Pocetkom 90-tih Sanborn, nakon 13 godina provedenih sa Warner Brothers, menja izdavacku kucu i izdaje album pod nazivom „Another Hand“ za etiketu Elektra. Na ovom izuzetnom albumu Sanborn se nasao u drustvu vrsnih muzicara avangardnog miljea poput Charlie Haden-a, Herb Robertson-a, Bill Frisell-a, Marc Ribot-a, David Tronzo-a, Joey Baron-a i Jack DeJohnette-a.

Sanborn-ova otvorenost i sklonost muzickim avanturama vise je nego ocita na visoko ocenjenom debi albumu iz 2003. godine za kucu Verve pod nazivom „Timeagain“ kao i na albumu koji ga sledi pod nazivom „Closer“. Ovde je Sanborn takodje okruzen all-star postavom koju cine Larry Goldings (elektricni klavir, organ), Gil Goldstein (el. Klavir, harmonika), Mike Mainieri (vibrafon), Russell Malone (gitara), Christian McBride (bas), Steve Gadd (bubnjevi), Luis Quintero (udaraljke), Bob Shepard (saksofon) kao i pevacica Lizz Wright koja gostuje na albumu sa pesmom James Taylor-a „Don´t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight“.

Album otvara Sanborn-ova vrlo temperamentna interpretacija klasicne latinoamericke numere autorskog tandema Gil Fuller/Chano Pozo “Tin Tin Deo” koju je Dizzy Gillespie ucinio vrlo popularnom i svetski poznatom. Ovaj fulminantni uvod sledi Horace Silver-ov standard “Senor Blues” ciju ritmicku strukturu cini quasi africki ritam. Silver, poznati hard-bop pijanista na albumu je zastupljen sa jos jednom numerom „Enchantment“, izvanredno izvedenom od strane Sanborna.


Svakako jedan od vrhunaca ovog albuma je i verzija James Taylor-ovog hita „Don´t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight“ cijom je interpretacijom mlada pevacica Lizz Wright nesumnjivo dokazala zbog cega se ubraja u jednog od najvecih talenata modernog jazz-a. Charlie Chapline-ova sarmantna i melanholicna balada „Smile“ Sanborn-u je omogucila da iskaze sve svoje emocije i unutrasnji nemir. Najvece iznenadjenje u repertoaru je bez sumnje Abdulah Ibrahim-ova (bivsi Dollar Brand), vedra juznoafricka himna “Capetown Fringe”.

Ova probrana kolekcija jazz standarda zaokruzena je sa jos par poznatih numera kao sto su kompozicija Fran Landesman/Tommy Wolf-ova “The Ballad of the Young Sad Man” (koju je Anita O´Day ucinila besmrtnom a takodje i od strane pop velicine kao sto je Ricky Lee Jones vrlo uspesno interpretirana). Sledeca je “Poinciana”, Nat Simon/Buddy Berniers-ova fantasticna numera (koju je Ahmad Jamal pocetkom 50-tih pretvorio u pravi jazz hit) a za njom sledi romanticna balada “You Must Believe in Spring” od Michel Legrand-a, Alan Bergman-a, Marilyn Bergman i Jacques Demy. Na kraju album “Closer” upotpunjavaju jos dve nove Sanborn-ove kompozicije koje se odlicno uklapaju u repertoar: “AnotherTime, Another Place – Fog” i “Sofia”. Ove numere dokazuju da Sanborn ne pise samo jednostavne rhythm´n´blues pesme vec i vrlo kompleksne jazz kompozicije rafiniranih harmonija.

"Making Closer, I was very clear about my picture of what I wanted the record to be," potvrdjuje ovaj sestostruki dobitnik Grammy-a. "Gil Goldstein and myself pretty much arranged everything, and I recorded very detailed demos, playing all the instruments myself, to give the musicians an idea of the tempos and chords and some of the voicings. But within that structure, a lot was left open to interpretation."

“I've never been particularly comfortable giving people direction. I would rather just find the right people, explain what I want and then leave them to their own devices, because an important part of the process is getting people to invest something of themselves in the situation.  And if you get the right people, people that you have a rapport with, it's always something more than you expect”.

Rodjen u Tampa-i na Florida-i 30. jula 1945. godine, odrastao u St. Louis-u, alt saksofonista David Sanborn je bio jos u ranoj mladosti izlozen razlicitim muzickim stilovima i uticajima. Rano je bio privucen muzikom soul jazz saksofonista kao sto su: Gene Ammons, Arnett Cobb, Illinois Jacquet, Jimmy Forrest, King Curtis i Willis “Gator” Jackson koji su posedovali i “tesku” swing tehniku odlicno izbalansiranu sa toplinom i izrazajnoscu. Prihvatajuci alt saksofon kao svoj glavni instrument Sanborn se priklonio jazz-u paralelno pokazujuci afinitet za popularnu kulturu. Njegov talenat i prilagodljivost omogucili su mu vrlo rano nastupe sa umetnicima poput bozanstva soul-a James Brown-a i velikog blues umetnika Albert King-a.

Sedamdesetih godina Sanborn stice reputaciju kako odlicnog improvizatora i jazz instrumentaliste, tako i vrlo trazenog r&b/pop/rock studijskog muzicara. Njegov saksofon se moze cuti na albumima takvih jazz velicina kao sto su Gil Evans, Jaco Pastorius, Brecker Brothers, Joe Beck i Mark Murphy kao i na projektima umetnika Donny Hathaway, Bruce Springsteen, Carly Simon, Linda Ronstadt i mnogih drugih.

Debi albumom “Taking Off” Sanborn zapocinje sa snimanjem sopstvenih projekata 1975. godine za izdavacku kucu Warner Bros. Sledecih nekoliko godina snimio je desetak albuma za ovu firmu medju kojima su veoma uspesni “Heart to Heart”, “Hideaway”, “Voyer” i “Straight to the Heart”. 1990. godine potpisuje za etiketu Elektra i izdaje od kritike i publike veoma prihvacene albume: “Another Hand” (1991.), “Upfront” (1992.), “Hearsay” (1993.), “Pearls” – na kome saradjuje sa aranzerom Johnny Mandel-om (1995.), “Songs From the Night Before” (1996.) i “Inside” (1999.).

David Sanborn o svom poslednjem albumu “Closer” kaze jos:

"Ultimately, it's not an intellectual exercise, it's kind of like arranging the furniture in a room; you try to set things up so that there's a certain ambience. You paint the walls a certain color and you choose a certain kind of rug, with the intention of creating this little world that you want to be in, and hopefully other people will want to inhabit that world as well. And if you do it right, you forget about the components and the process, and it becomes about the experience”.

"Maybe that sounds like an obvious thing, but you need the right people to make that happen. The great thing about guys Steve Gadd or Christian McBride is that you don't always hear how great they are, but if you talk to any musician who's played with them, it's obvious.  They're about moving everything forward and making the music happen. They're selfless, and that's what music's supposed to be about”.

"There's an old expression, called 'Getting a little house,' which refers to using a flashy trick to get the crowd to go nuts, like jumping up on the bar or playing a really fast lick or holding a note for a really long time. That's an easy trap to fall into, going for the quick fix, and we're all guilty of it. But as time goes on, I'm less and less interested in that kind of thing and more concerned with just making the kind of music that feels the most real to me. To me, that's what Closer is about."

Izabrana diskografija

Ovde je prikazana diskografija kao i nazivi filmova za koje je pisao muziku ili u kojima je glumio.

AS A LEADER :

--TAKING OFF (1975)
--DAVID SANBORN (1976)
--PROMISE ME THE MOON (1977)
--HEART TO HEART (1978)
--HIDEAWAY (1980)
--VOYEUR (1981)
--AS WE SPEAK (1982)
--BACKSTREET (1983)
--STRAIGHT TO THE HEART (1984)
--A CHANGE OF HEART (1987)
--CLOSE UP (1988)
--ANOTHER HAND (1991)
--UPFRONT (1992)
--HEARSAY (1994)
--BEST OF DAVID SANBORN (1994)
--PEARLS (1995)
--LOVE SONGS (1995)
--SONGS FROM THE NIGHT BEFORE (1996)
--INSIDE (1999)
--ESSENTIALS (2002)
--TIMEAGAIN (2003)
--CLOSER (2005)

AS A LEADER TRACK :

--CASINO LIGHTS (1981)

AS A COLLABORATE :

--SUPER FUNKY SAX (1980)
--DOUBLE VISION (1986)

AS A SIDEMAN :

-GIL EVANS: SVENGALI (1973)

-THE GIL EVANS ORCHESTRA: PLAYS THE MUSIC OF JIMI HENDRIX (1974)

-GIL EVANS:THERE COMES A TIME / BLUEBIRD SERIES '70 (1975)

-PHIL UPCHURCH:UPCHURCH/TENNYSON (1975)

-THE BRECKER BROTHERS (1975)

-JOE BECK: BECK (1975)

-MARK MURPHY SINGS (1975)

-LARRY CORYELL: DIFFERENCE (1975)

-THE ELEVENTH HOUSE featuring LARRY CORYELL: ASPECTS (1976)

-JACO PASTORIUS (1976)

-PLAYERS ASSOCIATION:BORN TO DANCE (1977)

-GIL EVANS: PRIESTESS (1977)

-STEVE KHAN:TIGHTROPE (1977)

-DAVID MATTHEWS: DUNE (1977)

-GIL EVANS LIVE AT THE ROYAL FESTIVAL HALL LONDON 1978 (1978)

-THE REST OF GIL EVANS LIVE AT THE ROYAL FESTIVAL HALL LONDON 1978 (1978)

-SCARLET RIVERA:SCARLET FEVER (1978)

-MELANIE:PHONOGENIC NOT JUST ANOTHER PRETTY FACE (1978)

-WILBERT LONGMIRE:SUNNY SIDE UP (1978)

-JUN FUKAMACHI:ON THE MOVE (1978)

-JUN FUKAMACHI & THE NEW YORK ALL STARS LIVE (1978)

-STEVE KHAN:THE BLUE MAN (1978)

-MICHAEL FRANKS:TIGER IN THE RAIN (1978)

-KAY:SOMEWHERE IN NEW YORK (1979)

-STEVE KHAN: ARROWS (1979)

-DAVID MATTHEWS & THE ELECTRIC BIRDS:COSMIC CITY (1980)

-DAVID MATTHEWS PRESENTS: GRAND CROSS (1981)

-GIL EVANS and THE GIL EVANS ORCHESTRA LIVE IN EUROPE 1981:LUNAR ECLIYPSE (1981)

-FULL MOON featuring NEIL LARSEN & BUZZ FEITEN (1982)

-HIRAM BULLOCK:FIRST CLASS VAGABOND (1982)

-BOB MINTZER HORN MAN BAND: PAPA LIPS (1983)

-BOB MOSES: VISIT WITH THE GREAT SPIRIT (1983)

-JORGE DALTO & SUPER FRIENDS: RENDEZ-VOUS (1983)

-MIKE STERN: NEESH (1983)

-JOHN SCOFIELD:ELECTRIC OUTLET (1984)

-MARK GRAY & SUPER FRIENDS: THE SILENCER (1984)

-KAZUMI WATANABE:MOBO SPLASH (1985)

-HARVIE SWARTZ:URBAN EARTH (1985)

-MIKE STERN:UPSIDE DOWNSIDE (1986)

-MILES DAVIS:TIME AFTER TIME (1986)

-MILES DAVIS:ROBBEN'S BLUES (1986)

-BOB BERG: SHORT STORIES (1987)

-LENI STERN:CLOSER TO THE LIGHT (1989)

-STEVE KHAN:THE COLLECTION (1994)

-JOHN McLAUGHLIN:THE PROMISE (1995)

-DOKY BROTHERS: 2 (1996)

-MIKE STERN:GIVE AND TAKE (1997)

-CHRIS MINH DOKY: MINH (1998)

-CELEBRATING THE MUSIC OF WEATHER REPORT (2000)

AS A SIDEMAN (HORNS) :

- DON SEBESKY: THE RAPE OF EL MORRO (1975)

- DAVID SPINOZZA: SPINOZZA (1978)

Actor - filmography
(1980s) (1990s)

1. Eric Clapton & Friends in Concert (1999) (V) .... Himself
2. Kennedy Center Honors, The (1996) (TV) .... Himself
3. Wizard of Oz in Concert: Dreams Come True, The (1995) (TV)
4. Forget Paris (1995) .... Himself
5. Celebration: The Music of Pete Townshend and The Who (1994) .... Himself
... aka Celebration: The Music of The Who (1994)
... aka Daltrey Sings Townshend (1994)
6. Michael Kamen: Concert for Saxophone (1991) (V) .... Himself
7. Scrooged (1988) .... Street Musician
8. One Trick Pony (1980) .... Himself



Filmography as: Actor, Composer, Miscellaneous crew, Notable TV guest appearances


Composer - filmography
(1990s) (1980s)

1. Lethal Weapon 4 (1998)
... aka Lethal 4 (1998) (USA: promotional abbreviation)
2. Lethal Weapon 3 (1992)
3. Lethal Weapon 2 (1989)
4. Psycho III (1986)
... aka Psycose 3 (1986) (USA: Spanish title)
5. Finnegan Begin Again (1985) (TV)

Miscellaneous crew - filmography
(1990s) (1980s)

1. Forget Paris (1995) (musician)
2. Psycho III (1986) (saxophone)
... aka Psycose 3 (1986) (USA: Spanish title)


Notable TV guest appearances

1. "Magnum, P.I." (1980) playing "guest saxophonist" in episode: "L.A." (episode # 7.1) 10/1/1986