Brian Smith
b. 3 January 1939, Wellington, New Zealand. Smith is a self-taught saxophonist. He played in rock, dance and jazz bands at home and in Australia before coming to England in 1964, when he first played with Alexis Korner's Blues Incorporated (1964-65). In the late '60s he worked with the big bands of Tubby Hayes and Maynard Ferguson, with whom he worked until 1974. He also worked with the bands of Graham Collier, Gordon Beck, Mike Westbrook, Mike Gibbs, Keith Tippett and John Stevens. In 1969 he was a founder member of the successful band Nucleus with whom he stayed until he returned home to New Zealand in 1982. Since then he has played with his own quartet and won the Australian Jazz Record of the Year Award with SOUTHERN EXCURSIONS in 1984. He is a player with a formidable technique and the ability to fit into any music from rock and blues right through to free improvisation.