14 Facts About Yusef Lateef

Yusef Lateef is known for having been an innovator in the blending of jazz with "Eastern" music.

Peter Keepnews, in his New York Times obituary of Yusef Lateef, wrote that the musician "played world music before world music had a name".

Yusef Lateef's books included two novellas titled A Night in the Garden of Love and Another Avenue, the short story collections Spheres and Rain Shapes, and his autobiography, The Gentle Giant, written in collaboration with Herb Boyd.

Yusef Lateef published his own work through Fana, including Yusef Lateef's Flute Book of the Blues and many of his orchestral compositions.

Yusef Lateef was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, as William Emanuel Huddleston.

Yusef Lateef's family moved, in 1923, to Lorain, Ohio, and again in 1925, to Detroit, Michigan, where his father changed the family's name to Evans.

Yusef Lateef was a proficient saxophonist by the time of his graduation from high school at the age of 18, when he launched his professional career and began touring with a number of swing bands.

In 1950, Yusef Lateef returned to Detroit and began his studies in composition and flute at Wayne State University.

Yusef Lateef began recording as a leader in 1957 for Savoy Records, a non-exclusive association which continued until 1959; the earliest of Yusef Lateef's album's for the Prestige subsidiary New Jazz overlap with them.

Yusef Lateef expressed a dislike of the terms "jazz" and "jazz musician" as musical generalizations.

In 1960, Yusef Lateef returned to school, studying flute at the Manhattan School of Music in New York City.

Yusef Lateef received a bachelor's degree in music in 1969 and a master's degree in music education in 1970.

The Manhattan School of Music, where Yusef Lateef had earned a bachelor's and a master's degree, awarded him its Distinguished Alumni Award in 2012.

In 1980, Yusef Lateef declared that he would no longer perform any place where alcohol was served.