If anyone ever sets up a study to attempt to divine whether musical talent is based on either nature or nurture, David Ornette Cherry would be a terrible study subject. The son of Jazz icon Don Cherry, David Ornette Cherry was genetically predisposed to be a musician of some kind, and his father’s circle of friends (David’s namesake Ornette Coleman, Thelonious Monk, Charlie Haden, among countless other Jazz legends) ensured that his environmental upbringing would similarly steer him down a musical path. See Sound Advice here.
This article appears in Oct 1-7, 2008.