Andrew Lamb

Tenor saxophonist Andrew Lamb can unleash full-throated screams in the style of committed free-jazz players, yet he usually occupies an intense middle zone that merges bop phrasing with avant-garde exploration in both timbre and harmonic language. Born in Clinton, North Carolina, he spent part of his youth in Chicago before establishing himself in New York. After studying with AACM founder Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre, Lamb arrived on the city’s experimental scene precisely as activity tapered off during the 1970s, leaving him without recordings for an extended period. He meanwhile became a steady contributor to the Bedford-Stuyvesant cultural community and later received support from the Brooklyn Arts Council.

His first opportunity to lead a date came in 1994 with Delmark, which issued Portrait in the Mist; Lamb wrote every composition and assembled vibraphonist Warren Smith, bassist Wilber Morris, and drummer Andrei Strobert. The same unit maintained regular engagements throughout the New York region, especially in Brooklyn, and appeared repeatedly at the Vision Festival after its founding in 1996. In 2001 Lamb joined Alan Silva’s large-ensemble project the Sound Visions Orchestra; the next year he toured with AACM-associated drummer Alvin Fielder.