Nicknamed "The Little Giant," English saxophonist Tubby Hayes was an excellent hard bop and modal stylist. His virtuosic flurries of notes drew as much criticism as praise, and while his forays into America may not have registered in the jazz press, he was revered by a who's who of artists on the other side of the Atlantic, including Quincy Jones, Ella Fitzgerald, Charles Mingus, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, and Sonny Rollins. Also a highly skilled arranger, composer, and an accomplished vibraphonist, Hayes led quartets, quintets, sextets, as well as big bands and amassed a vast canon of albums for labels such as Tempo, Fontana, Spotlite, Epic, Smash, and Mole. A ubiquitous presence on the 1960s and early-'70s British jazz scene, Hayes died in 1973, but his undisputed influence made him the standard bearer for 20th century British jazz.