Ode to a Tenor Titan

After John Coltrane, there was arguably no more revered and profoundly influential jazz saxophonist on the planet than Michael Brecker. Ode to a Tenor Titan follows Brecker's story from growing up in Philadelphia to a four-decade career as a commanding voice in jazz. Brecker possessed peerless technique (a byproduct of his remarkable work ethic and relentless woodshedding) and an uncanny ability to fit into every musical situation he encountered, whether it was as a ubiquitous studio musician (more than nine hundred sessions) for pop stars like Paul Simon and Bruce Springsteen, playing with seminal fusion bands like Dreams and the Brecker Brothers, or collaborating with the likes of Frank Zappa, Charles Mingus, and Herbie Hancock. But his biggest triumphs came as a bandleader during the last twenty years of his career, when he produced some of the most challenging, inspired, and visionary modern jazz recordings of his time. At the peak of his powers, Brecker was struck down by a rare preleukemic blood disease that sidelined him for two and a half years. He got off a sick bed to make a heroic comeback with his swan song, Pilgrimage, which Pat Metheny called "one of the great codas in modern music history" and which earned him a posthumous Grammy Award in 2007. Michael Brecker was a player of tremendous heart and conviction as well a person of rare humility and kindness, and his story is one for the ages.

Bill Milkowski is a longtime contributor to such music magazines as Downbeat, Jazziz, Guitar Player, Absolute Sound, and Germany's Jazzthing. His work has also appeared in Jazz Times, Interview, Musician, Mix, Modern Drummer, Bass Player, Guitar Club (Italy), Guitar (Japan), and the New York Daily News. He is also the author of Jaco: The Extraordinary and Tragic Life of Jaco Pastorius (Backbeat Books), Swing It! An Annotated History of Jive (Billboard Books), Rockers, Jazzbos & Visionaries (Billboard Books), Legends of Jazz (White Star) and Keith Richards: A Rock 'n'Roll Life (White Star). He also co-authored Here and Now: The Autobiography of Pat Martino (Backbeat Books). After covering jazz and guitar-oriented music in New York City for forty years, he moved to West Hartford, Connecticut, in 2018.

Foreword: My Brother Mike by Randy Brecker Preface: Ode to a Tenor Titan Prologue: One Finger Snap 1 Becoming Michael Brecker (1949-1967) 2 IU and a Nightmare in Chi-Town (1968-1969) 3 Loft Scenes and Big Apple Dreams (1969-1974) 4 Sneakin' Up Behind You (1975-1977) 5 Those Perfect Eighth Notes (1978-1981) 6 Working the Program (1982-beyond) 7 Susan and a New Lease on Life (1985-1986) 8 Going Solo: The "Pitt" Bull and the EWI (1987-1990) 9 Paul Simon and a Brotherly Reunion (1991-1994) 10 Time for Tyner . . . and Herbie and Elvin (1995-1999) 11 Expanding Horizons (2000-2005) 12 The Arc of the Disease (2006-2007) Epilogue: More to Live For Appendix: Testimonials to a Tenor Titan