About The Band

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About The Band....

Dave Wild... Click here for Dave's bio page.

Ken Wild.... Click here for Ken's web site.

Ralph Humphrey....
Born in Berkeley CA in 1944. He recorded with the Don Ellis orchestra in 1968 while still a student at California State College, Northridge, and joined the band in 1969, staying with Ellis until 1973. Recordings from the period amply demonstrate his command of the unusual time signatures which characterized the Ellis group. He also contributed a chapter to Ellis's publication The New Rhythm Book (1972). Ralph later joined Frank Zappa (1973-1974), and still later began freelancing in LA, working with Tony Bennett, Joe Williams, Carmen McRae, Clare Fischer, and John Klemmer and recording with L. Subramaniam, Ray Pizzi, Wayne Shorter (Atlantis) and Manhattan Transfer among many others. In 1982 he joined Free Flight, a group noted for jazz versions of classical pieces, and later during the decade he toured with the Toshiko Akiyoshi Orchestra.

Ralph is an in-demand session musician in Los Angeles, working in movies, television, jingles and recording sessions. His television work includes soundtrack work for “Deep Space Nine”, “Voyager” and “Dawsons Creek”. He’s also been involved in most of the animated shows for Warner Brothers over the last 5-6 years, including work on “Animaniacs”, “Freakazoid”, “Pinky and the Brain”, “Tweety and Sylvester” and “Histeria”. Other animated television programs he’s worked on include “The Simpsons” and “King of the Hill”. He also teaches at the Los Angeles Music Academy and gives private lessons as time allows. He has also contributed articles to Modern Drummer.

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Larry Williams....
Larry Williams, from Kansas City, started on clarinet at age 8 (encouraged by his father, a saxophonist). He attended New Mexico State University on multiple scholarships, but he eventually transferred to Indiana University, where he met trumpeter Jerry Hey and saxophonist Kim Hutchcroft. All three were in Hawaii in the late sixties, where Ken and I first met them, and where they became the horn section for what would become Seawind . Larry is also a marvelous keyboard player, and has played both keys and various wind instruments on a wide variety of sessions in LA. He is currently a member of Al Jarreau’s touring band. Larry’s solo album The Beautiful Struggle was released in Japan on Sony in 2001, and features Pauline Wilson (Seawind's lead singer), Jerry Hey, Vinnie Colauita, Dave Carpenter, among others, performing Larry's originals and standards like "Soul Eyes", "'Round Midnight" and "Inner Urge" .

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Jeff Horton...
is also a skilled guitarist, taught guitar at McLennan Community College until recently, and performs (as a bassist) with a number of central Texas symphony orchestras.

Charles Burleson...
a computer systems administrator by day, studied at Cal State Northridge with legendary percussionist Jerry Steinholtz and has had wide experience in many forms of jazz and commercial music both in central Texas and in California.

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Dave Wild's WildPlace and its contents are protected by copyright and are published for non-commercial use only. Some of the contents of this site are based on The Recordings of John Coltrane: A Discography, (c) 1977, 1978, 1979 by David Wild and disc’ribe, Issues # 1, # 2, and # 3, (c) 1980, 1981 and 1983 by Angelyn and David Wild. All the usual legal protections apply. Click here to send mail to Dave Wild.