Michael Evans Osborne (28 September 1941 – 19 September 2007) was an English

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 ...

alto saxophonist, pianist, and clarinetist who was a member of the band

Brotherhood of Breath The Brotherhood of Breath was an English-South African big band established in the late-1960s by South African pianist and composer Chris McGregor, an extension of McGregor's previous band, The Blue Notes. History The Brotherhood of Breath i ...

in the 1960s and 1970s.

Biography

Mike Osborne was born in

Hereford Hereford () is a cathedral city, civil parish and the county town of Herefordshire, England. It lies on the River Wye, approximately east of the border with Wales, south-west of Worcester and north-west of Gloucester. With a population ...

, England, and attended

Wycliffe College Wycliffe College () is an evangelical graduate school of theology at the University of Toronto. Founded in 1877 as an evangelical seminary in the Anglican tradition, Wycliffe College today attracts students from many Christian denominations from ...

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean. The county town is the city of Gl ...

and the

Guildhall School of Music The Guildhall School of Music and Drama is a conservatoire and drama school located in the City of London, United Kingdom. Established in 1880, the school offers undergraduate and postgraduate training in all aspects of classical music and jazz ...

Steve Voce Steve Voce (born 23 December 1933) is a British journalist and music critic. As well as writing obituaries for ''The Independent'', Voce has been a columnist for ''Jazz Journal'' for about 60 years, and presented the ''Jazz Panorama'' radio progr ...

"Mike Osborne"
(obituary), ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'', 24 September 2007.Jason Ankeny
Mike Osborne biography
at

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

. From 1962 to 1972, Osborne belonged to the

Mike Westbrook Michael John David Westbrook (born 21 March 1936) is an English jazz pianist, composer, and writer of orchestrated jazz pieces. He is married to the vocalist, librettist and painter Kate Westbrook. Early work Mike Westbrook was born in Hig ...

band. During this period the artist also worked with musicians such as Michael Gibbs,

Mike Cooper Mike Cooper may refer to: * Mike Cooper (musician) (born 1942), English blues and jazz guitarist and singer-songwriter * Mike Cooper (politician) (born 1951), former politician in Ontario, Canada See also * Michael Cooper (disambiguation) * Mike Ho ...

Stan Tracey Stanley William Tracey (30 December 1926 – 6 December 2013) was a British jazz pianist and composer, whose most important influences were Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk. Tracey's best known recording is the 1965 album ''Jazz Suite Inspir ...

Kenny Wheeler Kenneth Vincent John Wheeler, OC (14 January 1930 – 18 September 2014) was a Canadian composer and trumpet and flugelhorn player, based in the U.K. from the 1950s onwards. Most of his performances were rooted in jazz, but he was also active ...

Humphrey Lyttelton Humphrey Richard Adeane Lyttelton (23 May 1921 – 25 April 2008), also known as Humph, was an English jazz musician and broadcaster from the Lyttelton family. Having taught himself the trumpet at school, Lyttelton became a professional ...

Alan Skidmore Alan Richard James Skidmore (born 21 April 1942) is an English jazz tenor saxophonist, and the son of saxophonist Jimmy Skidmore. Career He was born in London, England. Skidmore began his professional career in his teens, and early in his care ...

John Surman John Douglas Surman (born 30 August 1944) is an English jazz saxophone, bass clarinet, and synthesizer player, and composer of free jazz and modal jazz, often using themes from folk music. He has composed and performed music for dance performanc ...

, Harry Miller, Alan Jackson (drums), John Mumford (trombone) and

Lionel Grigson Lionel Grigson (12 February 1942 – 14 June 1994) was an English jazz pianist, cornettist, trumpeter, composer, writer and teacher, who in the 1980s started the jazz course at the Guildhall School of Music. As Simon Purcell wrote in ''The Ind ...

. During 1974–75, Osborne was part of the saxophone trio S.O.S. with John Surman and Alan Skidmore. They recorded an LP plus BBC radio and television sessions and toured extensively in Europe. Health issues hastened the end of his career in 1982, and he returned to Hereford, where he was living under care at the time of his death in 2007, aged 65.

Select discography

* Mike Osborne Quintet: ''Outback'' (Turtle); with Chris McGregor (piano), Harry Miller (bass), and

Louis Moholo Louis Tebogo Moholo (born 10 March 1940), is a South African jazz drummer. He has been a member of several notable bands, including The Blue Notes, the Brotherhood of Breath and Assagai. Biography Born in Cape Town, Moholo formed The Blue ...

(drums)Richard Williams
"Mike Osborne"
(obituary), ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'', 21 September 2007. * Mike Osborne Trio: ''Border Crossing'' (

Ogun Ogun or Ogoun (Yoruba: Ògún, Portuguese: Ogum, Gu; also spelled Oggun or Ogou; known as Ogún or Ogum in Latin America) is a spirit that appears in several African religions. He attempted to seize the throne after the demise of Obatala, who re ...

) * Mike Osborne Trio: ''All Night Long (Live at Willisau)'' (Ogun) * Mike Osborne &

: ''Original'' (Cadillac) * Mike Osborne ''Force of Nature'' (REEL) * ''Mike Osborne/Stan Tracey Duo'' (Cadillac) * ''Tandem: Mike Osborne/Stan Tracey Live at the Bracknell Festival'' (Ogun) * Mike Osborne Quintet: ''Marcel's Muse'' (Ogun) * ''Shapes'' (Future Music) With

* ''Bremen to Bridgwater'' (

Cuneiform Cuneiform is a logo-syllabic script that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Middle East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. It is named for the characteristic wedge-sha ...

) * ''Eclipse at Dawn'' (Cuneiform) With

Barry Guy Barry John Guy (born 22 April 1947, in London) is an English composer and double bass player. His range of interests encompasses early music, contemporary composition, jazz and improvisation, and he has worked with a wide variety of orchestras ...

/London Jazz Composers' Orchestra * ''

Ode An ode (from grc, ᾠδή, ōdḗ) is a type of lyric poetry. Odes are elaborately structured poems praising or glorifying an event or individual, describing nature intellectually as well as emotionally. A classic ode is structured in three majo ...

'' (

Incus The ''incus'' (plural incudes) or anvil is a bone in the middle ear. The anvil-shaped small bone is one of three ossicles in the middle ear. The ''incus'' receives vibrations from the ''malleus'', to which it is connected laterally, and transmit ...

, 1972) With

* ''John Surman'' ( Deram) * ''How Many Clouds Can You See?'' (Deram) With

and Alan Skidmore * ''SOS'' (1975) (

) With

* ''The Mike Westbrook Concert Band: Marching Song Vols. 1 & 2'' (Deram) * ''The Mike Westbrook Concert Band: Release'' (Deram) With Michael Gibbs * ''Michael Gibbs'' (Deram) With Mike Cooper * ''Too Late Now'' (

Dawn Dawn is the time that marks the beginning of twilight before sunrise. It is recognized by the appearance of indirect sunlight being scattered in Earth's atmosphere, when the centre of the Sun's disc has reached 18° below the observer's horizo ...

) * ''Your Lovely Ways'' (Dawn) * ''Life and Death in Paradise'' (Fresh Air) With

* ''Alan Skidmore Quintet: T.C.B.'' (

Philips Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), commonly shortened to Philips, is a Dutch multinational conglomerate corporation that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, it has been mostly headquartered in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarters i ...

) With

* '' Song for Someone'' (Incus, 1973) With Harry Miller's Isipingo * ''Which Way Now: Live in Bremen 1975'' (Cuneiform) * ''Family Affair'' (Ogun) With Norma Winstone * ''Edge of Time'' (Algo)

Select bibliography

*''

Ian Carr Ian Carr (21 April 1933 – 25 February 2009) was a Scottish jazz musician, composer, writer, and educator. Carr performed and recorded with the Rendell-Carr quintet and jazz-fusion band Nucleus, and was an associate professor at the Guildhall ...

: Music Outside: Contemporary Jazz in Britain, 2nd edition'' (London:

Northway Publications Northway Books ( Northway Publications) is a publishing company based in London, UK. Northway specialises in biographies of musicians, and British social and cultural history. Its focus has been particularly on documenting jazz history in Britain ...

, 2007)

References

External links

Obituary in ''The Times'', 2 October 2007
*Jason Ankeny
Mike Osborne biography
at

{{DEFAULTSORT:Osborne, Mike 1941 births 2007 deaths English jazz alto saxophonists British male saxophonists English jazz pianists People educated at Wycliffe College, Gloucestershire Deaths from lung cancer 20th-century pianists 20th-century English musicians 20th-century saxophonists British male pianists 20th-century British male musicians British male jazz musicians FMR Records artists