Don Messina

I met Lennie Tristano in 1973, while accompanying a friend to his weekly lessons. I did this about a dozen times over a few months. I was 17, the same year I started to play the double bass and it was after I heard a recording of the Metronome All-Stars featuring Charlie Parker and Lennie that I decided I wanted to be a jazz bassist. Since then I have been a devoted admirer and fan of Lennie’s music and his teaching as well as the beautiful music of Bird, Prez, Billie Holiday, Sal Mosca, Bud Powell, Fats Navarro, Roy Eldridge, Warne Marsh, Lee Konitz, Louis Armstrong, Oscar Pettiford, Jimmy Blanton, Charlie Christian, Art Tatum, Django, Wes Montgomery, Max Roach, and Kenny Clarke. I spent the next 5 years traveling and playing music, ultimately realizing that I needed to study. In September of 1978 I called Lennie to take lessons. He told me he would get back to me; unfortunately, Lennie died weeks later in November, 1978.

Soon after that call I met some players who were studying with a teacher in New Jersey who was involved with the music of Tristano and Sal Mosca and they all raved about his playing and teaching. I started studying jazz improvisation with tenor saxophonist Fred Amend in 1978 for fourteen years. Fred, who at that time was a student of Sal Mosca, had a number of young players studying with him that sessioned regularly. I entered into a perfect music scene. Most of the musicians that I've played with then and today I met while studying with Fred. He helped me understand the concept of an improvised bass line whether soloing or accompanying; plus he shared his love of the great players of jazz and classical music with me, especially Lester Young, Charlie Parker, and Bach. I was soon introduced to Sal Mosca. Listening to Sal, and eventually sessioning regularly with Mosca changed every aspect of my appreciation for music. Sal's piano improvising and teaching, as well as his carefully measured words related to music gave me an even deeper understanding of what an improvised melodic line could and should be; the importance and necessity of steady time and swing; and how to use the colorful palette of harmony to develop and become your own player. Through Sal's influence I learnt that there is no limit to creativity on any instrument.

Since the early 1980s I have been part of many rhythm sections with drummer Bill Chattin. Bill and I were part of the Larry Bluth Trio for over 30 years. We played every Sunday morning, rarely missing a week, it was my church. We recorded three live CDs for Zinnia Records and one for the Fresh Sound Record label that was released in 2022. These recordings were awarded four-stars by Chris Albertson in Stereo Review; selected as “one of the best Jazz CDs of 1999” by Bob Blumenthal of the Boston Globe; received the 2000 IAJE Blue Chip Award for Outstanding Jazz Recording by Herb Wong; and given 4-1/2 stars by the All-Music Guide, Jazz Times, Down Beat, Wired, LA Jazz Scene, Cadence, All About Jazz, Jazz Weekly, and many others. 

During these same years (1978 thru 1991) of study, I had ongoing sessions (or performed)  with Dean Robinson, Fred Amend, Larry Bluth, Jon Easton, Peter Prisco, Don Joseph, Rick Moore, Ron Naldi, Mark Diorio, Tim Pleasant, Bill Chattin, Judy Neimack, Josh Breakstone, Phil Woods, and others. After 1991 there were gigs and sessions with Jimmy Halperin, Connie Crothers, Carol Liebowitz, Nick Lyons, Skip Scott, Will Jhun, Gary Levy, Johnny Quara, Ted Brown, Charley Krachy, Kazzrie Jaxen, Joris Roelofs, and others.

Bill Chattin and I sessioned weekly with Sal Mosca from 1999 through 2007 with Jimmy Halperin and others; we released two CDs with him (as a trio and as a quartet) and performed concerts and clubs such as Birdland, William Paterson University, and Trumpets Jazz. In 2009 Bill and I formed a working quartet with Kazzrie Jaxen and Charley Krachy. This group lasted for ten years, recorded 2 CDs, and were honored to play at Lincoln Center for the "Induction of Lennie Tristano” into the JALC Hall of Fame. Bill and I also recorded live albums with the Rick Moore Trio and Ron Naldi Quartet. We had ongoing sessions with pianist Jon Easton and Jimmy Halperin for decades and we recorded two albums with each group as well as a few albums with the Ted Brown Quartet. In 2017 I released an album of solo bass improvisations,  Dedicated To on Cadence Jazz Records.   

After Sal's death in 2007 I was asked to be the executor of the Sal Mosca Archives at the Institute of Jazz Studies, Rutgers University. I documented and digitalized over 450 hours of unpublished private recordings from 1950 to 2007. In partnership with the Mosca family we produced four CD collections of Sal Mosca, (9 CDs in total) from 1970 to 2004 on Blue Jack Jazz, Cadence Jazz, Sunnyside, and Fresh Sound Records.

I consider both Sal Mosca and Lennie Tristano as jazz mentors and I have a deep love for the bass playing of Oscar Pettiford (especially Oscar!), Jimmy Blanton, Vinnie Burke (whom I was lucky enough to have known well and we even did duets), Scott LaFaro, Sonny Dallas, Red Mitchell, Niels Henning Orsted Pedersen, Ray Brown, Lou Stelluti, Paul Chambers and Walter Page as well as the playing of classical bassists Gary Karr, Edgar Myers, and whenever Florentin Ginot plays Bach.

As of this writing (September 2024) I session three times a week and start every morning by playing a Bach Cello Suite and a Violin Partita (pizzicato). I'm waiting the release of a few new albums: Ted Brown Quartet (with Jon Easton & Bill Chattin); a live duo concert with Kazzrie Jaxen (vocals and piano); a double CD, with Bill Chattin and Kazzrie; a trio called JAM, with altoist Chris Aiello and Kazzrie; a HMC Trio with Jimmy Halperin and Bill Chattin.