Malachi Thompson, 56; Jazz Trumpeter, Composer and Arts Activist

Malachi Thompson, 56, a jazz trumpeter, composer and educator whose playing combined free jazz with bebop, blues and gospel, died Sunday of cancer at his home in Chicago.

An influential figure in the Chicago music scene, Thompson came to prominence in the late 1960s, playing with the Assn. for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, a collective of jazz artists playing the music of Henry Threadgill and Muhal Richard Abrams.

He won a National Endowment for the Arts composition scholarship in the early 1970s and moved to New York, where he played with some of the leading names in jazz, including Joe Henderson, Jackie McLean and Archie Shepp.

After returning to Chicago, he was diagnosed with T-cell lymphoma in 1989. While receiving treatment, Thompson studied jazz history and wrote the musical play “The Jazz Life,” which premiered in 1990.

In 1991, he created Africa Brass, a 13-piece brass ensemble as a larger vehicle for his original compositions. He was selected as a “Chicagoan of the Year” in 1996 by the Chicago Tribune for his efforts to bring jazz back to the city’s South Side. In 1997, he was honored by the Chicago Endowment for the Arts for his arts activism.

Born in Princeton, Ky., he moved to Chicago with his family as a young child and started playing trumpet at age 5.