Steve Grossman
It was the jazz equivalent of a movie star getting discovered in a coffee shop when 19-year-old Steve Grossman caught the ear of Miles Davis at the Village Vanguard in 1969. Then a sophomore at Juilliard, Grossman was recruited to replace Wayne Shorter on tenor sax in Davis’s influential fusion band of the ‘70s. From there he became the leading light of a generation of sax players, making landmark records before relocating to Italy and becoming a legend in Europe and Latin America. His return to the States was quietly cut short by a cardiac event in August of 2020. Steve Grossman. His death at age 69 was untimely, but his life force is timeless.