Kenn Cox

Detroit native Kenny Cox was born on November 8, 1940. He began playing music on trumpet, and studied at the Detroit Conservatory of Music from 1949-1958, but had given up the horn for the piano as a freshman at Cass Tech High School in 1956, where he started with the piano. Upon graduation from Cass Tech in 1958, he attended the Detroit Conservatory of Music from 1949-1958 and the Detroit Institute of Music Arts from 1959-1961. Cox then left for New York City, where he connected with Etta Jones and was her accompanist and music director until 1966, also working on occasion with Helen Humes and Ernestine Anderson. He returned to Detroit and joined a legendary hard bop quintet led by trombonist George Bohannon. Emerging as a modern jazz composer inspired by the music of the '60s and the political and cultural landscape of Detroit, Cox also produced a weekly radio program, Kaleidophone, on WDET, and was the station's director of community access programming. In 1967 he had written enough material to record two albums for the Blue Note label, and formed the Contemporary Jazz Quintet with Ron Brooks, Charles Moore, Leon Henderson, and Danny Spencer. It was a breakthrough ensemble in modern jazz, in many ways paralleling the work of Miles Davis. In addition, the trip to New York allowed him opportunities to perform with the likes of Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Eddie Harris, Jackie McLean, Roy Haynes, Ben Webster, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Dorham, Joe Williams, Philly Joe Jones, and fellow Detroiters Kenny Burrell, Donald Byrd, Roy Brooks, Charles McPherson, and Curtis Fuller. CJQ changed with the times in the electronic-infused '70s, adding second drummer Bud Spangler, guitarist Ron English, keyboardist Phil Mendelson, and others in what was dubbed an "infinite Q." Cox and a group of...