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Artist
The Crusaders
12+ albums
jazzfunkFusionjazz-funksoul
about
There are several artists named The Crusaders; 1) The Crusaders were an American jazz fusion group that was successful from the 1960s to the 1980s. The group was known as The Jazz Crusaders from its formation in 1960 until shortening its name in 1971. High school friends Joe Sample (piano), Wilton Felder (tenor saxophone) and Nesbert "Stix" Hooper (drums) formed their first band together, the Swingsters, in Houston, Texas in 1954. They played a mixture of jazz and R&B, and were joined by Wayne Henderson (trombone), Hubert Laws (flute), and Henry Wilson (bass). The group soon turned more to hard bop, and renamed themselves the Modern Jazz Sextet, but also recorded in a more R&B vein as the Nighthawks (or Nite Hawks). In 1960, Sample, Felder, Hooper and Henderson moved to Los Angeles, and formed the Jazz Crusaders as a quintet with a succession of different bass players. Influenced by musicians such as Cannonball Adderley, Art Blakey and John Coltrane, the band signed to the Pacific Jazz label in 1961, and released 16 albums on the label over the subsequent eight years. With a front-line horn section of Felder and Henderson, the group's sound was rooted in hard bop, but with a slant towards R&B and soul music. Their first two albums, with Jimmy Bond on bass, were Freedom Sound (1961), and Lookin' Ahead (1962), followed by the live album At the Lighthouse (1962) and Tough Talk, the first of several albums with bassist Bobby Haynes. In all, the group recorded five live albums
