What are some groovin' bands that are instrumental mostly with a sax doing most of the leads?

The Legends band. David Sanborn, Joe Sample, Clapton, Gadd and Marcus Miller. Not a "groove" band but they are always grooving no matter what style they are playing. There's a great DVD live at Montreaux.

I love it when Jeff Coffin leads the music on a lot of Bela Fleck and the Flecktones stuff.

The Legends band. David Sanborn, Joe Sample, Clapton, Gadd and Marcus Miller. Not a "groove" band but they are always grooving no matter what style they are playing. There's a great DVD live at Montreaux.

Can you tell me more about the Live in Montreaux DVD?

I love it when Jeff Coffin leads the music on a lot of Bela Fleck and the Flecktones stuff.

I agree. And when Howard Levy played harmonica with them as well.

Also, Christian McBride Band!

For older stuff, you might try some of the old soul jazz reissues from the late 60's early 70's. Kind of a big R&B groove with greasy sax over the top...think old fashioned stripper music when it gets really bluesy.

Look for guys like Rusty Bryant, Houston Pearson, Idris Muhammad...my own personal prejudice when surfing for music like this is to look for someone playing "Fender Bass" listed in the credits. The Prestige label with it's "Legend of Acid Jazz" series of reissues covers a lot of good ground.

Try a band called Void.

My teacher is working towards his masters in electric bass performance at University of Miami and apparently this band came and performed and blew away the teachers and staff. The bassist is smokin' and they lay down some deep grooves and wicked unison lines. Lot's of funky syncopated melodies and great textures. The lead sax player is great as well.

http://cdbaby.com/cd/voidsounds

Shuffle Demons (http://www.shuffledemons.com/)

Enjoying the links/bands cited. I'd add Spyro Gyra (http://www.spyrogyra.com - multiple grammy nominations and arguably the greatest current band of this profile) and the Yellow Jackets (http://www.yellowjackets.com - two-time grammy winners). The latter possibly carries lead with sax primarily in the more recent work.

The late great Bob Berg bands always had great bassist like Will Lee, Jeff Andrews etc.

Grover.Washington.Jr.

Not instrumental, but check out Morphine if you haven't.

I'll second the Spyro Gyra.

And being a sax player myself, I would have to add the not-so-well-known Mindi Abair.

We can´t forget Maceo. the Teacher of Funk....I know there´s often a full horn section but he LEADS the band.