https://www.mosaicrecords.com/
~~ recommended by emil karpo ~~
Joe Pass
"Joe could play the melody, add the chords and make the fills. That had never been done before quite the way he did it." - Joe Diorio
Joe Pass was born January 15. 1929 in New Brunswick, New Jersey. He grew up in Johnstown, Pennsylvania where his father worked in a steel mill. The boy’s imagination had been captured by a Gene Autrey movie. Accordingly, for Joe Pass’ ninth birthday his father brought home a S17.00 Harmony guitar. Determined that his son does not follow him into manual trades, his father demanded adherence to a strict practice schedule for Joe Pass. Six hours each day – Joe Pass worked on the guitar for five years. As an adult when Joe Pass spoke of the regimen, he tersely acknowledged “l hated it.”
During the 1950s, Joe Pass could often be found in Las Vegas, where he played in show bands and lounge trios. Pianist Frank Strazzeri lived there from 1954 to ‘57. Joe Pass, like many musicians, sat in with him. “I had a trio job at a small club called the Black Magic,” Strazzeri recalls. “When Joe came around he’d sit in the corner, over in the dark practically, and just play very quietly. Even then, I don’t think he had any limitations as a player. I’d play off-the-wall-tunes that I knew he didn’t know. But, come time for him to play, he’d play ’em beautifully and in any key. He could just hear it and he’d have it. And play the changes the right way too.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
In the spring of 1961, Joe Pass, pianist Arnold Ross and others took part in a recording for Pacific Jazz called SOUNDS OF SYNANON (PJ-48). Soon, Bock was telling people about the great new guitarist he’d found. The album garnered Pass the New Star award in Down Beat’s 11th Annual Critic’s Poll. Bock signed Pass to a contract and for the next six years, he challenged Joe Pass in many novel ways. Journalist Howard Lucraft, who has chronicled L.A. jazz for the past 45 years, notes that Bock “was a very positive person and knew exactly what he was doing. He took note of the ability and individuality of each musician and tried to use those things in interesting ways.”
Joe Pass all but grew another arm when he began working with guitarist John Pisano sometime in 1963. Their relationship led to Joe Pass’ first working band and the recording of FOR DJANGO and would continue intermittently for the rest of his life.
Django
September 1964
Joe Pass (g), John Pisano (rhythm g), Jim Hughart (b), Colin Bailey (d)
Mention Joe Pass and Pacific Jazz in the same breath to anyone knowledgeable enough to know of the connection and the first thing you’ll probably hear is something superlative about For Django. The album pays homage to Django Reinhardt not by recreating the recordings of the Quintet of the Hot Club of France but by Joe Pass and company giving a good accounting of themselves on material associated with the Belgian gypsy.
During this laboratory period, Joe Pass was hammering out a personal style. He was playing single-note lines that were rooted in the Charlie Christian mode. In Joe Pass, though, that impulse was filtered through the rapid-fire playing of Parker, Gillespie, Haig and the other bebop horn players and pianists. Joe Pass also had chordal roots in Reinhardt but he’d paid close attention to the more modern, bop-inflected harmonies of guitarists like Jimmy Raney, Tal Farlow and Barney Kessel.
In 1967 and ’68, Pass played in the TV studio band for The Woody Woodbury Show, led by pianist Mike Melvoin. Joe Pass, according to Melvoin, “was extremely fast with new material. He could have been a great studio player. I talked to him a couple of times about doing it full time but he wasn’t really interested. He saw himself as a jazz musician and didn’t want to be a generalist.”
Melvoin also remembers a special guest on the Woodbury Show. “Wes Montgomery was on the show one time,” he recalls. “Woody asked Wes who his favorite guitarist was. Wes pointed to Joe Pass and said, ‘He’s sittin’ right over there in your band.’”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
In January of 1994, at what became his final recording session, Joe Pass briefly got philosophical. “People always ask me where my music comes from and for years I used to say Gene Autry as a joke, because nobody in my family played a thing. So I just went on playing guitar all these years without thinking where it comes from. In the last couple of years I’ve realized that my playing is a gift from God.”
In this 90 minute video, Joe Pass is interviewed about his playing techniques, interplay with musicians and a 1994 trio concert with Bob Magnusson on bass Joe Porcaro playing drums.
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