Four-time Grammy Award winner Stanley Clarke is undoubtedly one of the most celebrated acoustic and electric bass players in the world. What’s more, he is equally gifted as a recording artist, performer, composer, conductor, arranger, producer and film score composer. A true pioneer in jazz and jazz-fusion, Clarke is particularly known for his ferocious bass dexterity and consummate musicality. Unquestionably, he has attained “living legend” status during his over 40-year career as a bass virtuoso.
Clarke’s creativity has been recognized and rewarded in every way imaginable: gold and platinum records, Grammy Awards, Emmy nominations, virtually every readers and critics poll in existence, and more. He was Rolling Stone’s very first Jazzman of the Year and bassist winner of Playboy’s Music Award for ten straight years. Clarke was honored with Bass Player Magazine’s Lifetime Achievement Award and is a member of Guitar Player Magazine’s “Gallery of Greats.” In 2004 he was featured in Los Angeles Magazine as one of the Top 50 Most Influential People. He was honored with the key to the city of Philadelphia, a Doctorate from Philadelphia’s University of the Arts and put his hands in cement as a 1999 inductee into Hollywood’s “Rock Walk.” In 2011 he was honored with the highly prestigious Miles Davis Award at the Montreal Jazz Festival for his entire body of work. Most recently Clarke won the 2013 and 2014 Downbeat Magazine’s Reader’s and Critic’s Poll for Best Electric Bass Player....
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Four-time Grammy Award winner Stanley Clarke is undoubtedly one of the most celebrated acoustic and electric bass players in the world. What’s more, he is equally gifted as a recording artist, performer, composer, conductor, arranger, producer and film score composer. A true pioneer in jazz and jazz-fusion, Clarke is particularly known for his ferocious bass dexterity and consummate musicality. Unquestionably, he has attained “living legend” status during his over 40-year career as a bass virtuoso.
Clarke’s creativity has been recognized and rewarded in every way imaginable: gold and platinum records, Grammy Awards, Emmy nominations, virtually every readers and critics poll in existence, and more. He was Rolling Stone’s very first Jazzman of the Year and bassist winner of Playboy’s Music Award for ten straight years. Clarke was honored with Bass Player Magazine’s Lifetime Achievement Award and is a member of Guitar Player Magazine’s “Gallery of Greats.” In 2004 he was featured in Los Angeles Magazine as one of the Top 50 Most Influential People. He was honored with the key to the city of Philadelphia, a Doctorate from Philadelphia’s University of the Arts and put his hands in cement as a 1999 inductee into Hollywood’s “Rock Walk.” In 2011 he was honored with the highly prestigious Miles Davis Award at the Montreal Jazz Festival for his entire body of work. Most recently Clarke won the 2013 and 2014 Downbeat Magazine’s Reader’s and Critic’s Poll for Best Electric Bass Player.
In 2011 Clarke won a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Jazz Album, The Stanley Clarke Band, with Ruslan Sirota and Ronald Bruner, Jr., featuring pianist Hiromi. He was also nominated for the “No Mystery” cut as Best Pop Instrumental Performance. The same year Clarke won a Latin Grammy for Best Instrumental Album with Return to Forever’s Forever, along with group members Chick Corea and Lenny White. Forever went on to win him the 2012 Grammy award for Best Instrumental Album. Clarke’s eagerly awaited new CD, The Stanley Clarke Band: UP, was released on Mack Avenue Records September 30, 2014. Entirely produced by Clarke, he considers UP to be the most energetic, fun, rhythmic and upbeat album that he has ever done. Unlike his predominant acoustic bass work on the last few albums, UP is almost equal electric and acoustic bass. It has already garnered rave reviews. Clarke was nominated for a 2015 Grammy Award for Best Jazz Arrangement Instrumental or A Cappella for the song “Last Train to Sanity” from UP. The CD also has garnished him a 2015 NAACP Image Award nomination for Best Jazz Album.
Stanley Clarke was barely out of his teens when he exploded into the jazz world in 1971. Fresh out of the Philadelphia Academy of Music, he arrived in New York City and immediately landed jobs with famous bandleaders such as Horace Silver, Art Blakey, Dexter Gordon, Joe Henderson, Pharaoh Saunders, Gil Evans and Stan Getz among others. As a young prodigy he was immediately recognized for his sense of lyricism and melody, which he had distilled from his bass heroes Charles Mingus, Scott LaFaro and others, as well as non-bass players like John Coltrane.
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