Born in Brooklyn, NY in 1938, saxophonist Arnie Lawrence began his music career learning the clarinet. He had originally wanted to learn trumpet, but that instrument was too loud for apartment living. During the next two years, he listened to the records of the Jazz at the Philharmonic concerts - Stan Getz, Illinois Jaquet, Flip Phillips. They all played tenor saxaphone. So, at 14, Arnie Lawrence took up the tenor.

Switching to alto sax after a summer in the Catskill Mountains playing night club shows (all the parts were written for alto) Lawrence gigged around Long Island and even worked in a Dixieland band. Influenced by artists as diverse as Charlie Parker, Fats Navarro, Clifford Brown and even Ornette Coleman, Arnie Lawrence was finally discovered by the great Enoch Light and recorded his first album; "You're Gonna Hear From Me" for the Project 3 label in 1966. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.