Ira Coleman, born April 29, 1956, is a French-American jazz bassist whose international background has shaped both his musicianship and his distinctive versatility. Born in Stockholm, Sweden, and raised in Southern France, he lived in Germany for fourteen years, studying double bass at Cologne’s Hochschule für Musik before moving to the United States to attend Berklee College of Music in Boston, from which he graduated in 1985. His mother was a Swedish silversmith and designer and his father was a painter and graphic artist from Baltimore, and among the visitors to his childhood home were Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday, Ray Charles, Charles Mingus, and Chester Himes. As a child he sat beside his father as he painted jazz album covers, including John Coltrane’s Olé, where he famously drew two basses because he could hear both on the record.

Over the years Coleman has worked with such well-known figures as Cab Calloway, Freddie Hubbard, Betty Carter, Milt Jackson, Branford Marsalis, Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Jessye Norman, Grover Washington Jr., Barbara Hendricks, Sting, Kathleen Battle, The Carnegie Hall Jazz Ensemble, and The Duke Ellington Orchestra under the direction of Mercer Ellington, among many others. He served as musical director for vocalist Dee Dee Bridgewater and toured with her internationally from 2002 until 2009. His recording credits also include work with Philip Bailey, Angélique Kidjo, Oumou Sangaré, Billy Cobham, Tony Williams, Toumani Diabaté, Ernest Ranglin, and Baaba Maal, and he appears on more than 100 releases, reflecting a career that moves as fluidly through African and Malian traditions as it does through bebop, gospel, pop, and classical settings.

Coleman is as comfortable playing Jamaican rhythms as he is accompanying a gospel choir or performing in a jazz trio, and this breadth has built him an international reputation for versatility — one night he’s on the stage at Carnegie Hall playing in a tribute to African-American culture, and the next morning he’s on a plane to Europe for a recording session or heading to Japan for a jazz festival. In 2021 he joined the faculty of the Schulich School of Music at McGill University in Montreal as an associate professor, bringing decades of experience to guide and support students and leading a Fall 2021 seminar on the music of Mali along with jazz combo coaching and improvisation classes. Reflecting on his chosen instrument, Coleman has said, “The bass fits my character. In most musical genres the bass is the pivotal center piece, the instrument which provides a discrete and clear foundation, and I enjoy the many challenges its function poses.”