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Aug. 22: Multi-instrumentalist Roger Glenn (Cal Tjader, Herbie Mann, Kurt Elling, Taj Mahal) in My Latin Heart, Patois Records In his first album as a leader in a half-century, multi-instrumental wizard Roger Glenn celebrates his 80th birthday with My Latin Heart, a panoramic journey through his lifelong passion for Afro-Caribbean rhythms Out August 22, 2025 via Patois Records, album features Roger Glenn with Ray Obiedo, David K. Mathews, David Belove, Paul van Wageningen, Derek Rolando with special guests John Santos and Michael Spiro It’s never one thing with Roger Glenn. A multifarious musical force, he’s cut a brilliant path across the jazz scene since the 1960s, collaborating with an improbable constellation of masters on a daunting array of instruments. Criminally under-documented as a leader, he reintroduces himself with the delicious blast of Afro-Caribbean and Brazilian jazz on the August 22, 2025 Patois Records release My Latin Heart. It’s his first new album since 1976’s Mizell Brothers-produced cult classic funk/jazz session Reachin’. Known among his peers as a supremely talented improviser, Glenn played flute with vibraphone star Cal Tjader and vibes with flute great Herbie Mann. He made his recording debut with legendary pianist/composer Mary Lou Williams and contributed to classic albums by Cuban percussion maestro Mongo Santamaria (Mongo´70 on Atlantic), bebop patriarch and Latin jazz progenitor Dizzy Gillespie (Bahaina on Pablo), pioneering funk/jazz trumpeter Donald Byrd (Black Byrd on Blue Note), and Latin jazz pioneer Cal Tjader (the Grammy Award-winning La Onda Va Bien on Concord Picante). No single project or recording could possibly capture every facet of this kaleidoscopically creative musician. But with Glenn playing vibes, flute, alto sax, marimba, and also contributing vocals, My Latin Heart showcases his dazzling multi-instrumental prowess via his abiding passion for Latin American rhythms. “I’ve been playing for various other people for years, ” says Glenn, a longtime resident of the San Francisco Bay Area. “I love all the different challenges and situations, but I need to make my own statement. These original tunes are truly coming from my heart.” Joined by a superlative cast of Bay Area musicians, including Santana keyboardist David K. Mathews, ace bassist David Belove, veteran guitarist/producer Ray Obiedo, percussionist Derek Rolando, and the late, beloved drummer Paul van Wageningen, Glenn celebrates jazz’s kinship with other rhythmic riches of the African diaspora. From the irresistible groove and surging flute of “Zambo’s Mambo” and the incantatory vibraphone work on his Tjader tribute “Cal’s Guajira” to his sensuous alto flute on “A Night of Love” and Michael Spiro’s and John Santos’s Regla de Ocha incantation on “Angola, ” Glenn’s compositions serve as high-octane fuel for full-spectrum Latin jazz. With “Congo Square” he celebrates the unique confluence of European and African currents that converged in New Orleans, and closes the album with the celebratory Brazilian pulse of “Samba De Carnaval.” It’s a typically Glennian move, embracing multiplicity rather than fitting himself into someone else’s pigeonhole. “I’m really interested in the concept of different cultures coming together, ” he says. “When I was in New Orleans working with Taj Mahal I went to Congo Square and was thinking about how jazz could not have been created without the input of African and European cultures at that time and place. The concept starts out classical with the piano intro and when we move into a 6/8 rhythm it brings everything together.” If Glenn was better at self-promotion he could have landed a gig as the World’s Most Interesting Man. A pilot who serves in the Civil Air Patrol flying search and rescue missions in his spare time, he’s never seen fit to limit himself. His sheer profusion of creative pursuits is one reason he isn’t more of a marquee name. Record labels might be puzzled, but Glenn’s colleagues know the score. They just call him for the gig. In the past few years he’s done a series of runs with American blues griot Taj Mahal, playing flute, tenor and alto sax, vibes, clarinet and piccolo. Grammy Award-winning jazz singer Kurt Elling featured him as a soloist on flute and vibes, and during a tour opening for Steely Dan with his organ trio Glenn held forth on flute, sax and vibes. Another tour took him to New Zealand and Australia playing baritone sax with the Count Basie Orchestra. In May the Los Angeles Jazz Society celebrated Glenn’s career, naming him 32nd Annual Vibe Summit honoree. But he’s not putting down his other axes. “I’ve always seen myself as a musician rather than a flutist or vibraphonist or saxophonist, ” Glenn says. “I treasure and value all the instruments I play. That can be confusing to some folks.” You could say that Glenn inherited his confounding ways from his father, the great trombonist and vibraphonist Tyree Glenn. Born in Manhattan, Glenn grew up mostly in Englewood, New Jersey, a town rife with world-class jazz talent. His father played with Cab Calloway (1939-1946), Don Redman (1946), and most famously Duke Ellington (1947-1951), holding down the wah-wah trombone role perfected by Tricky Sam Nanton while introducing the vibraphone into the Maestro’s orchestral palette. During his stint with the Louis Armstrong All-Stars (1965-1971) he recorded with Satchmo on the beloved track “What a Wonderful World.” Tyree made sure Roger and his brother, Germany-based saxophonist, vocalist and songwriter Tyree Jr., were exposed to the music world. “I remember as a kid going to see his rehearsals with Duke Ellington, and there would be Billy Strayhorn and various members of the Ellington Orchestra, ” Glenn says He credits his mother with instilling his love of Cuban rhythms, and by junior high he was leading his own Latin combo. Always interested in a variety of instruments, he studied flute and various reeds, but decided to major in math and physics in college. Glenn spent the last three years of the 1960s in the service, playing in an Army band with Grover Washington Jr. and Billy Cobham at Fort Dix, but ended up stationed in Hawaii “which is where I started flying, and got into scuba diving and sailing, ” he says. When he got out of the service in 1969, Glenn quickly established himself on the New York scene. He made his recording debut that year with pioneering pianist/composer Mary Lou Williams on Music For Peace (tracks later reissued on the Smithsonian Folkways album Mary Lou’s Mass). Glenn spent several years with Mongo Santamaria when the conguero was a regular presence in San Francisco, and each time Glenn visited he felt drawn to the region. He ended up making the move west in 1973. A few years later, walking down Market Street, he ran into Cal Tjader. They had played together with Dizzy Gillespie at the Monterey Jazz Festival, and Tjader invited him to bring his flute to a recording session the next day. The resulting album, La Onda Va Bien, won a Grammy, and Glenn continued to perform with Tjader through the early ’80s. With My Latin Heart, Roger Glenn picks up Tjader’s mantle and steps into the spotlight. Uncategorizable and uncontainable, he’s a singular artist who is ready to be recognized in all his instrumental splendor. |
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