FILE - In this Sunday, Sept. 2, 2007, file photo, jazz flutist Yusef Lateef discusses his music in the Jazz Talk Tent at Hart Plaza at the Detroit International Jazz Festival in Detroit. Grammy-winning musician and composer Lateef, one of the first to incorporate world music into traditional jazz, died Monday, Dec. 23, 2013. He was 93. (AP Photo/ The Detroit News, Ricardo Thomas, File)
December 23, 2013 - 9:46 PM
SHUTESBURY, Mass. - Grammy-winning musician and composer Yusef Lateef, one of the first to incorporate world music into traditional jazz, has died. He was 93.
The Douglass Funeral Home in Amherst, Mass., says Lateef died Monday at his home in Shutesbury.
Lateef, a tenor saxophonist known for his impressive technique, also became a top flutist. He was a jazz soloist on the oboe and played bassoon. He introduced different types of flutes and other woodwind instruments from many countries into his music. He's credited with playing world music before it was officially named.
He was a performer, composer and music educator. In 1987, he won a Grammy Award for his new age recording "Yusef Lateef's Little Symphony," and in 2010, he received the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters Award.
News from © The Associated Press, 2013