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Benny Carter was best known as a Jazz saxophonist and composer from the 1930's to the 1990's.


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Benny Carter was best known as a Jazz saxophonist and composer from the 1930's to the 1990's. Following an attempt at Wilberforce College, Carter joined a series a big bands and learned the trumpet along the way. He would eventually settle down in Los Angeles, working on many film and television compositions.

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      Saxophonists have been an integral part of the American jazz scene, with the timbres of their chosen instrument often at the center of layered compositions. Coleman Hawkins was the first American jazz saxophonist to become famous during the 1920s-30s. Jimmy Dorsey and Johnny Hodges also had major success with big bands during jazz's heyday as a popular music juggernaut, while Lester Young popularized the West Coast, cool style. Later, soprano and tenor saxophonist John Coltrane created pioneering works that ranged from "sheets of sound" bebop to unbound, rhythmically complex free jazz. And Branford Marsalis has taken his sax to great heights in non-jazz arenas; he's toured with rock artist Sting and served as musical director for The Tonight Show.

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