Jimmy Owens

Biography

9 December 1943, New York City, New York, USA. Owens went to the High School of Music and Art in New York when he was aged 14. He studied composition with Henry Bryant and trumpet with Donald Byrd. In the 60s, after appearing with Marshall Brown’s Newport Youth Band, he played with the bands of Slide Hampton, Lionel Hampton, Maynard Ferguson, Gerry Mulligan, Charles Mingus and Herbie Mann. Owens worked briefly with Duke Ellington and Count Basie and was a member of the Thad Jones - Mel Lewis band. During the early 70s he played with drummer Billy Cobham as well as in Billy Taylor’s band on the Frost Show, and continued the work he had started with Collective Black Artists Inc. (1969) and Jazzmobile. He has been on the music panel of the New York State Council on the Arts and was musical director of the New York Jazz Repertory Company (1974). Owens has written many extended pieces for the Brooklyn Philharmonic Orchestra. A gifted hard bop player, the...

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