Marchel Ivery was an American modern

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

saxophonist, known as one of the Texas Tenors.

History

Ivery was born in 1938 in

Ennis, Texas Ennis () is a city in eastern Ellis County, Texas. It is on the edge of the blackland prairie region of Texas. The population is 20,159 according to the 2020 census, with an estimated population of 21,210 in 2021. Ennis is home to the annual Nat ...

. He grew up in a musical family: his siblings were singers and jazz and blues were played constantly. Ivery began with trumpet, but switch to sax in the early 1950s. Ivery joined the army upon graduating from George Washington Carver High School in 1957 and pursued medical training. While assigned to a medical clinic in Paris, France, he sat in with pianist Bud Powell. He returned to the US in 1960 and pursued a musical career, touring with the Bobby Blue Band, Al Braggs, Lightnin' Hopkins, Big Joe Turner, Freddie King, and others. In 1966 he came together with

Red Garland William McKinley "Red" Garland Jr. (May 13, 1923 – April 23, 1984) was an American modern jazz pianist. Known for his work as a bandleader and during the 1950s with Miles Davis, Garland helped popularize the block chord style of playing in jazz ...

, who he worked with extensively from 1975 to 1983. He did not put out an album under his own name until 1994, at age 56, when he recorded ''Marchel's Mode'', featuring Coltrane pianist

Cedar Walton Cedar Anthony Walton Jr. (January 17, 1934 – August 19, 2013) was an American hard bop jazz pianist. He came to prominence as a member of drummer Art Blakey's band, The Jazz Messengers, before establishing a long career as a bandleader and com ...

. This record got the recording started, and two more albums soon followed, also introducing Duke Ellington Orchestra saxophonist Shelley Carroll, Fred Sanders, and Earl Harvin. He served as a mentor to every serious jazz musician to come through Dallas, where he served as bandleader for a quartet at the Recovery Room, frequently with Red Garland. He died of pneumonia on October 30, 2007. Around that time, recordings of Ivery in 1970 surfaced.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ivery, Marchel 1938 births 2007 deaths American jazz saxophonists Musicians from Dallas 20th-century American saxophonists