Terence Blanchard

Trumpeter, composer

Terence Blanchard may be most widely known for his work composing music for director Spike Lee's films, but his deepest love remains with his own jazz trumpeting. When Blanchard rearranged his score for Lee's 1992 film Malcolm X into The Malcolm X Jazz Suite for his own quintet in 1993, Washington Post reviewer Geoffrey Himes called the album "extraordinary, landmark," and esteemed Blanchard as "[Wynton] Marsalis's only real rival as a modern composer of jazz suites in the Ellington mode." In 1994 Down Beat's Michael Bourne deemed In My Solitude: The Billie Holiday Songbook Blanchard's "most heartfelt album." This flurry of success in the early to mid-1990s followed a steady rise from Blanchard's New Orleans roots to his years starting in 1982 with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers in New York and through his playing and recording in the late 1980s with fellow Jazz Messenger Donald Harrison.

In 1989 Blanchard's career was well underway, but he faced a critical crisis. The trumpeter had been mistakenly placing his lips over his teeth instead of in front of them in forming his embouchure, or physical connection to his instrument. This caused a lip injury that led to a one-year hiatus from playing the trumpet. Frustrated in the midst of growing success, Blanchard had to relearn his fundamental technique in proper form after his lips had a chance to heal.

A Father's Influence

Blanchard made it through the ordeal and emerged a leader on the jazz scene. He credited his father with teaching him the patience and wherewithal to overcome deep frustrations in his career, both in retraining himself after the injury and in maintaining his inspiration during some longer tours on the road. Joseph Oliver Blanchard instilled discipline and determination into his son at a young age. The elder Blanchard was an insurance company manager and part-time opera singer in New Orleans who maintained his passion for music despite the racial bias that precluded him from singing full time.

When at age five the young Blanchard began picking up TV show themes such as "Batman" on his grandmother's piano, Blanchard's father brought a piano home and hired a teacher for his son. Then he watched him practice. "He would actually sit there while I practiced," Terence recalled for Wayne K. Self in Down Beat. "He'd sit on the couch and listen until I got it straight. If I made a mistake, he would stop me and say, ‘Go back; go back. Do it again; you've got to get it right.’ I hated it; I hated it with a passion."

If his father introduced him to music and helped him mold aspects of his character, then Blanchard's experience with legendary teachers of jazz developed his love for the trumpet into a striking ability. First Blanchard studied with Ellis Marsalis at the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (NOCCA). Ellis Marsalis, father of Branford and Wynton Marsalis, introduced the trumpeter to the sounds of Clifford Brown, Miles Davis, Charlie "Bird" Parker, and John Coltrane, all of whom would become influences on Blanchard's playing. Meanwhile, Blanchard continued his classical studies and played around town, in the New Orleans Civic Orchestra, in Sunday afternoon Dixieland gigs, and subbing for a big band at the Blue Room.

In 1980 Blanchard went to New York and studied classical and jazz trumpet at Rutgers University on a scholarship. The head of the jazz program there, Paul Jeffrey, connected Blanchard with the Lionel Hampton band. Blanchard played on the road with Hampton on weekends for two years, while he was a Rutgers student. Then Wynton Marsalis approached Blanchard and fellow NOCCA grad Donald Harrison about taking his place in Art Blakey's band in New York. "We auditioned in the band at Fat Tuesday's," Blanchard told Michael Bourne of Down Beat. "One night we played a whole set while Wynton and Branford sat in the back. And then Art said, ‘You're a Jazz Messenger now.’"

Coming Into His Own

Blakey immediately urged Blanchard to develop his own style. "I used to come in and try to play like Miles Davis or Clifford Brown," Blanchard told Scott Aiges of the New Orleans Times-Picayune. "I remember I was playing ‘My Funny Valentine’ and he said, ‘Look, you got to stop doing that, man. You got to pick a ballad that you can make your own and work on your own style and your own sound. Miles did that already. He put his stamp on it.’" One year after joining Blakey's band, Blanchard became musical director and had contributed some tunes of his own to the band's repertoire.

After four years with Blakey's band, Blanchard and Harrison set out in 1986 to form their own quintet and recorded five albums, starting with New York Second Line in their first year. Blanchard had also worked on the soundtracks for the Spike Lee films School Daze, Do the Right Thing, and Mo' Better Blues before breaking with Harrison and signing on to Columbia with his own quintet in 1990. Blanchard's first two albums as a leader, Terence Blanchard, with Branford Marsalis and others in 1991, and Simply Stated in 1992, generated basically positive, although not glowing, reviews. Blanchard attributed the tepid recognition to logistical problems with his Columbia contract and to juggling studio schedules while working on Lee's film Jungle Fever.

With his album The Malcolm X Jazz Suite, culled and translated from the best of his soundtrack for Lee's film Malcolm X, Blanchard achieved broad and deep recognition for succeeding in a bold and ambitious project. A New York Times review by jazz writer K. Leander Williams included sympathetic comparisons to the legendary Duke Ellington. Both artists brought heightened force and energy to the extended suite form. This form, beginning in 1943 with Ellington's Black, Brown and Beige Suite, shifted jazz from a kind of popular music to an art music as well. "Like the extended compositions of Ellington's later years," Williams wrote, "Mr. Blanchard's suite has succeeded in creating music that, while illuminated by his players, is indelibly shaped by its composer."

For the Record …

Born on March 13, 1962, in New Orleans, LA; son of Joseph Oliver Blanchard (an insurance company manager and part-time opera singer). Education: Studied under Ellis Marsalis at New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (NOCCA); studied under jazz trumpeter Paul Jeffrey and classical trumpeter Bill Fielder at Rutgers University, 1980-82.

Trumpet player with New Orleans Civic Orchestra, in Dixieland gigs, and with big bands at the Blue Room in New Orleans, late 1970s; with Lionel Hampton's band, 1980-82; with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, 1982-86, as musical director, 1983-86; with Donald Harrison in a quintet, 1986-90; founder and leader of Terence Blanchard Quintet, beginning 1990; performed concerts at Equitable Center, JVC Jazz Festival, New York, 1991; Orpheum Theater, New Orleans, and Jazz Tent, New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, 1992; with Sonny Rollins, Carnegie Hall, 1993; as leader, Jazz at Lincoln Center, 1993; with Terence Blanchard Quintet, Village Vanguard, New York City, 1993; and at Jazz Showcase, Chicago, 1994; has also played internationally; performed trumpet music for films; composer of soundtracks and music for films, including Clockers: Original Orchestral Score, 1995; issued Wandering Moon, 2000, and Let's Get Lost, 2001; composed soundtrack for 25th Hour and Bounce, 2003; participated on McCoy Tyner's Grammy Award Winning Album Illuminations, 2004; issued Flow, 2005; recorded A Tale of God's Will (A Requiem for Katrina), 2007.

Addresses: Record company—Columbia Records, 51 West 52nd St., New York, NY 10019, Web site: http://www.columbiarecords.com/.

In the 1990s Blanchard remained as busy as ever. He continued to score soundtracks for Spike Lee movies, including 1994's Crooklyn, and contributed to other film soundtracks, such as Sugar Hill, Inkwell, Trial by Jury, Housesitter, and BackBeat. EntertainmentWeekly considered Blanchard central to a general resurgence of jazz composition for film. Meanwhile, Blanchard recorded another bold album, In My Solitude: The Billie Holiday Songbook, for Columbia in 1994. Blanchard's deepest love remained with playing his trumpet, both in recording and especially live. "Writing for film is fun, but nothing can beat being a jazz musician, playing a club, playing a concert," Blanchard was quoted as saying in Down Beat. "When I stood next to Sonny Rollins at Carnegie Hall last fall and listened to him play, that was it for me. … You could've shot me and killed me right there, and I would've been happy."

Blanchard continued to record both solo projects and score movies at the turn of the millennium. In 2000 he issued Wandering Moon, an album that led Michael G. Nastos of All Music Guide to comment, "Trumpeter Blanchard has released some fine recordings in the '90s, but this one may be the best of them all, as he asserts himself as a composer of truly original modern jazz." In 2001 Blanchard completed Let's Get Lost, a tribute to songwriter Jimmy McHugh, a recording that relied on the talents of four female singers, Diana Krall, Jane Monheit, Dianne Reeves, and Cassandra Wilson. Blanchard also continued to work with director Spike Lee, scoring the soundtrack for his 2002 movie 25th Hour.

A Musical Storm

In 2006 the tragedy of Hurricane Katrina assumed special meaning for Blanchard: he had been born in New Orleans, and his mother lost her home in the storm. The tragedy would also lead to one of his most deeply felt musical projects. When his long-time collaborator Lee heard the news, Blanchard recalled in the Santa Barbara Independent, "he got on the next plane from New York and came straight to my place. He knocked on the door and then, before he even said hello, he said that we had to make this film—that we had to let these people tell their stories." As a result, Blanchard recorded A Tale of God's Will (A Requiem for Katrina), a moving tribute to the victims. "The music here will leave you in a melancholy, contemplative mood and definitely in awe of the talented musicians, composers, and arrangers who told A Tale of God's Will," wrote Paula Edelstein in All Music Guide.

Recalling his work on the soundtrack, and the magnitude of the New Orleans tragedy and its aftermath, Blanchard told the Santa Barbara Independent, "I had that aspect of the film in mind, that in the levees you see just everybody. In a strange way, now, I feel blessed, because this thing has gotten the best out of us as artists."

Selected discography

(With Donald Harrison) New York Second Line, Concord Jazz, 1983.

(With Art Blakey) New York Scene, Concord Jazz, 1984.

(With Harrison) Discernment, Concord Jazz, 1986.

(With Harrison) Nascence, Columbia, 1986.

(With Blakey) Live at Kimball's (recorded 1985), Concord Jazz, 1987.

(With Blakey) Blue Night (recorded 1985), Timeless, 1991.

Terence Blanchard, Columbia, 1991.

(With Blakey) Dr. Jekyle (recorded 1985), Evidence, 1992.

Simply Stated, Columbia, 1992.

(With Blakey) Hard Champion (recorded 1985), Evidence, 1992.

(With Blakey) New Year's Eve at Sweet Basil (recorded 1985), Evidence, 1992.

(With Harrison and others) Fire Waltz (recorded 1986), Evidence, 1993.

The Malcolm X Jazz Suite, Columbia, 1993.

(With Harrison and others) Eric Dolphy and Booker Little Remembered Live at Sweet Basil (recorded 1986), Evidence, 1993.

In My Solitude: The Billie Holiday Songbook, Columbia, 1994.

Clockers: Original Orchestral Score, Columbia, 1995.

Wandering Moon, Columbia, 2000.

Let's Get Lost, Sony, 2001.

25th Hour, Hollywood, 2003.

Bounce, Blue Note, 2003.

Flow, Blue Note, 2005.

A Tale of God's Will (A Requiem for Katrina), Angel, 2007.

Film soundtracks

Do the Right Thing, Columbia, 1989.

Mo' Better Blues, Columbia, 1990.

Malcolm X, Columbia, 1992.

Inside Man, Varese Sarabande, 2006.

Sources

Periodicals

Billboard, July 13, 1991; June 6, 1992.

Down Beat, August 1983; October 1991; August 1992; May 1994.

Entertainment Weekly, May 13, 1994.

Los Angeles Times, August 15, 1993.

New York Times, June 20, 1993.

Time, May 16, 1994.

Times-Picayune (New Orleans, LA), May 1, 1992.

Washington Post, October 1, 1993.

Online

"An Interview with Terence Blanchard of the Monterey Jazz Festival Orchestra," Santa Barbara Independent,http://independent.com/news/2008/jan/10/interview-terenceblanchard-monterey-jazz-festival/, January 7, 2008.

"Terence Blanchard," All Music Guide,http://www.allmusic.com, January 7, 2008.

Other

Additional information for this profile was provided by Columbia Records Media Department publicity materials.

—Nicholas Patti and Ronald D Lankford, Jr.

Terence Blanchard

Trumpeter, composer

Gave Dad Credit

Hooked Up With Hamp

Led Bands, Scored Films

Selected discography

Sources

Terence Blanchard may be most widely known for his work composing music for director Spike Lee’s films, but his deepest love remains with his own jazz trumpeting. When Blanchard rearranged his score for Lee’s 1992 film, Malcolm X, into The Malcolm X Jazz Suite for his own quintet in 1993, Washington Post reviewer Geoffrey Himes called the album “extraordinary, landmark” and esteemed Blanchard as “[Wynton] Marsalis’s only real rival as a modern composer of jazz suites in the Ellington mode.” Then in 1994, Down Beat’s Michael Bourne deemed In My Solitude: The Billie Holiday Songbook Blanchard’s “most heartfelt album.” This flurry of success in the early to mid-1990s followed a steady rise from Blanchard’s New Orleans roots to his years starting in 1982 with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers in New York and through his playing and recording in the late 1980s with fellow Jazz Messenger Donald Harrison.

In 1989 Blanchard’s career was well underway, but he met with a nearly critical crisis. The trumpeter had been mistakenly placing his lips over his teeth instead of in front of them in forming his embouchure, his physical connection to his instrument. This caused a lip injury that led to a one-year hiatus from the trumpet. Frustrated in the midst of growing success, Blanchard would have to relearn his fundamental technique in proper form after his lips had a chance to heal.

Gave Dad Credit

Blanchard made it through the ordeal and emerged a leader on the jazz scene. He credited his father with teaching him the patience and wherewithal to overcome deep frustrations in his career—both in retraining himself through his crisis and in maintaining his inspiration during some longer tours on the road. Joseph Oliver Blanchard instilled discipline and determination into his son at a young age. The elder Blanchard was an insurance company manager and part-time opera singer in New Orleans who maintained his passion for music despite a racial stigma that precluded him from singing full time.

When at age five the young Blanchard began picking up TV show themes such as Batman on his grandmother’s piano, Blanchard’s father brought a piano home and hired a teacher for his son. Then he watched him practice. “He would actually sit there while I practiced,” Terence recalled for Wayne K. Self in Down Beatin 1992. “He’d sit on the couch and listen until I got it straight. If I made a mistake, he would stop me and say, ‘Go back; go back. Do it again; you’ve got to get it right.’ I hated it; I hated it with a passion.”

For the Record…

Born March 13, 1962, in New Orleans, LA; son of Joseph Oliver Blanchard (insurance company manager and part-time opera singer). Education: Studied under Ellis Marsalis at New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (NOCCA); studied under jazz trumpeter Paul Jeffrey and classical trumpeter Bill Fielder at Rutgers University, 1980-82.

Trumpet player with New Orleans Civic Orchestra, in Dixieland gigs, and with big bands at the Blue Room in New Orleans, late 1970s; with Lionel Hampton’s band, 1980-82; with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, 1982-86, as musical director, 1983-86; with Donald Harrison in a quintet, 1986-90; founder and leader of Terence Blanchard Quintet, beginning in 1990; performed concerts at Equitable Center, JVC Jazz Festival, New York, 1991; Orpheum Theater, New Orleans, and Jazz Tent, New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, 1992; with Sonny Rollins, Carnegie Hall, 1993; as leader, Jazz at Lincoln Center, 1993; with Terence Blanchard Quintet, Village Vanguard, New York, 1993; and at Jazz Showcase, Chicago, 1994; has also played internationally; performed trumpet music for films; composer of soundtracks and music for films.

Addresses: Record company —Columbia Records, 51 West 52nd St., New York, NY 10019.

If his father introduced him to music and taught him aspects of character to stead him well in his art, then Blanchard’s experience with legendary teachers of jazz developed his love for the trumpet into a striking ability. First, Blanchard studied with Ellis Marsalis at the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (NOCCA). Ellis Marsalis, father of Branford and Wynton Marsalis, introduced the trumpeter to the sounds of Clifford Brown, Miles Davis, Bird, and John Coltrane, all of whom would become influences on Blanchard’s playing. Meanwhile, Blanchard continued his classical studies and played around town—in the New Orleans Civic Orchestra, in Sunday afternoon Dixieland gigs, and subbing for a big band at the Blue Room.

Hooked Up With Hamp

In 1980 Blanchard went to New York and studied classical and jazz trumpet at Rutgers University on a scholarship. The head of the jazz program there, Paul Jeffrey, connected Blanchard with the Lionel Hampton band. Blanchard played on the road with Hamp on the weekends while a Rutgers student for two years. Then Wynton Marsalis called Blanchard and fellow NOCCA grad Donald Harrison about taking his place in Art Blakey’s band in New York. “We auditioned in the band at Fat Tuesday’s,” Blanchard told Michael Bourne of Down Beat. “One night we played a whole set while Wynton and Branford sat in the back. And then Art said, ‘You’re a Jazz Messenger now.’”

Blakey immediately urged Blanchard to develop his own style. “I used to come in and try to play like Miles Davis or Clifford Brown,” Blanchard told Scott Aiges of the New Orleans Times-Picayune. “I remember I was playing ‘My Funny Valentine’ and he said, ‘Look, you got to stop doing that, man. You got to pick a ballad that you can make your own and work on your own style and your own sound. Miles did that already. He put his stamp on it.’” With that insistence, Blanchard first imagined himself as a jazz leader. “And when he said that it was like, damn, I wouldn’t even put my name in the same breath as Miles Davis or Clifford Brown, but he made me understand that I can have my own identity.” One year after joining Blakey’s band, Blanchard became musical director and had contributed some tunes of his own to the band’s repertoire.

Led Bands, Scored Films

After four years with Blakey’s band, Blanchard and Harrison set out in 1986 with their own quintet and recorded five albums, starting with New York Second Line in their first year. Blanchard had also worked on the soundtracks for the Spike Lee films School Daze, Do the Right Thing, and Mo’ Better Blues before breaking with Harrison and signing on to Columbia with his own quintet in 1990. Blanchard’s first two albums as a leader—Terence Blanchard, with Branford Marsalis and others in 1991, and Simply Stated in 1992—generated basically positive, although not glowing, reviews. Blanchard attributed that tepid recognition to logistical problems with his Columbia contract and to juggling studio schedules while working on Lee’s film Jungle Fever.

With his next album, The Malcolm X Jazz Suite, culled and translated from the best of his soundtrack for Lee’s film Malcolm X, Blanchard achieved broad and deep recognition for succeeding in a bold and ambitious project. A New York Times review by jazz writer K. Leander Williams included sympathetic comparisons to the legendary Duke Ellington. Both brought heightened force and energy to the extended suite form—a form which in 1943 with Ellington’s Black, Brown and Beige Suite shifted jazz from a kind of popular music only to an art music as well. “Like the extended compositions of Ellington’s later years,” Williams wrote, “Mr. Blanchard’s suite has succeeded in creating music that, while illuminated by his players, is indelibly shaped by its composer.”

In the 1990s Blanchard remained as busy as ever. He continued to score soundtracks for Spike Lee movies, including 1994’s Crooklyn, and contributed to other film soundtracks, such as Sugar Hill, Inkwell, Trial by Jury, Housesitter, and BackBeat. Entertainment Weekly considered Blanchard central to a general resurgence of jazz composition for film. Meanwhile, Blanchard recorded another bold album, In My Solitude: The Billie Holiday Songbook, for Columbia in 1994. Blanchard’s deepest love remained with playing his trumpet, both in recording and especially live. “Writing for film is fun, but nothing can beat being a jazz musician, playing a club, playing a concert,” Blanchard was quoted as saying in Down Beat in 1994. “When I stood next to Sonny Rollins at Carnegie Hall last fall and listened to him play, that was it for me.… You could’ve shot me and killed me right there, and I would’ve been happy.”

Selected discography

(With Donald Harrison) New York Second Line, Concord Jazz, 1983.

(With Art Blakey) New York Scene, Concord Jazz, 1984.

(With Harrison) Discernment, Concord Jazz, 1986.

(With Harrison) Nascence, Columbia, 1986.

(With Blakey) Live at Kimball’s (recorded 1985), Concord Jazz, 1987.

(With Blakey) Blue Night (recorded 1985), Timeless, 1991.

Terence Blanchard, Columbia, 1991.

(With Blakey) Dr. Jekyle (recorded 1985), Evidence, 1992.

Simply Stated, Columbia, 1992.

(With Blakey) Hard Champion (recorded 1985), Evidence, 1992.

(With Blakey) New Year’s Eve at Sweet Basil (recorded 1985), Evidence, 1992.

(With Harrison and others) Fire Waltz (recorded 1986), Evidence, 1993.

The Malcolm X Jazz Suite, Columbia, 1993.

(With Harrison and others) Eric Dolphy and Booker Little Remembered Live at Sweet Basil (recorded 1986), Evidence, 1993.

In My Solitude: The Billie Holiday Songbook, Columbia, 1994.

Film soundtracks; composer

Jungle Fever, Motown, 1991.

Malcolm X, Columbia, 1992.

Crooklyn, 1994.

Film soundtracks; contributor

School Daze, EMI-Manhattan, 1988.

Do the Right Thing, Columbia, 1989.

Mo’ Better Blues, Columbia, 1990.

BackBeat.

Housesitter.

Sugar Hill.

Inkwell.

Trial by Jury.

Sources

Billboard, July 13, 1991; June 6, 1992.

Down Beat, August 1983; October 1991; August 1992; May 1994.

Entertainment Weekly, May 13, 1994.

Los Angeles Times, August 15, 1993.

New York Times, June 20, 1993.

Time, May 16, 1994.

Times-Picayune (New Orleans, LA), May 1, 1992.

Washington Post, October 1, 1993.

Additional information for this profile was provided by Columbia Records Media Department publicity materials.

—Nicholas Patti

Blanchard, Terence 1962–

PERSONAL

Full name, Terence Oliver Blanchard; born March 13, 1962, in New Orleans, LA; son of Joseph Oliver Blanchard (an insurance company manager and part-time opera singer); married, wife's name Robin; children: four, including Olivia Ray. Education: Studied at New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts, 1978; attended Rutgers University, 1980–82.

Addresses: Agent—Wayne Fitterman, United Talent Agency, 9560 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 500, Beverly Hills, CA 90212. Manager—Burgess Management, 3225 Prytania St., New Orleans, LA 70115.

Career: Composer, trumpet player, band leader, conductor, orchestrator, recording artist, and actor. Trumpeter with New Orleans Civic Orchestra and with big bands at the Blue Room in New Orleans, late 1970s; appeared with Lionel Hampton Orchestra, 1980–82; Jazz Messengers (musical group), trumpeter, 1982–86, musical director, 1983–86; appeared with Donald Harrison in a quintet, 1986–90; Terence Blanchard Quintet, founder and leader, beginning 1990; performed with Terence Blanchard Group, Natural Spirit Orchestra, and New York Jazz Ensemble; concert performer in the United States and abroad. University of Southern California, artistic director of Thelonius Monk Institute of Jazz Performance.

Awards, Honors: Grand Prix du Disque (France), 1984, for New York Second Line; Grammy Award nomination, National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, best jazz instrumental performance by a group (with others), 1990, for Mo' Better Blues; Emmy Award nomination, best original score for a documentary, 1995, for The Promised Land; Grammy Award nomination, best Latin jazz performance, 1996, for The Heart Speaks; readers' choice for jazz artist of the year and trumpeter of the year, Downbeat, 2000; readers' choice for jazz album of the year, Downbeat, 2000, for Wandering Moon; Grammy Award nomination, best jazz instrumental solo, 2001, for "I Thought About You," Wandering Moon; Grammy Award nomination, best jazz instrumental solo, 2002, for "Lost in a Fog," Let's Get Lost; Golden Globe Award nomination, best original score for a motion picture, Golden Satellite Award nomination, International Press Academy, best original score, Sierra Award, Las Vegas Film Critics Society, best score, and World Soundtrack Award nomination, soundtrack composer of the year, all 2003, for 25th Hour; Black Reel Award nomination, best original score, 2005, for She Hate Me.

CREDITS

Film Work; Trumpet Player:

(With Natural Spirit Orchestra) School Daze, Columbia, 1988.

Do the Right Thing, MCA/Universal Pictures, 1989.

Mo' Better Blues, Universal, 1990.

(And leader of Big Band, and conductor of Malcolm X Orchestra) Malcolm X, Warner Bros., 1992.

Housesitter, 1992.

(With Terence Blanchard Quintet) Sugar Hill (also known as Harlem), Twentieth Century-Fox, 1994.

(And orchestrator) The Inkwell (also known as No Ordinary Summer), Buena Vista, 1994.

(With Terence Blanchard Quartet) Trial by Jury, Warner Bros., 1994.

Backbeat, 1994.

Soloist, Primal Fear, Paramount, 1996.

(And score producer and conductor) 4 Little Girls, Green Valley Films, 1997.

Soloist (and score conductor), Summer of Sam, Buena Vista, 1999.

Random Hearts, Columbia, 1999.

(And conductor) Bamboozled, New Line Cinema, 2000.

(And organist) Glitter, Twentieth Century-Fox, 2001.

Soloist, Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/United Artists, 2001.

(And conductor) Jim Brown All American, HBO Sports/40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks, 2002.

Soloist, The Salton Sea, Warner Bros., 2002.

Film Work; Other:

Conductor, Crooklyn, Universal, 1994.

Conductor, Clockers, Universal, 1995.

Score producer and conductor, Get On the Bus, Columbia, 1996.

Music arranger, "A Child with the Blues," Eve's Bayou, MCA/Universal, 1997.

Music conductor, Next Friday, New Line Cinema, 2000.

Orchestrator and conductor, Love & Basketball, New Line Cinema, 2000.

Orchestrator and conductor, The Caveman's Valentine (also known as Sign of the Killer), MCA/Universal, 2001.

Conductor and orchestrator, Original Sin (also known as Peche originel), Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 2001.

Conductor and organist, Barbershop, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 2002.

Song performer, "Uptown Lowdown" and "JMP," People I Know (also known as Im inneren kreis and Der innere kreis), Miramax, 2003.

Film Appearances:

Trumpet player with Billie Holiday Quartet, Malcolm X, Warner Bros., 1992.

Television Appearances; Specials:

Country Spring Break '94, ABC, 1994.

Swing into Christmas, Arts and Entertainment, 1995.

Television Appearances; Miniseries:

Himself, A Girl Thing, Showtime, 2001.

Television Appearances; Episodic:

Guest, Late Show with David Letterman, 1999.

Appeared in episodes of ABC in Concert, ABC, and Evening at Pops, PBS.

Television Music Performer:

Soul of the Game (movie), HBO, 1996.

Unchained Memories: Readings from the Slave Narratives (special), HBO, 2003.

RECORDINGS

Albums; Solo Artist:

Terence Blanchard, Columbia/Sony, 1991.

Simply Stated, Columbia/Sony, 1992.

The Malcolm X Jazz Suite, Columbia/Sony, 1993.

In My Solitude: The Billie Holiday Songbook, Columbia/Sony, 1994.

Romantic Defiance, Columbia/Sony, 1995.

The Heart Speaks, Columbia, 1995.

Jazz in Film, Sony Classical, 1999.

Wandering Moon, Sony Classical, 2000.

Let's Get Lost: The Songs of Jimmy McHugh, Sony Classical, 2001.

Bounce, Blue Note, 2003.

Flow, Blue Note, 2005.

Albums; With Donald Harrison:

New York Second Line, Concord Jazz, 1983.

Discernment, Concord Jazz, 1986.

Nascence, Columbia, 1986.

(With Harrison and others) Eric Dolphy and Booker Little Remembered Live at Sweet Basil, two volumes, Evidence, 1986.

(With Harrison and others) Fire Waltz: Eric Dolphy and Booker Little Remembered, Projazz, 1986.

Crystal Stair, Columbia/CBS, 1987.

Black Pearl, Columbia/CBS, 1988.

Albums; With Art Blakey:

New York Scene, Concord Jazz, 1984.

Live at Kimball's, Concord Jazz, 1987.

Blue Night, Timeless, 1991.

Dr. Jekyle, Evidence, 1992.

Hard Champion, Evidence, 1992.

New Year's Eve at Sweet Basil, Evidence, 1992.

Film Soundtrack Albums; Contributor:

School Daze, EMI-Manhattan, 1988.

Do the Right Thing, Columbia, 1989.

Mo' Better Blues, Columbia/Sony, 1990.

Jungle Fever, Motown, 1991.

Malcolm X, Columbia/Sony, 1993.

Sugar Hill, Arista, 1993.

Crooklyn, 1994.

The Inkwell, Buena Vista, 1994.

Trial by Jury, 1994.

Backbeat, Polygram/Verve, 1994.

Clockers, Columbia/Sony, 1995.

The Promised Land, Columbia/Sony, 1995.

Get on the Bus, Columbia, 1996.

'Til There Was You, Paramount, 1997.

4 Little Girls, 1997.

Eve's Bayou, Sonic Images/MCA, 1997.

Summer of Sam, 1999.

Next Friday, 2000.

The Caveman's Valentine, Decca, 2001.

Original Sin, Chapter III, 2001.

25th Hour, Hollywood, 2002.

People I Know, Decca, 2003.

She Hate Me, Milan, 2004.

Also contributed to the soundtrack recording of Housesitter.

Videos:

Rendezvous in New York (concert video), Ideal Entertainment, 2004.

WRITINGS

Film Music:

Song, "Sing Soweto," Mo' Better Blues, Universal, 1990.

Jungle Fever, Universal, 1991.

Malcolm X, Warner Bros., 1992.

Crooklyn, Universal, 1994.

Sugar Hill (also known as Harlem), Twentieth Century-Fox, 1994.

The Inkwell (also known as No Ordinary Summer), Buena Vista, 1994.

Trial by Jury, Warner Bros., 1994.

Clockers, Universal, 1995.

Get On the Bus, Columbia, 1996.

4 Little Girls, Green Valley Films, 1997.

'Til There Was You, Paramount, 1997.

Eve's Bayou, MCA/Universal, 1997.

Summer of Sam, Buena Vista, 1999.

Next Friday, New Line Cinema, 2000.

Love and Basketball, New Line Cinema, 2000.

Bamboozled, New Line Cinema, 2000.

Underscore, The Caveman's Valentine (also known as The Sign of the Killer), MCA/Universal, 2001.

Original Sin (also known as Peche originel), Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 2001.

Glitter, Twentieth Century-Fox, 2001.

Jim Brown All American, HBO Sports/40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks, 2002.

Barbershop, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 2002.

25th Hour, Buena Vista, 2002.

(Including songs "Uptown Lowdown" and "JMP"), People I Know (also known as Im inneren kreis and Der innere kreis), Miramax, 2003.

Dark Blue, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/United Artists, 2003.

Negroes with Guns: Rob Williams and Black Power (documentary), 2004.

Original music, She Hate Me, Sony Pictures Classics, 2004.

Drum, Armada Pictures International, 2004.

Television Music; Movies:

Assault at West Point: The Court-Martial of Johnson Whittaker (also known as Assault at Westpoint), Showtime, 1994.

(Contributor) Soul of the Game, HBO, 1996.

Gia, HBO, 1998.

The Tempest, NBC, 1998.

A Saintly Switch (also known as In Your Shoes), ABC, 1999.

Free of Eden, Showtime, 1999.

The Color of Courage, USA Network, 1999.

Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters' First 100 Years (also known as Having Our Say), CBS, 1999.

Navigating the Heart, Lifetime, 2000.

The Truth about Jane, Lifetime, 2000.

Bojangles, Showtime, 2001.

Redemption, FX Channel, 2004.

Their Eyes Were Watching God (also known as Oprah Winfrey Presents: Their Eyes Were Watching God), ABC, 2005.

Television Music; Miniseries:

The Promised Land, The Discovery Channel, 1995.

A Girl Thing, Showtime, 2001.

Television Music; Other:

Special music, Soul of the Game (also known as Field of Honour), HBO, 1996.

Sucker Free City (pilot), Showtime, 2004.

Sucker Free City (series), Showtime, 2005.

ADAPTATIONS

Music composed by Blanchard for various films was also featured in the television special Unchained Memories: Readings from the Slave Narratives, broadcast by HBO in 2003.

OTHER SOURCES

Books:

Contemporary Black Biography, Volume 43, Gale, 2004.

Contemporary Musicians, Volume 13, Gale, 1994.

Magro, Anthony, Contemporary Cat: Terence Blanchard with Special Guests, Scarecrow Press, 2002.

Periodicals:

Down Beat, May, 1999, p. 41; December 3, 2000.

Essence, April 1, 2001, p. 76.

Jazz Now, July, 1996.

Time, May 16, 1994, p. 89.

Electronic:

Terence Blanchard Electronic Press Kit, http://www.terenceblanchard.com, May 9, 2005.