Jamie Branch, jazz musician and trumpeter, has died at the age of 39. International Anthem, the progressive Chicago label that released his music, confirmed that he died on August 22 at his home in Brooklyn, New York. No cause of death was shared.
“Jamie was a daughter, sister, aunt, cousin, friend and teacher,” the label said in a statement. “She touched countless people with her music and soul, is both fearless, true and beautiful, and will live on in hearts and ears forever. Jamie’s family asks not only for your thoughts and prayers but also for your actions.” Show your love and support to your family and friends and to anyone in need – just like Jamie did for all of us.”
Branch was known for his fiery solo albums: he released Fly or Die in 2017, described by the Chicago Reader as a “stunning quartet recording that weaves many threads into Branch’s music – laser-sharp”. A deep sense for improvisational exploration, weak melodies and a groove”.
This was followed in 2019 by Fly or Die II: Bird Dogs of Paradise recorded live at the London venues Total Refreshment Center and Café Otto. It featured her singing for the first time as she ended racism and border control and defended life’s misfits. “At its peak, Jamie Branch’s trumpet playing has the feeling of a forlorn scream, a cry that elicits no response,” Guardian critic Ammar Kalia wrote of the album.
Branch was also a beloved and enthusiastic collaborator, working with untold artists – among them US bands TV on the radio, Yo La Tango & Spoon, Texas guitarists Ellie Winters, Ben Lamar Gay, Angel Bat David and international anthems such as Tortoise Jeffs. were companions. Parker and British jazz musician Alabaster DePlume, who paid tribute to Branch on Instagram.
Deplume (AKA Gus Fairbairn) wrote, “When Jamie was around, things were always more exciting, but somehow tender – more real and down to earth, but also more grand and epic and great.” “My best time with her was in the future, getting to know her more, and responding to her, and discovering who I could be in response to the way she was.”
uk jazz costume comet is comingphiladelphia guitarist Chris Forsyth, DJ Gilles Peterson And Illinois guitarist Riley Walker was also among the celebrities celebrating Branch’s life. “Jamie Branch was insanely funny,” Walker wrote, “Like my brain is pink slime choking in the air, dying of laughter. great memories. Jamie ruled so hard. Crazy confidence on stage and delivered on it. legend. it hurts a lot.”
Branch was born on June 17, 1983, in New York and began playing the trumpet at the age of nine. She moved to Chicago in her teens and began to explore the history of jazz, being commissioned by Miles Davis’s ’58 Seasons Featuring Stella by Starlight and later Ornette Coleman’s The Shape of Jazz to Come, though she trumpeted in punk. And also played keyboards – a ska band called Tuskers.
She was kicked out of the house as a teenager after accidentally burning down her house, and met a mentor, John McNeill, who encouraged her successful application to the New England Conservatory of Music. Branch returned to Chicago after graduation and became an in-demand local collaborator, organizer and sound engineer, playing in groups including Princesses, Princesses, Sherpas and Battle Cats.
“I loved it all,” she told Jazz Blues News. “There was a series virtually every night of the week. Everyone was playing the music at a high level but it was not ego driven. The focus was really on the music… I was drawn to it in a physical, visceral way. I needed to be a part of that scene.”
In 2012, she would earn a master’s degree in jazz performance and founded a record label, Pionic Records, which released her music with the Bomb Shelter group. In 2014, she dropped her master’s, unable to fund the course, and later sought treatment for her seven-year addiction to heroin.
She has lived in Brooklyn since 2015. A compulsive visit to her chosen instrument, Branch told Aquarium Drunkard that she was “always trying to get more and more detailed techniques, just working in depth with it”, and of German trumpeter Axel Dörner. Cited and saxophonist Evan Parker influenced his style.
In the same interview, Branch was asked what she wanted people to know about her music. “I want them to know that I mean every note I play,” she replied.
(This story has not been edited by seemayo staff and is published from a rss feed)