Once Greg Adams picked up a trumpet, his course was set. He earned the first trumpet chair as a freshman at his Bay Area high school, and was writing arrangements for various school ensembles by the time he was a junior. Following high school, he joined Tower of Power, and was soon taking a major role in crafting the group's distinctive horn sound. Adams' first solo record, 1995's Hidden Agenda, released on Epic Records, established him as a major architect of the emerging "smooth jazz" sound, and a single from the album, a cover of Sade's "Smooth Operator," remains a virtual ...