Larry Young

Larry Young offered as radical an approach to organ in the 1960s as Jimmy Smith had posed in the '50s. His free, swirling chords, surging lines, and rock-influenced improvisations were an alternative to the groove-centered blues and soul sound that had become the organ's dominant direction. He brought John Coltrane's late-'60s approach to the organ, generating waves of sound and influencing every session he participated in. Young had played in a hard bop vein during the early '60s before his 1965 album Into Somethin' alerted everyone that he was heading a different way, and Unity, recorded the same year, remains his best-known album. He played with Coltrane, joined Miles Davis' band in 1969, then worked with John McLaughlin in 1970 and was in Tony Williams' Lifetime in the early '70s. He made a couple of other records before sadly passing away in 1978 at the age of 38.