Born on July 7, 1932 in Vienna, Austria, Josef Zawinul started playing music at an early age on an accordion his grandfather gave him. At age 7, he was selected for enrollment in the prestigious Vienna Conservatory, where he studied classical piano, clarinet and violin. In the later stages of World War II, as Vienna came under heavy Allied bombardment, Joe and 28 of his Conservatory classmates were evacuated to a large estate in the Czech Sudetenland. It was there that he heard jazz for the first time when a fellow student performed an impromptu version of “Honeysuckle Rose” on the piano one evening. After the war, Joe returned to Vienna and continued classical piano training while earning money by playing accordion in small combos. He later began performing at clubs on American military bases, where he had access to a Hammond organ. In the 1950s, Zawinul led his own groups and also played in the Austrian All Stars—the first bona fide Austrian jazz combo.
In 1958, noticing an advertisement in one of the few copies of DownBeat magazine to reach Vienna, Joe applied for a scholarship to the Berklee School of Music in Boston. Berklee accepted him, and on January 2, 1959, he boarded a boat for the five-day journey across the Atlantic Ocean. But Joe’s stay at Berklee was brief. Within a few weeks, one of his instructors sent him to fill in as a substitute pianist at a local gig with bassist Gene Cherico and drummer Jake Hanna. Duly impressed, Hanna recommended Joe to the flamboyant trumpeter Maynard Ferguson that very night and the next day, Joe auditioned for Ferguson and landed his first job with a major American jazz band. Shortly thereafter, the Ferguson band needed a saxophonist, and among those auditioning was Wayne Shorter, who was hired in part on Joe’s recommendation. It was the first time the two played together; a portend of things to come.
After eight months with Maynard’s big band, Zawinul toured and recorded with singer Dinah Washington for 19 months, also accompanying the “Queen of the Blues” on the 1959 hit, “What a Diff’rence a Day Makes!” In the fall of 1961, Joe joined the Cannonball Adderley Quintet, one of the highest profile jazz bands at the time, remaining for nearly 10 years while recording his soul-jazz hits “Mercy, Mercy, Mercy,” “Walk Tall” and “Country Preacher” and 50 other compositions under the auspices of Cannon. Joe also participated in the 1969 recording sessions for Miles Davis’ seminal In a Silent Way, the title track being a Zawinul classic. Joe subsequently played on Miles’ Bitches Brew, Big Fun and Live-Evil before forming the jazz supergroup Weather Report at the end of 1970.
Over the course of 15 years and 16 albums with the adventurous fusion group, Zawinul explored the brave new world of synthesizers, widening his musical palette as the technology evolved. In 1986, he released the tour de force one-man synth-band project, Dialects, and the following year collaborated with classical pianist Friedrich Gulda on Music for Two Pianos. Joe formed the world music/fusion ensemble Zawinul Syndicate in 1988 and recorded six albums with them over the next 20 years, the last one being 75th, which was recorded on the maestro’s 75th birthday in 2007 in Lugano, Switzerland. Zawinul continued going out on the road with his Syndicate right until the end, including one poignant reunion with Wayne Shorter at the Veszprem Festival in Hungary on Aug. 2, 2007, when they performed “In a Silent Way” together. Joe died in Vienna on September 11, 2007.
*****
Tracks listed in chronological order:
“Lateef Minor 7th” from The Three Faces of Yusef Lateef (1960, Riverside Records)
Here’s a sly, swinging, harmonically shifting, upbeat, hip and eminently accessible number that Joe penned as a flute feature for the great Lateef. It features a great cello solo by Ron Carter, who also doubles the melody on the head with Yusef’s flute. Bassist Herman Wright and drummer Lex Humphries hold down the groove, while Zawinul paints with harmonic colors in sparse fashion.
“Mercy, Mercy, Mercy” from Cannonball Adderley’s Mercy, Mercy, Mercy!: Live at “The Club” (1967, Capitol)
Raconteur Cannonball sets the tone for this tune (recorded at Capitol’s Hollywood studio with an invited audience and an open bar) with one of his inimitable spoken word intros: “Sometimes we’re not prepared for adversity…We don’t know exactly how to handle it when it comes up…And I have advice for all of us. I got it from my pianist Joe Zawinul, who wrote this tune. And it sounds like what you’re supposed to say when you have that kind of problem. It’s called ‘Mercy, Mercy, Mercy’,” which elicits enthusiastic shouts, hollers, and spontaneous clapping from the audience, like the congregation of a Black church responding to the preacher’s sermon. What follows is a quintessential soul-jazz number with Zawinul on Wurlitzer electric piano, Cannonball on alto sax, Nat Adderley on cornet, Victor Gaskin on bass and Roy McCurdy on drums, all delivering in unhurried and super-hip fashion. At one point as Joe eases into the bridge on his Wurlitzer, you can hear one member of the audience yell out, “Make it sing!” And you have to wonder how a guy from Vienna ever copped such an authentic gospel feel.
“Country Preacher” from the Cannonball Adderley Quintet’s Country Preacher (1969, Capitol)
Another relaxed, gospel-infused soul-jazz nugget from the pen of Vienna-born Zawinul. Recorded live at an unidentified church meeting of the Chicago chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference's Operation Breadbasket, it was written for ‘country preacher’ Jesse Jackson, who gave an inspiring brief speech to open the festivities. Cannonball performs on soprano sax and this track also introduces a new member of the quintet, bassist Walter Booker. The dynamic bridge is joyful, providing a tension and release when they return to the soulful theme, which the audience responds to with rowdy ovations.
“In a Silent Way” from Zawinul (1971, Atlantic)
This is the way that Zawinul had originally envisioned the song when he composed it during a snowfall in his hometown Vienna. Miles Davis had simplified the harmony on his version from 1969’s In a Silent Way but Joe returns all the chords that Miles had removed, resulting in something more classically influenced bucolic-sounding than Miles’ version, though the tonality is indeed ambiguous on both. With Herbie Hancock on electric piano and Zawinul dealing with ring modulator and Echoplex on his electric piano, this piece also features New Orleans saxophonist Earl Turbinton playing the plaintive melody on soprano sax alongside Woody Shaw’s trumpet, George Lewis’ flute and Miroslav Vitous’ bowed bass.
“Boogie Woogie Waltz” from Weather Report’s Sweetnighter (1974, Columbia)
In some ways, this groove-oriented tune set the template for Zawinul’s subsequent rhythmic-conscious compositions with Weather Report (certainly “Birdland”) and his Zawinul Syndicate. This is 13-minutes of sheer kinetic pulse in three against four, with Zawinul breaking out some new toys, including a wah-wah pedal on his Fender Rhodes electric piano and an ARP 360 three-oscillator synthesizer.
“Man in the Green Shirt” from Weather Report’s Tale Spinnin’ (1975, Columbia)
Effervescent from right out of this gate, this invigorating number pairs Zawinul’s melodica on the front line with Wayne Shorter’s soprano sax over a pulsating groove provided by bassist Alphonso Johnson, drummer Ndugu Chancler. A wild ride with a whole lot of Wayne along the way.
“Cannon Ball” from Weather Report’s Black Market (1976, Columbia)
Zawinul’s beautiful ballad tribute to his former employer Cannonball Adderley, who had passed away just four months before this recording. This tune features Zawinul exploring new timbres and textures on a bank of synths and includes strong contributions for Wayne on tenor sax. It also marks the beginning of Jaco Pastorius’ connection with the band. Essentially his audition in the studio, Jaco’s warm, singing fretless baselines on this homage was enough to impress Zawinul and convince both Joe and Wayne to sign this kid up. And the rest is musical history.
“Birdland” from Weather Report’s Heavy Weather (1977, Columbia)
Compared to more esoteric, decidedly non-commercial Zawinul compositions like “Orange Lady” and “Waterfall” from Weather Report’s self-titled 1971 debut, or adventurous fare like “Unknown Soldier” and “The Moors” from 1972’s I Sing The Body Electric, this is blatant pop music. But how could you not include it in a list of Zawinul’s greatest tunes? From Jaco’s false harmonics-picked intro to the gradual buildup to Wayne Shorter’s entry, the driving pulse provided by Alex Acuña and the catchy-hooky sing-along refrain (which Manhattan Transfer would later play up on) this is without a doubt one of Joe’s tightest, grooviest, most infectious pieces in his massive oeuvre.
“A Remark You Made” from Weather Report’s Heavy Weather (1977, Columbia)
Another hauntingly beautiful ballad in the Zawinul canon, this graceful number features glorious contributions from Wayne Shorter on tenor sax along with some of Jaco Pastorius’ most affecting, singing fretless bass lines that he committed to record (outside of Joni Mitchell’s Hejira). With Zawinul’s new Oberheim string synthesizer providing a lush backdrop throughout, he injects some warm, flutey-sounding Oberheim polyphonic synthesizer fusillades at the end of this heartfelt piece.
“Night Passage” from Weather Report’s Night Passage (1980, Columbia)
Opening track from the last great Weather Report album features Joe going toe-to-toe with Wayne’s tenor on buoyant theme, with Jaco bubbling underneath on walking bass and Peter Erskine laying it down forcefully. Midway through the tune turns dark and the tempo gradually increases, with Zawinul’s synth now taking a commanding presence while Jaco plays his ass off while spewing streams of 16th notes all over the place. Joe layers on yet more contrapuntal synth lines as this things builds to a pulse-quickening, powerhouse crescendo. One of the most viscerally swinging pieces in the Weather Report book.
