David Sanborn

Sanborn released more than 20 albums and won six Grammy awards. In 2012, Sanborn was described by critic Scott Yanow as "the most influential saxophonist on pop, R&B and crossover players of the past 20 years." He became identified with radio-friendly smooth jazz, although he disliked the term and said he was not a jazz musician.

David Sanborn studied at Bienen School of Music, University of Iowa and Kirkwood High School. The recorded working language is English. The field of work recorded is music, jazz and saxophone performance. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are jazz, jazz fusion, blues rock and rhythm and blues.

Sanborn was born in 1945 in Tampa, Florida, where his father was stationed in the US Air Force. David grew up in Kirkwood, Missouri, a western suburb of St Louis. He contracted polio at the age of three. He "accepted his fate stoically" and endured a "miserable childhood". He was confined to an iron lung for a year, and polio left him with impaired respiration and a left arm shorter than the right. While confined to bed, Sanborn was inspired by the "raw rock 'n' roll energy" of music he heard on the radio, particularly saxophone breaks in songs such as Fats Domino's "Ain't That a Shame" and Little Richard's "Tutti Frutti". He loved the sound of the saxophone and at the age of eleven was happy to change to saxophone from piano lessons when doctors recommended that he take up a wind instrument to improve his breathing and strengthen his chest muscles. When he was 14, he was competent enough playing saxophone to play with blues musicians in local clubs. Alto saxophonist Hank Crawford, who was a member of Ray Charles's band at the time, was an early and lasting influence on Sanborn. Sanborn attended college at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, directly north of Chicago and studied music. He transferred to the University of Iowa where he played and studied with saxophonist J. R. Monterose.

Sanborn performed with blues musicians Albert King and Little Milton at the age of 14. In 1967 he took a Greyhound bus to San Francisco to join the "Summer of Love". While visiting recording studios he was invited to sit in on a session with The Paul Butterfield Blues Band. He made such an impression that he joined the band for five years. He recorded on four Butterfield albums as a horn section member and a soloist from 1967 to 1971. Early in the morning on August 18, 1969, he appeared with the band at the Woodstock Music Festival in Bethel, New York. In 1972, Sanborn played on the track "Tuesday Heartbreak" on the Stevie Wonder album Talking Book. In 1975 he worked with David Bowie on Young Americans and on the James Taylor recording of "How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved by You)" on the album Gorilla. Sanborn is featured on Linda Ronstadt's 1978 album Living in the USA, playing solos on "Ooh Baby Baby" and "Alison." In the mid-1970s, Sanborn became active in the popular jazz fusion scene by joining the Brecker Brothers band, where he became influenced by Michael Brecker. While with the Brecker brothers, he recorded his first solo album, Taking Off, which became a jazz/funk classic. In 1985, Sanborn and Al Jarreau played two sold-out concerts at Chastain Park in Atlanta. Although Sanborn was most associated with smooth jazz, he studied free jazz in his youth with saxophonists Roscoe Mitchell and Julius Hemphill. In 1993, he revisited this genre when he appeared on Tim Berne's Diminutive Mysteries, which was dedicated to Hemphill, who was Berne's mentor. Sanborn's album Another Hand featured avant-garde musicians. He found life on the road increasingly difficult but continued to tour. In 2017, despite plans to reduce his workload to no more than 150 gigs a year, he embarked on a tour which included Istanbul and Nairobi, Kenya.

Sanborn performed and hosted radio, television, and web programs. He was a member of the Saturday Night Live band in 1980. Beginning in the late 1980s he was a regular guest member of Paul Shaffer's band on Late Night with David Letterman. He also appeared on the Late Show with David Letterman a few times in the 1990s. From 1988 to 1989, Sanborn co-hosted Night Music, a late-night music show on television with Jools Holland. Using producer Hal Willner's eclectic approach, the show positioned Sanborn with many famed musicians including Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Pharoah Sanders, NRBQ, Eric Clapton, Robert Cray, Lou Reed, Elliott Sharp, Jean-Luc Ponty, Santana, Todd Rundgren, Youssou N'dour, Pere Ubu, Loudon Wainwright III, Mary Margaret O'Hara, Screamin' Jay Hawkins, Leonard Cohen, Sonic Youth, Was (Not Was), Anson Funderburgh, Warren Zevon, John Zorn, Curtis Mayfield, Richard Thompson, and Jo-El Sonnier. During the 1980s and 1990s, Sanborn hosted a syndicated radio program, The Jazz Show with David Sanborn. He recorded many shows' theme songs, as well as several other songs for The Late Late Show with Tom Snyder. In 2021, as the coronavirus pandemic paused live music performances in public venues, Sanborn hosted a series of master classes on Zoom and also virtual productions of "Sanborn Sessions" with artists such as Marcus Miller, Christian McBride, Sting, Michael McDonald, which involved live performances and interviews from his home in Westchester, New York.

Sanborn played a Selmer Mark VI alto saxophone. In the early 1980s he was endorsed by Yamaha and he played their saxophones on the albums As We Speak and Backstreet. He can be seen playing a Yamaha saxophone at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1981. According to an April 1988 interview in the jazz magazine DownBeat, he had a preference for Selmer Mark VI alto saxophones in the 140,000-150,000 serial number range, all produced in 1967. This range of the Selmer Mark VI preferred by Sanborn have the "medium bow" which are known for its great pitch and response. In the late 1960s to mid 1970s, Sanborn played a Brilhart Level-Air stainless steel mouthpiece created by Arnold Brilhart visible in footage from his performance in 1969 at Woodstock with the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, and on photographs accompanying his solo albums Taking Off (1975) and Heart to Heart (1978). From the late 1970s, Sanborn played with mouthpieces created by Bobby Dukoff. In 2014 he switched from the Dukoff to a mouthpiece designed by Aaron Drake.

Sanborn was married to his fourth wife, French-born Alice Soyer Sanborn, a pianist, vocalist, and composer. His first three marriages ended in divorce. He had one son, Jonathan, a bass player and two granddaughters. Sanborn died of complications from prostate cancer in Tarrytown, New York, west of White Plains, on May 12, 2024, at the age of 78. He was diagnosed with the disease in 2018. On November 25, 2024, a David Sanborn Tribute Concert was held at Sony Hall in New York City. The concert was live-streamed by WBGO and hosted by Marcus Miller and Pat Prescott, and featured performances by Eric Marienthal, Bob James, Paul Shaffer, Will Lee, Kurt Elling, Randy Brecker, Alex Han and Dave Koz.

Compilations The Best of David Sanborn (Warner Bros., 1994) Love Songs (Warner Bros., 1995) Dreaming Girl (WEA, 2008) Then Again: The Anthology (Rhino, 2012) [2-CD] This Masquerade (Warner, 2018) Anything You Want (Cherry Red, 2020) [3-CD] As guest Arif Mardin, All My Friends Are Here (NuNoise, 2010) – on "So Blue" Anders Wihk, Same Tree Different Fruit – on ”Thank You For The Music” (Capitol Music Group AB, 2012)

Love and Happiness (1986) The Super Session (1997) − David Sanborn & Friends The Super Session II (1998) − David Sanborn & Friends Legends: Live at Montreux 1997 (2005) The Legends of Jazz: Showcase (2006) Live at Montreux 1984 (2009)

Sanborn Sessions, official YouTube channel