CHARLOTTESVILLE - LeRoi Moore's personality and music were one and the same -- sweet, raucous, fun-loving and pensive, friends say.

Mr. Moore, saxophonist and arranger for the Dave Matthews Band, died Tuesday in Los Angeles from complications related to injuries he sustained in an all-terrain vehicle accident at his farm near Charlottesville in June.

"It's devastating. He was extremely modest and an extremely natural musician," said John D'earth, who played with Mr. Moore in a variety of groups, including Cosmology, the Charlottesville Swing Orchestra and his own John D'earth Quintet and Sextet.

"He was the tenor player I most enjoyed playing with in this area," D'earth said. "He was kind of a musical savant. He was very natural and his improvisations were truly self-expression. It seemed like a rare moment of justice in the music business when he finally received the recognition he deserved."

Mr. Moore, 46, was more than a musician. Dawn Thompson, whose vocals mixed with Mr. Moore's sax and Greg Howard's Chapman Stick in the improvisational band Code Magenta, recalled his humor and friendship.

"The way he told a joke was wonderful. Even if the joke wasn't funny, he'd have you laughing. I could hear him tell the same joke over and over and I'd still laugh," said Thompson, who is married to D'earth. "He was more than a friend. He was part of our family."

Thompson said Mr. Moore's music mimicked the man.

"He was passionate, but at the same time he was very laid back," she said. "His music was both energetic and relaxed. It's a real loss."

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Mr. Moore was taken to the University of Virginia Medical Center on June 30 after being thrown from his four-wheel ATV while riding on property he owned near Charlottesville. He spent several days in intensive care in serious condition.

Mr. Moore was a founding member of the Dave Matthews Band with Matthews and Charlottesville-area musicians Boyd Tinsley, Stefan Lessard and Carter Beauford. He learned sax from local bandleader Sonny Sampson and instructor Calvin Cage. His love for jazz led him to play in area combos and groups until he was brought into the Dave Matthews Band.

According to the band's Web site, Mr. Moore no longer considered himself a jazz musician, but said the freedom he had to arrange and improvise with the band was just as rewarding. Local jazz musicians, however, never gave him up to pop music.

"I met him several times and he seemed like a fantastic guy. He really exuded the joy of music and his joy of life came through in his music," said Gary Funston, a member of the Charlottesville Jazz Society's governing board. "It's a sad day for a whole lot of reasons."

Saddened fans yesterday expressed shock at Mr. Moore's death and mourned his loss. Terrance Kirwan of Midlothian was so moved by Mr. Moore's music that he learned to play the sax. The 19-year-old culinary student at J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College was just a boy when his father brought home two of the band's CDs, "Under the Table and Dreaming" and "Crash," and he immediately became hooked.

"I grew up listening to him," said Kirwan, who has seen the band five times, including Mr. Moore's last performance June 28 at the Nissan Pavilion in Bristow.

Bryan Morrison of Richmond recalled that he used to go see the band play on Wednesday nights at the Flood Zone. "Then, all of a sudden, they were on MTV."

Morrison, 39, said what impressed him most about Mr. Moore was his musicianship, the way he played many different instruments. It all helped to create the band's distinctive genre-defying music, which he said is not rock, country, jazz or blues.

"It's a distinctive sound. . . . He added an element to that sound," Morrison said.

D'earth said Mr. Moore didn't like the limelight that came with being famous.

"He just wanted to play and let his music speak for him," D'earth said. "He was amazing."
Bryan McKenzie is a staff writer at The Daily Progress in Charlottesville.

Times-Dispatch staff writer Daniel Neman contributed to this report.