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Denys Baptiste
Born in London of St Lucian parents in 1969, Denys took his first lessons in music at the age of 13. At the age of 14 he began to play tenor sax. His introduction to jazz came from videos of Morrisey-Mullen and from listening to recordings by Charles Mingus and Count Basie.
He studied music for two years at the West London Institue and then went on to take part in a jazz course at London’s Guildhall School of Music. He joined Gary Crosby’s Nu Troop as the tenor saxophonist after attending an open jam session organized by Tomorrow’s Warriors. In 1993 Denys joined the Jazz Warriors.
Denys has toured the UK with Bheki Mseleku, Julian Joseph, Jason Rebello, Omar, and Orphy amongst others and has recorded with artists as diverse as Incognito, Jazz Jamaica, Ernest Ranglin, Gregory Isaacs, Juliet Roberts, Montage, J-Life, Gary Crosby’s Nu Troop, The Jazz Warriors and more. Denys has performed in such prestigious events as Ottawa International Jazz Festival, Du Maurier, Atlantic Jazz Festival, Halifax, Roma Europa Festival, Berlin Jazz Festival, North Sea Jazz Festival, Red Sea Jazz Festival as well as in Russia, Netherlands, France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Greece, Zimbabwe, New Zealand and the Carribean.
A winner of the Best Soloist 1998 (3rd) at the Jazz a Vienne International Festival and al Best Ensemble 1998 with Gary Crosby’s Nu Troop, he also won an Album of the Year award at the Mercury Music awards in 1999 and a MOBO award for Best Jazz Act. Im 2000 Denys won The British Jazz Award for Rising Star.
Denys has recorded 3 albums: Be Where You Are; Alternating Currents; and the hudely popular Let Freedom Ring!. Let Freedom Ring!, was nominated for Best Album and Best New Work in the BBC Jazz Awards, and for Best Jazz Act in the MOBO Awards. It was also nominated for Best Album in the UK Parliamentary Jazz Awards in 2005.
The album Alternating Currents received great critical acclaim and consolidated his position as one of the top saxophonists in Europe. Denys has hosted a number of BBC Radio 3's highly popular Jazz Lineup shows and appeared in the Golden Globe-nominated movie, Love Actually. In 2007, in celebration of the 200th Anniversary of the Abolition Of The Slave Trade Act 1807in Britain, Denys debuted his new project – Anansi : Reunion..