Born on December 18, 1941 in Leland, Mississippi, Wadada Leo Smith began his musical journey steeped in the musical traditions of the South. He composed his first piece of music at the age of twelve, and at thirteen started performing with Delta Blues and other traditional bands. Smith received his formal musical education from his stepfather, composer/guitarist Alex “Little Bill” Wallace, one of the pioneers of electric guitar in Delta Blues. He was further educated through the U.S. Military band program at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri (1963); Sherwood School of Music (1967-69); and Wesleyan University (1975-76). He has researched a variety of music cultures, including African, Japanese, Indonesian, European and American.
Smith was a finalist for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize in Music for Ten Freedom Summers, (Defining Moments in the History of the United States of America), a collection of compositions inspired by the civil rights movement and released as a 4-CD boxed set. Ten Freedom Summers has also been awarded a MAP Fund Award (2011), Chamber Music America New Works Grant (2010), National Endowment for the Arts Recording Grant (2010), Southwest Chamber Music commission with support from the James Irvine Foundation and Clarence E. Heller Charitable Foundation, and a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship (2009-2010). Smith was named DownBeat Magazine’s Composer of the Year in 2013.
In 2016 Smith received a Doris Duke Artist Award and earned an honorary doctorate from CalArts, where he was also celebrated as Faculty Emeritus. In addition, he received the Hammer Museum’s 2016 Mohn Award for Career Achievement “honoring brilliance and resilience.” In 2018 he received the Religion and The Arts Award from the American Academy of Religion. In 2019 he received the UCLA Medal, the highest honor bestowed by the University of California, Los Angeles. United States Artists named Smith a 2021 USA Fellow, and he has been selected as a 2022 Mellon Arts & Practitioner Fellow at the Yale Center for the Study of Race, Indigeneity and Transnational Migration (RITM). Earlier in 2022, he also was commissioned by the LA Philharmonic to write the orchestral piece Gondwana: Earth, a Blue Sanctuary, Oceans, Seas, Lakes, Rivers, Springs and Lagoons; Paradise Gardens and Skies, as well as String Quartet #13, performed by the JACK Quartet
Photo: Jimy Katz