From humble beginnings in South Philadelphia, saxophonist, composer and teacher Jimmy Heath became a brilliant instrumentalist and a magnificent composer and arranger, along the way sharing the stage with some of the most well-known musicians in the Jazz genre.

The middle brother of the legendary Heath Brothers, a three-piece ensemble that included brothers Percy and Tootie, Heath grew up in a musical family. Both of his parents were musicians, and all of his siblings received musical training at a young age. When it was Heath’s turn to decide which instrument he would play, he said the choice came naturally.

“My father asked me ‘Jimmy what would you like to play?’ and I said: I like the saxophone,” Heath said during a presentation hosted by Temple Libraries. “I had heard Benny Carter and Johnny Hodges and I was enamored by those people. Then came Jimmy Dorsey and Charlie Parker and that solidified my love for alto saxophone.”

Spanning seven decades, Heath’s love for the saxophone is recounted in his new memoir titled I Walked with Giants.

Published by Temple University Press and co-written Hofstra University English professor Joseph McLaren, I Walked with Giants recounts Heath’s musical and personal experience in the Jazz world. Throughout a rich and varied career, he performed on more than 125 record albums — including eight with the Heath Brothers — and shared the stage with well known artists such as Cannonball Adderley, Miles Davis, Ahmad Jamal, Ray Charles and Dexter Gordon.

"Heath, with McLaren, tells a life story that is inspiring and thoroughly enjoyable,” said William G. Kenz, of Minnesota State University, Moorhead. “Rising up through the big band era, absorbing the ideas of the beboppers in the mid-1940s, and continuing to embrace changes in jazz from the 1960s through the 1990s, Heath has produced sought-after compositions and arrangements and, as a teacher, has shared his love of the principles of jazz with thousands of students. Now an elder statesman who remains active, he writes of how his supportive family life allowed him to succeed.”