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For those unaware, Adam De Lucia’s path into jazz fusion began less with genre than with structure - and with a sense of discovery. During a decade of one-on-one study starting in 1995, he encountered a musical language built on interdependence, where harmony, rhythm, and improvisation operate as a unified system. At the same time, the music carried a sense of excitement and possibility that would remain central to his approach.

Early playing experiences revealed that language in practice. Working with a range of musicians in the mid-1990s. De Lucia found himself drawn to a form of music that felt both rigorous and alive - shaped not only by its complexity, but by the energy and interaction between players. His fusion tradition, as he encountered it, was not static or preserved, but something being actively extended by musicians connected to the Miles Davis lineage.

That sense of continuity deepened in the early 2000s through regular exposure to Wayne Krantz’s trio residency in New York. What stuck De Lucia was not only the evolution of the language, but the presence of the same vitality he had heard in earlier generations of fusion players - a quality that combined technical command with immediacy, risk and momentum.

For De Lucia, composition is not only a technical process, but a form of introspection - where ideas emerge through sustained attention and are shaped into something that can be felt as much as understood.

Across more than three decades of playing, his work has come to center on balance between intellectual rigor and emotional impact. Rather than separating structure from feeling, his music aims for a broader arc - building toward moments of heightened intensity and release.

That approach converges in The Man Who Would Be King, a project that brings years of study, performance, and reflection into a fully-realized statement. Here, these ideas take shape through composition, interaction, and long-form development.

On The Man Who Would Be King, Adam De Lucia brings his long-term form of exploration of jazz fusion into focus as a fully-integrated statement - one where composition, improvisation, and ensemble interaction operate as a unified language.

1. “Cycle One”
2. “Gorilla”
3. “Store On the Corner”
4. “6 Day Regimen”
5. “Will You Follow?”
6. “Girl”
7. “8 Out”
8. “Carousel”

With the album drawing from a vocabulary shaped over decades, De Lucia opens his new recording on the ______________ of “Cycle One” and then brings us the __________ of “Gorilla,” the _______________ of “Store On the Corner” and the ___________ of “6 Day Regimen.”

Along next is the __________________ of “Will You Follow?” which is itself backed beautifully by the _____________ of “Girl,” the new set rounding out on the _______________ of “8 Out,” coming to a close on the __________ of “Carousel.”

Adam De Lucia @ YouTube

Adam De Lucia @ Apple Music

Adam De Lucia @ Instagram