching activities, he took 1970/71 with Dwight Michell and Dizzy Gillespie; In 1979 he toured with Mitchell in China. In 1981 his composition Harmonices Mundi was recorded, which refers to the mathematician and music theorist Johannes Kepler. In 1983 he appeared as soloist in the Venetian St. Mark's Basilica. In 1994, he was inducted into the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame.

Published in 1992 by Viking Press Ruff his memoirs under the title A Call to Assembly, which were awarded the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award.

Disco Graphical Notes

• The Mitchell - Ruff Duo Plus Strings And Brass ( Roulette, 1958) with Julius Baker, (oboe), Milt Hinton, Elvin Jones
• The Catbird Seat (Atlantic, 1961) Dwike Mitchell, Willie Ruff, Charlie Smith
• After This Message (Atlantic, 1965) with Dwike Mitchell, Willie Ruff, Helcio Milito
• The Smooth Side of Ruff (Columbia, 1968)
• Strayhorn: A Mitchell - Ruff Interpretation ( Kepler )
• Dizzy Gillespie & The Mitchell - Ruff Duo, Vol 1 ( Black-Hawk/Kepler, 1971)
• Breaking the Silence - The Mitchell - Ruff Duo ( Kepler )
• Virtuoso Elegance in Jazz - The Mitchell Ruff Duo ( Kepler )