Vishnu Wood

Born in Wilkesboro, North Carolina, he moved to Detroit when he was ten, where he started playing trumpet and later taking up double bass.

After studying at the Detroit Institute of Musical Arts he worked with Dorothy Ashby in 1957[1] and then with Yusef Lateef and Joe Henderson.

[1] Woods moved to New York in 1962 where he performed with Kenny Dorham,[1] Carmen McRae,[1] Terry Gibbs (with Gibbs’s group he recorded in 1963 alongside Alice McLeod (who later married John Coltrane),[1] Leo Wright,[1] Gloria Lynn,[1] Roy Haynes,[1] and Archie Shepp.

It was Wood who, a few years earlier, had suggested she meet his guru, Swami Satchidananda, who had given the opening speech at Woodstock.

[8] He released one solo album, Vishnu Wood in Concert, recorded live at the New England Science Center, Worcester, Massachusetts, featuring, among others, Talib Kibwe and Bertha Hope.