Milestones Aug. 20, 2007

DIED

THE ADVENTUROUS Art Davis saw little value in modesty. He called himself the "world's greatest bassist," and many jazz giants, notably John Coltrane, agreed. The classically trained genre hopper ("It all sounded good to me," he said), who turned to jazz after encountering resistance in his early searches for classical jobs, accompanied singers from Lena Horne to Bob Dylan, played in TV and Broadway orchestras and backed Coltrane on such recordings as Olé Coltrane and Ascension. In the '70s, his unsuccessful discrimination suit against the New York Philharmonic got him blacklisted, so he added a new profession to his résumé:...

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