Ernie Watts

Ernest James Watts (born 23 October 1945; Norfolk, Virginia), better known as Ernie Watts, is an American jazz and rhythm and blues saxophonist who plays soprano, alto, and tenor saxophone, as well as flute and clarinet.

Celebrated as a two-time Grammy Award-winning instrumentalist, he remains one of the music industry's most prolific and versatile musicians. His distinctively robust, burning tone has defined a vast body of recorded music, seamlessly bridging the worlds of traditional acoustic jazz, commercial rhythm and blues, and Hollywood soundtracks.

Early Life

Raised primarily in Wilmington, Delaware, he discovered his lifelong dedication to the saxophone at the age of thirteen after joining his junior high school music department. Deeply influenced by hearing John Coltrane's performance on the seminal album Kind of Blue, he began teaching himself jazz by ear, frequently falling asleep to a spinning stack of Coltrane records.

His discipline and natural talent earned him a classical music scholarship to the Wilmington Music School, leading to a featured soloist appearance with the Delaware Symphony by the age of sixteen. Following a brief period studying music education at West Chester University, he won a DownBeat magazine scholarship to the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston. His formal education was interrupted in 1966 when his professor, trombonist Phil Wilson, recommended him to temporarily replace Gene Quill in Buddy Rich's Big Band; the temporary student replacement ultimately toured the world and recorded two albums with the legendary drummer over a two-year tenure.

Career

Relocating to Los Angeles, his career entered an expansive mainstream commercial era as a premier studio session musician, ultimately contributing to more than 500 recordings for legendary artists including Marvin Gaye, Frank Zappa, Steely Dan, and Barry White's Love Unlimited Orchestra.

His versatility was further established through a prominent twenty-year tenure playing alto saxophone in The Tonight Show Band under Doc Severinsen, and by playing the iconic saxophone riff on Glenn Frey's hit "The One You Love". Beyond the television studio, he toured with The Rolling Stones during their historic 1981 international stadium tour and performed extensively with Charlie Haden's acclaimed Quartet West.

His cinematic contributions include featured work on the soundtracks for Grease and The Color Purple, alongside a 1982 Grammy Award win for his performance on the Chariots of Fire soundtrack. After decades of commercial session work, he initiated a profound late-career shift to return entirely to his first musical love: pure, live acoustic jazz.

In 2004, he and his wife, Patricia, launched their own independent label, Flying Dolphin Records, granting him total creative freedom and serving as the exclusive home for the Ernie Watts Quartet. The imprint produced a series of critically acclaimed studio projects, including Wheel Of Time and Analog Man, the latter of which secured an Independent Music Award for Best Jazz Album.

Personal Life

Maintained away from the bright lights of the television and recording studios, his personal life centers around his long-standing marriage to his wife, Patricia, who actively co-manages their independent business operations.

His enduring legacy as an instrumentalist is defined by a distinctively powerful tone and an unwavering technical mastery honed across sixty years of professional dedication. He remains active in the preservation of classic jazz, regularly channelling his experience back into the global music community through clinics, workshops, and educational outreach.

Current Activities

Balancing his time between his American home and international concert halls, he continues to follow a rigorous annual touring schedule, frequently travelling across Europe in the spring and autumn with his dedicated European Quartet, an ensemble that has performed together for over fifteen years.

Rather than slowing down, his recent activities include pushing traditional musical boundaries through genre-bending cross-cultural pairings, notably collaborating with iconic South Indian violinist Dr L. Subramaniam on the ambitious jazz, classical, and Carnatic fusion project Beyond Borders, which also features Herbie Hancock. Additionally, he has engaged in experimental live performances with Corky Siegel’s Chamber Blues, successfully blending his powerhouse tenor saxophone sound into a unique amalgam of classical string quartets, blues harmonica, and traditional Indian tabla rhythms.