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Verve's Bossa Nova U.S.A.
by Arnaldo DeSouteiro
Paul Desmond: Samba with Some Barbecue Originally titled “Struttin' with Some Barbecue" in 1941, this Satchmo tune lost its Dixie beat and got a bossa groove in the hands of the infallible Don Sebesky. Brazilian drummer Airto Moreira, then a newcomer in the New York jazz scene, provides a fiery propulsion to Paul Desmond's lyrical approach and “dry martini" alto sound. Different from the sad results of pseudo-bossa albums by Gene Ammons, Sonny Rollins, and so many others, this is ...
Continue ReadingJoe Pass: Meditation
by Ken Dryden
Although a few jazz guitarists still perform solo concerts in the early days of the 21st century, none of them has produced anything approaching the series of live recordings by Joe Pass during his two decades as a Pablo artist. Incredibly, Pass maintained that playing unaccompanied on stage wasn't even his idea. During my November 1993 interview with him, Pass recounted this verbal exchange: “I don't know why I did it. I was asked to do it. I was put ...
Continue ReadingTo Dream the Impossible Dream: the quest for a music education
by Peter Rubie
I've been thinking a lot about how jazz is taught recently. I realize now, my search for a real musical education was not a simple thing, but a series of life changing moments. My son, on the other hand, is planning to study music in college after he finishes high school. Though it would fill his grandparents with dread were they still around to see it, to Ben and his peers it is a natural choice, focused on finding the ...
Continue ReadingRoy Clark and Joe Pass: Play Hank Williams
by Samuel Chell
No, your eyes aren't deceiving you--the title means what it says. Birdland comes to Hee Haw on this all-instrumental session, which features the country music icon mixing it up with the once-dominating master of jazz guitar (Oscar Peterson et Joe Pass à la Salle Pleyel, Pablo, 1975). From the perspective of a city boy, this combination might seem as likely as Ornette Coleman and Kenny G getting together to record the music of John Tesh. But trust many guitarists to ...
Continue ReadingNorman Granz' Jazz In Montreux Presents: Joe Pass '75
by John Kelman
Joe Pass Norman Granz' Jazz In Montreux Presents: Joe Pass '75 Eagle Eye Media 2006 (1975)
It's not often you get a second chance in life, but the late guitarist Joe Pass was one of the fortunate few. After starting out playing in big bands like Charlie Barnet's in the 1940s, Pass' drug addiction and resulting jail sentence kept him off the scene for a decade until 1962, when he returned with a series ...
Continue ReadingJoe Pass Live at the Four Queens Hotel, Las Vegas, 1988
by Ken Dryden
By the time of his death from cancer in 1994, Joe Pass was widely recognized as one of the top jazz guitarists of all time, especially for his virtuoso solo performances. Prior to his passing, I had an opportunity to do a phone interview with Pass and was rather surprised that the guitarist found it difficult to listen to his recordings, as he always felt that he could have played better. The 1988 broadcast of his appearance at ...
Continue ReadingDoes Anybody Here Remember Joe (Pass)?
by Craig M. Cortello
Does anybody here remember Joe? That's the question I asked myself in May of 1994 when I learned that my hero had died. As the television show Entertainment Tonight rolled the closing credits one evening, they noted that the legendary jazz guitarist Joe Pass had passed away, while a brief clip from one of his live performances closed the show. I doubt that Mary Hart knew the magnitude of the words she read, but few of the ET viewers probably ...
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