Nat Adderley

The turning point in the Adderley brothers' careers occurred on a trip to New York in 1955. The brothers stopped by the Café Bohemia in Greenwich Village when bassist Oscar Pettiford was playing. Both of them showed up ready to play. Cannonball was asked to sit in because the regular saxophonist was out, and he overwhelmed the musicians. Then Nat was pulled on stage, and everyone was equally impressed.[3] This appearance was enough to renew their careers. Job offers began pouring in, and Nat recorded for the first time that year.[5]

The brothers moved to New York City, founding the bop group Cannonball Adderley Quintet in 1956. Due to lack of popular interest, they disbanded the group in 1957. Nat played for trombonist J. J. Johnson for a couple of years and ended up in the Woody Herman sextet. Cannonball gained a higher profile and joined the Miles Davis sextet alongside John Coltrane in time to record the album Kind of Blue.

In 1959, the Cannonball Adderley Quintet reunited. This time around the group was more successful and had its first hit, "This Here", written by pianist Bobby Timmons.[5] The group sound became known as soul jazz, starting the genre. The quintet also played hard bop, as everyone in the group had been influenced by bebop and wanted to continue a virtuosic tradition. Soul jazz kept the group popular, while hard bop gave the musicians a chance to challenge themselves and demonstrate their abilities.

Nat and Cannonball Adderley at the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, 1961

During the 1960s, Adderley acted as cornetist, composer, and manager for the quintet.[3] While he kept the band in order, he also composed some of the group's most successful songs. His most successful song was "Work Song" (January 1960), a hard bop tune. Adderley called it his "Social Security song" due to the steady flow of income over the years from royalty payments when others recorded the song.[5] "Work Song" is now considered a jazz standard. His other popular songs include "Jive Samba", "Hummin'", "Sermonette", and "The Old Country".[8]

While he was an integral part of the Cannonball Adderley Quintet, this was not the only project occupying his time in his career as professional jazz musician. Since moving to New York, he had been recording outside the Adderley group.[8] He worked with Kenny Clarke, Wes Montgomery, and Walter Booker.

Other projects included the film A Man Called Adam (1966). In the film, Sammy Davis Jr.'s character plays the trumpet. Since Davis could not himself play the trumpet, Adderley was hired to ghost everything that the character played.[6] His other significant project during this time was a musical. He and his brother wrote Shout Up a Morning based on the folk hero John Henry. While this project started as a collaboration, work was interrupted when Cannonball died from a stroke.[8]

After Cannonball's death in 1975, the quintet broke up. Nat Adderley toured Europe as a headliner.[7] He toured Japan, then returned to the U.S. and taught courses at Harvard while performing and recording with his quintet, which included Walter Booker, Jimmy Cobb, and Vincent Herring.[9][6] Adderley established himself in his own right. He also worked with Ron Carter, Sonny Fortune, Johnny Griffin, and Antonio Hart.[1]

Adderley created the Adderley Brotherhood, a sextet which included several members of the Cannonball Adderley Quintet. This group toured Europe in 1980. Shout Up a Morning, after having a concert performance in Carnegie Hall shortly after Cannonball's death, was staged in several locations around the United States in 1986.[8] Adderley became involved in several other ensembles over the next decade, including the Paris Reunion Band and a group called the Riverside Reunion Band (after the Riverside label), a bop group that formed at the Monterey Jazz Festival in 1993 and then toured Europe in 1994.[6]

Adderley spent half the year touring and the other half at home in Lakeland, Florida, writing and recording. He thought many of his greatest fans were in Japan, but Europeans were also enthusiastic about the music.[10]

In 1997, he joined the faculty of Florida Southern College as an artist-in-residence. He also helped in the founding and development of the annual Child of the Sun Jazz Festival held annually at the university which he headlined for over a decade.[11] During the same year, he was inducted into the Jazz Hall of Fame in Kansas City.[8]

He lived on 112th Street in Harlem in the 1960s and in Teaneck, New Jersey, in the 1970s, before moving to Lakeland.[12] He also lived near his brother in Corona, Queens.[13]

Nat Adderley died as a result of complications from diabetes at the age of 68 in Lakeland, Florida.[14] He was interred near his brother in the Southside Cemetery in Tallahassee, Florida. He was survived by his wife, Ann; a son, Nat Adderley Jr. of West Orange, N.J.; a daughter, Alison Adderley-Pittman of Palm Bay, Florida; and five grandchildren.[14]

He was an innovator in the popularization of soul jazz and was one of the most prolific jazz artists of his time, recording nearly 100 albums.[10] He proved that cornet could be a modern jazz instrument.

Compilation:

• Live on Planet Earth (West Wind, 2008) – live