Ron Carter is a champion of the culture of jazz. His playing is an amalgam of experiences, music-making adventures, and influences of the culture’s giants.
He is a jazz academic and a jazz artist. An academic with impressive credentials from impressive schools of music, and an academic as an always student of the school of the culture and community of jazz.
He also plays cello, it was his instrument in his first recording as ensemble leader and there is something very special about the essence of that instrument; it is one that can readily bring the sweetness of the unique qualities of the human voice to the depths and capabilities of resonance of the strings and body of the instrument.
His artistic focus is evident in every note he plays and every creative line he issues, and it is even right there in the expressions of concentration you can see on his face when in the throes of the music. Focus is a key piece of his artistry. As a member of the Jazz Foundation of America, he is part of the work and worthy effort to preserve and save the homes and lives of America’s elderly jazz and blues musicians. He walks elegantly in the culture of jazz, as an artist of it, as an ambassador of it, and as a citizen of it.
