Biography
Emerging as a singular voice in contemporary creative jazz, the saxophonist Michael Blake—Canadian by birth and long based in New York—melds avant-garde experimentation, post-bop foundations, and worldwide traditions. An early participant in N.Y.C.’s influential Lounge Lizards collective, he surfaced during the 1990s and has collaborated with an array of wide-ranging musicians such as Steven Bernstein, Ben Allison, Charlie Hunter, Stereo MC’s, Michael Leonhart, and Erik Friedlander. His recordings as a leader reflect this expansive, globally oriented outlook, incorporating Vietnamese elements on the 1991 release Kingdom of Champa while extending the legacies of Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane across Right Before Your Very Ears in 2005, In the Grand Scheme of Things in 2012, and the 2023 album Dance of the Mystic Bliss, shaped by folk and Afro-Brazilian currents.
Born in Montreal in 1964, Blake passed his teenage years in Toronto and San Francisco before his family established roots in Vancouver. There, at age 14, he took up the clarinet and soon shifted to tenor saxophone. He thrived during adolescence under the private guidance of the respected reedist David Branter. Following secondary school, he attended Vancouver Community College for a year and later received a scholarship to the Courtenay Music Center. Locally he began performing jazz under the mentorship of trombonist, pianist, and composer Hugh Fraser.
In the mid-1980s Blake took part in the Banff School of Fine Arts Jazz Workshop, where he worked alongside such figures as bassist Dave Holland, pianist Cecil Taylor, and trumpeter Kenny Wheeler. A 1986 grant from The Canada Council for the Arts enabled him to study with saxophonist David Liebman in New York City. At the close of that period he returned to Vancouver and directed his own quartet at the Alcan Jazz Competition.
By 1987 the twenty-three-year-old musician had settled once more in New York, performing in merengue ensembles and supporting artists ranging from Chubby Checker to Jack McDuff. In 1990 John Lurie encountered him at a downtown venue; six months afterward Blake joined the Lounge Lizards, appearing on both volumes of the Live in Berlin recordings as well as the 1998 studio album Queen of All Ears.
Blake’s first outing as leader, Kingdom of Champa, appeared on Intuition in 1997. Produced by Teo Macero, the album integrated Vietnamese musical influences within a jazz framework that featured downtown New York figures including Thomas Chapin and Steven Bernstein. Around the same time he contributed to Lurie’s score for the film Get Shorty and began an extended collaboration with bassist Ben Allison.
His second Intuition recording, Drift, followed in 2001 with a small ensemble that included guitarist Tony Scherr and pianist Frank Kimbrough. Elevated came next in 2002, again involving Allison, Kimbrough, and drummer Mike Mazor. The trio session Right Before Your Very Ears, also featuring Allison and drummer Jeff Ballard, was issued by Clean Feed in 2005. During these years Blake performed with Groove Collective, Medeski, Martin & Wood, Tricky, the Gil Evans Orchestra, Pinetop Perkins, and the Herbie Nichols Project.
He subsequently pursued a sequence of exploratory projects for Stunt Records, opening with the quartet album Blake Tartare in 2006, followed the same year by More Like Us and by The World Awakens: Tribute to Eli Lucky Thompson in 2007. Also in 2007 he released the quintet recording Amor de Cosmos with trumpeter Brad Turner. In 2009 he joined drummer Kresten Osgood for Control This on Clean Feed.
In the Grand Scheme of Things, issued in 2012, combined electronics with modal jazz. Two years later Blake, Ben Allison, Frank Kimbrough, and Rudy Royston documented the hard bop-oriented Tiddy Boom. The textural and atmospheric Fulfillment appeared in 2016, drawing contributions from guitarist Aram Bajakian, trumpeter JP Carter, keyboardist Chris Gestin, and additional musicians. Dance of the Mystic Bliss arrived in 2023, another richly layered work informed by classical string traditions, country, and psychedelic rock.
Born in Montreal in 1964, Blake passed his teenage years in Toronto and San Francisco before his family established roots in Vancouver. There, at age 14, he took up the clarinet and soon shifted to tenor saxophone. He thrived during adolescence under the private guidance of the respected reedist David Branter. Following secondary school, he attended Vancouver Community College for a year and later received a scholarship to the Courtenay Music Center. Locally he began performing jazz under the mentorship of trombonist, pianist, and composer Hugh Fraser.
In the mid-1980s Blake took part in the Banff School of Fine Arts Jazz Workshop, where he worked alongside such figures as bassist Dave Holland, pianist Cecil Taylor, and trumpeter Kenny Wheeler. A 1986 grant from The Canada Council for the Arts enabled him to study with saxophonist David Liebman in New York City. At the close of that period he returned to Vancouver and directed his own quartet at the Alcan Jazz Competition.
By 1987 the twenty-three-year-old musician had settled once more in New York, performing in merengue ensembles and supporting artists ranging from Chubby Checker to Jack McDuff. In 1990 John Lurie encountered him at a downtown venue; six months afterward Blake joined the Lounge Lizards, appearing on both volumes of the Live in Berlin recordings as well as the 1998 studio album Queen of All Ears.
Blake’s first outing as leader, Kingdom of Champa, appeared on Intuition in 1997. Produced by Teo Macero, the album integrated Vietnamese musical influences within a jazz framework that featured downtown New York figures including Thomas Chapin and Steven Bernstein. Around the same time he contributed to Lurie’s score for the film Get Shorty and began an extended collaboration with bassist Ben Allison.
His second Intuition recording, Drift, followed in 2001 with a small ensemble that included guitarist Tony Scherr and pianist Frank Kimbrough. Elevated came next in 2002, again involving Allison, Kimbrough, and drummer Mike Mazor. The trio session Right Before Your Very Ears, also featuring Allison and drummer Jeff Ballard, was issued by Clean Feed in 2005. During these years Blake performed with Groove Collective, Medeski, Martin & Wood, Tricky, the Gil Evans Orchestra, Pinetop Perkins, and the Herbie Nichols Project.
He subsequently pursued a sequence of exploratory projects for Stunt Records, opening with the quartet album Blake Tartare in 2006, followed the same year by More Like Us and by The World Awakens: Tribute to Eli Lucky Thompson in 2007. Also in 2007 he released the quintet recording Amor de Cosmos with trumpeter Brad Turner. In 2009 he joined drummer Kresten Osgood for Control This on Clean Feed.
In the Grand Scheme of Things, issued in 2012, combined electronics with modal jazz. Two years later Blake, Ben Allison, Frank Kimbrough, and Rudy Royston documented the hard bop-oriented Tiddy Boom. The textural and atmospheric Fulfillment appeared in 2016, drawing contributions from guitarist Aram Bajakian, trumpeter JP Carter, keyboardist Chris Gestin, and additional musicians. Dance of the Mystic Bliss arrived in 2023, another richly layered work informed by classical string traditions, country, and psychedelic rock.
Albums
Combobulate
2022
Breathe
2021
Rubber Ball in Space!
2018
Out of the Blue
2017
Fulfillment
2016
In the Grand Scheme of Things
2012
Remind Me (Quebec Antique Electronic Remix)
2012
Remind Me
2012
What Tau Sounds Like
2011
The World Awakes - A Tribute To Eli "Lucky" Thompson
2007
Instrumental
2005
Singles
