Ted Dunbar

An autodidact on guitar who eventually took up teaching the instrument, Ted Dunbar supplied incisive riffs, economical solos, and supportive playing across hard bop, soul-jazz, jazz-rock, and free settings. While enrolled at Texas Southern during the mid- and late 1950s, he performed on both trumpet and guitar. Early gigs placed him alongside Arnett Cobb, Don Wilkerson, and Joe Turner. In the early 1960s he studied and performed with Dave Baker at Indiana, stepping in at times for Wes Montgomery. After relocating to New York in the mid-1960s, he appeared and recorded with Gil Evans throughout the 1970s, as well as with Tony Williams’ Lifetime and Frank Foster. Additional associations included Sonny Rollins, Ron Carter, Billy Harper, Roy Haynes, and McCoy Tyner. He contributed to Billy Taylor’s Jazzmobile project, the New Jazz Repertory Co., and the National Jazz Ensemble before joining the faculty at Livingston College (Rutgers) in 1972. Beyond his own leader dates for Xanadu and Muse, Dunbar authored several texts on jazz harmony and guitar before his death in 1998.