Jazz Musician Les McCann, 88

Les McCann, a prolific and influential musician and recording artist who helped found the soul-jazz trend and changed into a popular source for sampling by Dr. Dre, A Tribe Known as Quest and tons of of assorted hip-hop performers, has died. He used to be 88.

McCann died Friday in Los Angeles a week after being hospitalized with pneumonia, in line alongside with his longtime supervisor and producer, Alan Abrahams.

A Lexington, Kentucky, native, McCann used to be a vocalist and self-taught pianist whose profession dated support to the Fifties, when he won a singing contest while serving in the U.S. Navy and regarded on “The Ed Sullivan Expose,” the head vary program of its time. With admirers including Quincy Jones and Miles Davis, he went on tour worldwide and released dozens of albums, starting in 1960 with “Les McCann Ltd. Plays the Reality.”

He used to be only identified for “Compared to What,” a wintry remark tune on which he first teamed up alongside with his future musical companion, saxophonist Eddie Harris. Written by Eugene McDaniels and recorded are residing at the 1968 Monteaux Jazz Festival, “Compared to What” blended jazzy riffs and McCann’s gospel-trend vocals. The tune condemned war, greed and injustice with such couplets as “Nobody supplies us rhyme or reason/Occupy one doubt, they call it treason.”

Amongst those overlaying “Compared to What” used to be Roberta Flack, a McCann protégé whose profession he helped commence by constructing an audition with Atlantic Records. McCann used to be a pioneer in merging jazz with soul and funk. He would file with Flack and tour with such in trend musicians as Wilson Pickett, Santana and the Staples Singers.

His assorted albums included “Focus on to the Of us” (1972), “Layers” (1973) and “One other Origin” (1974). Last month, Resonance Records issued “Below no instances A Dead Moment! – Dwell from Soar to Soar (1966-1967).”