Randy Weston

Jazz pianist who was proud of his African roots

Randy Weston, an esteemed pianist whose music and scholarship advanced the argument – now broadly accepted – that jazz is, at its core, an African music, died on Saturday at his home in New York. He was 92.

On his earliest recordings in the mid-1950s, Weston recorded jazz standards and original tunes in a typical, smallgroup format. But his sharply cut harmonies and intense rhythms conveyed a manifestly Afrocentric sensibility.

Early on, he exhibited a distinctive voice as a composer. Hi-fly, which he first released in 1958 on the LP New Faces at Newport, became a standard. He eventually distinguished himself as a solo pianist, reflecting the influence of his main idol, Thelonious Monk.

Reviewing a concert in 1990, The New York Times’ Peter Watrous wrote of Weston: “Everything he played was edited to the essential notes of a phrase. Weston sat rippling waves of notes down next to glossy and percussive octaves, which led logically to meditative chords.”

Even before making his first album, Weston was giving concerts and teaching seminars that emphasised the African roots of jazz.

“I try to explain that if you love music, you have to know where it came from,” Weston told the website All About Jazz in 2003. “Whether you say jazz or blues or bossa nova or samba, salsa – all these names are all Africa’s contributions to the Western hemisphere. If you take out the African elements of our music, you would have nothing.”

He moved to Morocco in 1968 and stayed for five years, living first in Rabat and then in Tangier, where he ran the African Rhythms Cultural Center.

Weston drew particular inspiration from musicians of the Gnawa tradition, whose music centered on complex, commingled rhythms and low drones. He established a rigorous international touring regimen and played often in Europe. In the late 1980s and early 90s, Weston released a series of high-profile recordings for the label Verve, all to critical acclaim.

Weston earned a Grammy nod in 1973 for his album Tanjah (nominated for best jazz performance by a big band), and in 1995 for The Splendid Master Gnawa Musicians of Morocco (in the best world music album category), a recording he produced and released under his name, but on which he left most of the playing to 11 Moroccan musicians.

In 2001, the National Endowment for the Arts bestowed Weston with its Jazz Masters award and he was voted into Downbeat magazine’s hall of fame in 2016.

He also received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and United States Artists, as well as awards from the Moroccan government and the Institute of the Black World.

He held honorary doctorates of music from Brooklyn College, Colby College and the New England Conservatory, and had served as artist in residence at universities around New York City.

In addition to his wife, Fatoumata Mbengue, Weston is survived by three daughters, Cheryl, Pamela and Kim; seven grandchildren; six greatgrandchildren; and one great-great-grandchild. Weston’s first marriage, to Mildred Mosley, ended in divorce. A son, Azzedin, is deceased.

Randolph Edward Weston was born in Brooklyn, New York, on 6 April, 1926. His father, Frank Weston, was a barber and restaurateur who had emigrated from Panama, and who studied his African heritage with pride. Randy’s mother, nee Vivian Moore, was a domestic worker.

Though his parents split when he was three, they stayed on good terms and lived near each other in Brooklyn. Randy spent time with both, receiving his father’s teachings about the cultures of Africa and the Caribbean while absorbing the music of the African-american church from his mother, who made sure that Randy and his half sister, Gladys, were in the pews every Sunday. In his memoir, African Rhythms, Weston remembered that his father hung “maps and portraits of African kings on the walls, and was forever talking to me about Africa”.

As a child, Weston took classical piano lessons, but did not fall in love with the instrument until he started studying with a teacher who encouraged his love for Ellington, Count Basie and Coleman Hawkins.

Weston was drafted into the Army in 1944, serving three years and rising to staff sergeant. While stationed in Okinawa, Japan, he was in charge of managing supplies, and frequently tried to share leftover materials and food with local residents, many of whom had lost their homes.

Upon returning to Brooklyn, he took over his father’s restaurant, Trios, which became a hub of intellectuals and artists. Weston began playing jazz and R&B gigs, and became particularly close to Monk. Heroin use was rampant on the jazz scene then and Weston developed a habit. In 1951 he left New York to get clean, moving to Lenox, Massachusetts.

Weston’s towering stature – he was 6ft 7in and favoured flowing garments from North or West Africa – made him an imposing, though genial, figure. He remained in good health until the end, performing with a rotating group he called African Rhythms.

Weston’s last public concert was in July at the Nice Jazz Festival in France, with his African Rhythms Quintet. At the time of his death, his website listed upcoming performances scheduled through October.

Looking back on his career, he told All About Jazz: “I have been blessed because I have been around some of the most fantastic people on the planet. I have become a composer and become a pianist. I couldn’t ask for anything more.” GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO