AintNoBadDude

|link| Posted 3:54 PM by Brian Linse

Josef Zawinul & Jaco Pastorius

I was out of the country last week when news of the death of Joe Zawinul was announced. Zawinul passed away on September 11th in his home town in Austria, but he was an American Jazz musician of the highest order. If you are not a jazz fan you may not know the name, but unless you are unable to hear, you've heard the music; through his significant influence on the use of keyboard synthesizers, or through his breakthrough "hits" with Cannonball Adderley and Weather Report, Joe Zawinul was one of the most important musicians and composers of his time.

NPR has a nice piece on Joe with some worthy linkage, and here is the Zawinul website.

I had the great pleasure of meeting Zawinul many years ago, and attended a few of his famous New Year's Eve parties in Malibu. He kicked my ass at Ping Pong, smoked a cigar with me once, and was persuaded to drop a few memorable stories about his amazing musical career. He was, as anyone who ever met him will tell you, a force of nature. He adored his gorgeous wife, Maxine, and his three sons, Erich, Ivan, and Tony, and was, in spite of his irrepressible Alpha Male personality, a kind and generous soul.

One of Zawinul's most important musical associations was with the great bassist and composer, Jaco Pastorius. Jaco joined Weather Report in 1976 and helped propel the band to a level of popularity rarely attained by jazz musicians. The seminal jazz "fusion" recording, Birdland, from 1977's Heavy Weather, featured Jaco's bass as a lead melody instrument, and provided Zawinul with that rarest of jazz achievements - a hit record.

Today is the 20th anniversary of Jaco's death. NPR is on it once again with a great piece, and a link to this You Tube vid of Jaco from September 28, 1978, about a month before I first saw him live in concert in Boston with Weather Report.

Weather Report, at the close of the 70's, was one of those things - like seeing Hendrix in concert, or watching Bobby Orr play hockey live - that if you never had the luck of seeing it in person you can never really grasp the impact that it had. The prime lineup was Zawinul, Wayne Shorter, Jaco, and drummer Peter Erskine. It is just generally accepted within jazz circles that that was the "baddest" band to ever take the stage, and having seen it I can say that I don't ever expect to experience anything like it again.

The Jaco Pastorius website has a nice page up with remembrances from some notable musicians. My favorite comes from Erskine:

And now Jaco Pastorius and Joe Zawinul, the 2 baddest cats in the universe, are reunited.

Here's hoping that the Universe works that way. In case it does, I won't say "rest in peace" to Joe, because if he and Jaco are together again there's gonna be trouble.