Early life Pullen was born and raised in
Roanoke,
Virginia, United States. Growing up in a musical family, he learned the piano at an early age. A graduate of
Lucy Addison High School, Pullen played in the school's band. He played with the choir in his local church and was heavily influenced by his cousin, Clyde "Fats" Wright, who was a professional jazz pianist. He took some lessons in classical piano and knew little of jazz. At this time, he was mainly aware of church music and the blues. Pullen left Roanoke for
Johnson C. Smith University in North Carolina to study for a medical career, but soon he realized that his true vocation was music. After playing with local musicians and being exposed for the first time to albums of the major jazz musicians and composers, he abandoned his medical studies. He set out to make a career in music, desirous of playing like
Ornette Coleman and
Eric Dolphy.
Early musical career (1964 to 1972) In 1964, he went to
Chicago,
Illinois, for a few weeks, where he encountered
Muhal Richard Abrams' philosophy of making music.) to publish the result as two LPs. These were the first records to bear Pullen's name, second to Graves'. Although not greatly known in the United States, these avant-garde albums were well received in Europe, most copies being sold there. In 2020, Corbett vs. Dempsey released the contents of both albums on a CD titled
The Complete Yale Concert, 1966. Finding little money in playing
avant-garde jazz, Pullen began to play the
Hammond organ to extend his opportunities for work, transferring elements of his individual piano style to this instrument. During the remainder of the 1960s and early 1970s, he played with his own organ trio in clubs and bars, worked as a self-taught arranger for record companies, and accompanied various singers including
Arthur Prysock,
Irene Reid,
Ruth Brown,
Jimmy Rushing and
Nina Simone. In 1972, Pullen briefly appeared with
Art Blakey's
Jazz Messengers. Pullen appeared on no more commercial recordings until 1971 and 1972, when he played organ on three recordings by altoist
Charles Williams, one being issued under the title of a Pullen composition, "Trees And Grass And Things".
Mingus connection (1973 to 1975) In 1973 drummer
Roy Brooks introduced Pullen to bassist
Charles Mingus, and after a brief audition he took over the vacant piano chair in the Mingus group; when a tenor saxophone player was needed, Pullen recommended
George Adams; subsequently,
Dannie Richmond returned on drums; these men, together with
Jack Walrath on trumpet,
Emergence as a leader (1975 to 1979) Pullen had always played piano with bass and drums behind him, feeling more comfortable this way, but in early 1975 he was persuaded to play a solo concert in Toronto. This was recorded as
Solo Piano Album (
Sackville) and became the first record issued under Pullen's name alone. Among other pieces, it contains "Sweet (Suite) Malcolm", declared a masterpiece by
Cameron Brown, Pullen's long time associate of later years. Meanwhile, he recorded with groups led by
Billy Hart (drums),
Hamiet Bluiett (baritone sax),
Cecil McBee (bass),
Sunny Murray (drums) and Marcello Melis (bass). On the formation of the first
Mingus Dynasty band Pullen occupied the piano chair and appeared on their recording
Chair In The Sky in 1979, but he soon left the band, feeling the music had diverged too far from Mingus' intentions.
George Adams/Don Pullen Quartet (1979 to 1988) In late 1979 Pullen, Adams, and Richmond were booked to play as a quartet for a European tour of a few weeks' duration. Pullen invited Cameron Brown to join them on bass. They were asked to bill themselves as a "Mingus group", but not wanting to be identified as mere copyists, they declined and performed as the George Adams/Don Pullen Quartet. They played music that was more structured than Pullen normally favored, but the immediate rapport among them led to the group touring the world with unchanged personnel until the death of Richmond in early 1988. From very early in their first tour in 1979, and until 1985, the quartet made a dozen recordings for European labels, both in the studio and in concert. Of these,
Earth Beams (1980),
Live At The Village Vanguard (1983) and
Decisions (1984) provide typically fine examples of their work at that period. Although highly regarded in Europe, the quartet felt they were not well enough known in America, so in 1986 they signed to record for
Blue Note Records, for which they recorded
Breakthrough (1986) and
Song Everlasting (1987). Beginning the Blue Note contract with great hope of increased fame and success, as shown by the title of the first album, they became disillusioned by the poor availability of the two records. Although the power of their live concerts maintained their reputation as one of the most exciting groups ever seen, the music recorded for the Blue Note sessions was at first deemed "smoother" than on their European recordings, and took time to achieve the same high reputation. After the death of Dannie Richmond the quartet fulfilled their remaining contracted engagements with drummer
Lewis Nash and then disbanded in mid-1988. Their music, usually original compositions by Pullen, Adams and Richmond, had ranged from
blues, through ballads, to
post-bop and avant-garde. The ability of the players to encompass all these areas, often within one composition, removed any sameness or sterility from the quartet format. Except for the early recordings on the vanished Horo label, their European recordings on Soulnote and Timeless remained frequently available, unlike those made for Blue Note. During the life of the Quartet, Pullen also made a duo recording with George Adams,
Melodic Excursions (1982), and made three recordings under his own name, two further solo albums, the acclaimed
Evidence Of Things Unseen (1983) and
Plays Monk (1984), then with a quintet, another highly praised recording
The Sixth Sense (1985) on Black Saint. He also recorded with (alphabetically) Hamiet Bluiett; Roy Brooks, the drummer who introduced him to Mingus; Jane Bunnett; Kip Hanrahan;
Beaver Harris; Marcello Melis; and
David Murray. All Pullen's future recordings under his own name were for Blue Note. On 16 December 1988 he went into the studio with
Gary Peacock (bass) and
Tony Williams (drums) to make his first trio album
New Beginnings, which astonished even those familiar with his work and became widely regarded as one of the finest trio albums ever recorded. He followed this in 1990 with another trio album,
Random Thoughts, in somewhat lighter mood, this time with
James Genus (bass) and Lewis Nash (drums).
African Brazilian connection and late career (1990 to 1995) In late 1990 Pullen added a new element to his playing and his music with the formation of his
African Brazilian Connection ("ABC"). This featured
Carlos Ward (alto sax),
Nilson Matta (bass),
Guilherme Franco and
Mor Thiam (percussion) in a group which mixed African and Latin rhythms with jazz. Their first album,
Kele Mou Bana, was released in 1991. Their second, but very different, album of 1993,
Ode To Life, was a tribute to George Adams, who had died on November 14, 1992, containing Pullen's heartfelt and moving composition in Adams' memory, "Ah George We Hardly Knew Ya". A third album,
Live...Again, recorded in July 1993 at the
Montreux Jazz Festival, was not released until 1995. This featured "Ah George..." and other songs from their previous albums, in somewhat extended versions. Pullen achieved more popular and commercial success with this group than with any other. In 1993
Ode To Life was fifth on the U.S.
Billboard Top Jazz Album chart. During the last few years of his life, Pullen toured with his trio, with his African Brazilian Connection, and as a solo artist, but did not release any more solo records. As a
sideman and
session musician, he left his mark with a variety of noteworthy artists, including (alphabetically) Jane Bunnett (notably their duo album
New York Duets),
Bill Cosby,
Kip Hanrahan, David Murray's 1991 ''
Shakill's Warrior'',
Maceo Parker,
Ivo Perelman and
Jack Walrath. He also toured and recorded with the group
Roots from its inception. Pullen's final project was a work combining the sounds of his African Brazilian Connection (extended by
Joseph Bowie on trombone) with a choir and drums of
Native Americans. Despite his Native American background (his paternal grandmother was half-Indian, probably Cherokee) he began to experiment with American Indian music as late as July 1992. In 1994 Pullen was diagnosed with
lymphoma. He continued to put great physical effort into completing the composition. In early March 1995 he played on his final recording,
Sacred Common Ground (with the Chief Cliff Singers,
Kootenai Indians from
Elmo, Montana), a few weeks away from his death, returning to his heritage of the blues and the church. Unable to play at the live premiere, his place at the piano was taken by
D.D. Jackson, with whom Pullen discussed the music from his hospital bed shortly before his death. He died on April 22, 1995, of
lymphoma. Pullen composed many pieces, which often were portraits or memories of people he knew. All were published by his own company, Andredon, but because he for a long time suffered from neglect musically, so did many of his compositions. His best known are the humorous "Big Alice" (for an imaginary fan), "Double Arc Jake" (for his son Jake and
Rahsaan Roland Kirk), the passionate "Ode To Life" (for a friend), and the aforementioned lament, "Ah George We Hardly Knew Ya". Occasionally he wrote pieces with a religious feeling, such as "Gratitude" and "Healing Force", or to highlight the plight of African-Americans, such as "Warriors", "Silence = Death", and "Endangered Species: African American Youth". Following the assassination of African-American activist
Malcolm X, Pullen had written a suite dedicated to Malcolm X's memory, but this required more instrumental resources than a normal-sized jazz group provides, and only the piano parts of this were ever recorded. Except for the
Plays Monk album, Pullen almost exclusively featured his own compositions on his own recordings, until his time with the African Brazilian Connection. His compositions are well represented on the George Adams/Don Pullen Quartet recordings, but his compositions which were recorded by others were usually performed by those who had known and worked with him. Pullen's piano technique can be seen on the DVDs
Mingus At Montreux 1975 and
Roots Salutes The Saxophones. ==Posthumous tributes==