Ralph Bowen


Ralph Bowen is a Canadian jazz saxophonist.

Biography

Bowen started piano lessons at an early age, with clarinet and saxophone lessons following soon after. At thirteen he led a quartet and performed in big bands in Toronto. As a teenager, he was awarded a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts to study music with Pat LaBarbera and Phil Nimmons at the Banff School of Fine Arts. While in Toronto, he studied with LaBarbera for eight years and developed a long-time association with drummer Keith Blackley and his father, drummer Jim Blackley. He performed and recorded with Canadian fusion group Manteca.
In 1983 and 1984, he was awarded two more grants to pursue his musical studies in at the jazz department at Indiana University, where his teacher was David Baker. In 1985, the same year he and Cecil Taylor were voted Main Jazz Men of the Year by the Toronto Globe and Mail, Bowen won the audition for the Blue Note Records co-leader position of the contemporary all-star New York based jazz band known as Out of the Blue. He moved to New York and would eventually record four albums for Blue Note.
In 1986, Bowen began to tour with jazz pianist Michel Camilo with whom he recorded a number of albums and soundtracks. Between 1986 and 1991 he completed three world tours with jazz pianist Horace Silver and toured Europe with Jim Beard. He has also worked with Orrin Evans, Jim Trompeter, Renee Rosnes, Earl MacDonald, Ralph Peterson Jr., Charles Fambrough, and Anthony Branker.
Bowen has led the jazz program at Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University.

Awards and honors

As leader

With Out of the Blue
With Anthony Branker
With Michel Camilo
With Orrin Evans
With others