Wynton Marsalis

Wynton began playing the trumpet at the age of six

Following in the footsteps of Miles Davis is a tough act to follow, but Wynton Marsalis has rapidly achieved a legendary status of his own.

The decision to play acoustic jazz instead of fusion or funk must have been tough, but Marsalis can now credibly take his place alongside the jazz greats, having notched up nine Grammies in a 30-album career.

He's in the UK to play a series of what's being described as intimate club dates.

Wynton Marsalis joined us live on Breakfast this morning

Born in 1961, he began playing trumpet at six, studying the instrument seriously from 12.

In the summer of 1980, he became a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers and that same year signed with Columbia Records.

Since his self-titled debut was released in 1982, Marsalis' numerous jazz and classical recordings for Columbia and Sony Classical have sold nearly five million copies world wide.

He has taken his jazz groups to thirty countries on six continents, averaging more than 120 concerts per year for many of the past sixteen years. He also has a parallel career in classical music.

The most influential trumpeter since Miles Davis

During the past 15 years, Wynton Marsalis has managed to be a controversial figure despite his obvious abilities - particularly his views on jazz history.

He considers the post-1965 avant-garde playing to be outside of jazz and 1970s fusion to be barren.

Wynton and co have "done a lot to take the essence of jazz and distort it," the composer and pianist George Russell told The New York Times in 1998.

"They've put a damper on the main ingredient of jazz, which is innovation."

The critics were pretty harsh on him but some speculate this is because most of them are white and much of the jazz audience is white and here's a very articulate black man doing their job for them.

Marsalis says he never got on well with critics, he feels he was never portrayed accurately.

Why should he worry about the critics? He probably prefers to let his music speak for him.