Lenny Pickett (born April 10, 1954) is an American saxophonist and musical director of the Saturday Night Liveband. From 1973 to 1981 he was a member of the band Tower of Power. Pickett has worked extensively as a session musician for a wide range of performers and genres.
He is known for his skill in the high pitched altissimo register, which can be heard during the opening credits of Saturday Night Live.
Music career
Pickett grew up in Berkeley, California. He has no formal musical training, did not attend high school beyond the first year and did not attend college. After dropping out of high school, he took lessons from Bert Wilson, a jazz saxophonist known for his facility with the altissimo register. Other than those lessons, he is self-taught on saxophone.
In the 1970s and early 1980s, he led the horn section for Tower of Power, an innovative and funk-focused East San Francisco Bay area band, and also a popular session band that backed many musicians in multiple genres, from Elton John to musicians in soul music, rhythm and blues, and funk. Tower of Power also released its own albums as a group.[1]
Pickett joined the Saturday Night Live Band in 1985 and has served as the band's musical director since G. E. Smith was fired during the cast exodus in 1995.
As a composer, he has written for his group, the Borneo Horns, and has received a number of commissions to write works mixing classical and popular idioms for a variety of musical ensembles, including the New Century Saxophone Quartet, as well as music for theatre and collaborations with dancers, poets and film-makers. He is an adjunct faculty member of the jazz studies area at New York University.
