Francis Davis, a 1994 Pew Fellow in the Arts and one of the most influential jazz critics of his generation, died on April 14, 2025, at his home in Philadelphia. He was 78.
Over five decades, Davis shaped the way readers and listeners engaged with music, contributing to publications including The Atlantic, The Village Voice, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and NPR Music. He was also the original jazz critic for Fresh Air, NPR's nationally syndicated radio program hosted by Davis’s wife, Terry Gross.
Born in Southwest Philadelphia in 1946, Davis graduated from John Bartram High School and Temple University. He began his writing career in the late 1970s, contributing to The Philadelphia Inquirer before joining The Atlantic in 1984. He also established the annual jazz critics poll, which began at the Village Voice in 2006. Davis authored several books, including In the Moment; Outcats: Jazz Composers, Instrumentalists, and Singers; The History of the Blues; and Jazz and Its Discontents. His liner notes for the 2009 reissue of Kind of Blue earned him one of his two Grammy Awards.
Beyond writing, Davis taught courses on jazz and blues at Temple University and the University of Pennsylvania. His contributions were recognized with numerous honors, including multiple ASCAP Deems Taylor Awards, his aforementioned Pew Fellowship, and a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Davis is remembered for both his intellect and his sense of humor, as well as his ability to illuminate the cultural context of the music about which he wrote. As he once remarked, “Writing about music is trying to figure out why it reaches you and communicate that to someone else, hopefully.”
Learn more about Francis Davis and his legacy, in obituaries from NPR and The Philadelphia Inquirer.