Roy Ayers: 10/09/1940 - 04/03/2025

There is a certain symbolism in the passing of Roy Ayers at the beginning of spring. The revered signature tune of the vibraphonist-composer-bandleader, who has died at the age of 84 following a long illness, was ‘Everybody Loves The Sunshine.’ Early March’s welcome bout of golden rays feels like a parting gift from the great man.

Ayers had a huge international fan base built on a voluminous discography that saw him create a unique blend of jazz, soul, funk and Afro-Latin rhythms that had a magical combination of accessibility and virtuosity. Apart from the aforesaid anthem, he gained immense popularity throughout the 1970s and 1980s with tracks such as ‘Running Away’, ‘Red, Black & Green,’ ’Destination Motherland’, ‘We Live In Brooklyn, Baby’, ‘Love Will Bring Us Back Together’, ‘Chicago’, ‘Life Is Just A Moment’, ‘2000 Black’, ‘Searchin’, ’Mystic Voyage’, and ’The Third Eye.’ These songs showed Ayers’s wide expressive and lyrical range, as he was adept at instrumental and vocal numbers that broached anything from sexuality to political-cultural identity via the quest for spiritual fulfillment. Ayers told real life stories.

Born in 1940 in Los Angeles’ black neighbourhood South Central, he learned music at an early age from his pianist mother and trombonist father. The gift of a pair of mallets from vibes legend Lionel Hampton after a gig convinced Ayers, who played keyboard and sang in a church choir, to make the instrument his number one ‘axe’, and he soon started to progress on the west coast scene after dropping out of Los Angeles City College. His first major gig was with post-bop pianist Jack Wilson in 1963, before he co-led a band with saxophonist Curtis Amy and then joined flautist Herbie Mann. It was here that Ayers made a leap forward as a soloist, particularly on the strappingly funky LP Memphis Underground. Ayers’s improvisations had hard-edged, propulsive energy, but he was also capable of careful, caressing subtlety.

Ayers’s early solo albums, such as the Mann-produced Stoned Soul Picnic, where A-list guests included Herbie Hancock, Gary Bartz, Charles Tolliver and Ron Carter, were impressive, but it was when he formed Ubiquity in 1970 that his career took off in earnest. He had a startling run of superb albums in the decade that included Virgo Red, Vibrations, Lifeline and Change Up The Groove, and in 1980 made Music Of Many Colours, an inspired collaboration with Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti. Ayers also produced artists such as vocalist Sylvia Striplin and wrote the soundtrack to the cult Blaxploitation movie Coffy. Although still successful in the 1980s, he enjoyed a great resurgence in the 1990s when funk DJs rediscovered his vast back catalogue and then hip-hop artists sampled his songs extensively, realising Ayers was a pivotal link between the likes of Miles Davis, James Brown and Earth, Wind & Fire. Of even greater significance was the influence Ayers had on contemporary soul singers, from Brits, Omar and Don-E, to Americans, D’Angelo, Erykah Badu and Jill Scott.

Ayers was a fantastic live performer, with a charming sense of humour, and his numerous tours in Britain between the 1990s and 2010s made him something of a national treasure from abroad. Ayers’s ability to connect with audiences stemmed from humour and wit as well as chops, which is typified by his re-moulding of ‘We Live In Brooklyn, Baby’ to ‘We Live In Bristol, Baby’, whenever he played the city in the west country. His engaging stage presence will be missed, but like the sunshine, his endless supply of radiant songs, will be welcome across the seasons.