The jazz guitar world lost an icon when John Pisano passed away in May of 2024. John was a stellar soloist, an exquisite accompanist, and a consummate gentleman and human being. His generosity and warmth were legendary, and I was fortunate to spend some time with him in 2019. During that year I visited Los Angeles twice for the purpose of hanging with John and playing with him at his legendary and long-running Guitar Night. This was a weekly series where a guest guitarist would join John and his rhythm section for a night of swinging two-guitar dialogue. Past guests included George Van Eps and Ted Greene, and I was overjoyed at the privilege of taking part in this series.
The first meeting (and the first clips in this video) took place at John's house in January of 2019. We got to know each other the way guitarists do, by playing together. We hit it off immediately, and wound up playing for three hours straight. John was in his late 80's and he had way more stamina than I did to keep going! After 30 minutes of playing he asked if I'd like to play Joe Pass's last guitar. I knew this guitar well from the many videos of Joe playing it. A custom-made Gibson, similar to an ES 175, but thinner, and with the neck pickup flush up against the fingerboard. I held this guitar with genuine awe. I never got to see Joe, but have spent countless hours with his music, and here I was playing his guitar in front of the man who played with Joe on "For Django."
John stood there watching as I started playing some solo guitar on "Everything Happens To Me," a terrific Matt Dennis standard. We got to talking about some of the great tunes Matt composed, and that's how this video begins. As an aside, Matt Dennis is one of my favorite composers of popular songs - Angel Eyes, Will You Still Be Mine, Violets For Your Furs and more!
We got back to duo playing in his music room, with me on Joe's Gibson and John on his signature Eastman. I was smart enough to turn my phone's camera on, but not smart enough to have a fully-charged battery. What little footage I captured is shared in this video, a snippet of us playing "If You Could See Me Now." John's spirit that evening was SO INSPIRING. He had a stack of tunes on his music stand (like Kenny Barron's "Voyage," Ivan Lins' "Love Dance," and Dori Caymmi's "Like A Lover") and we just read through them, discussing the changes and the beauty of all of these great tunes. We could have gone on all night, but luckily John's lovely wife Jeanne shooed me home so we could rest up.
The Guitar Night gig together the next day was more fun than I could have imagined, and we made plans for a return visit. I came back out to LA in July of that year, and spent another memorable day at John's house. This time he opened up his enormous filing cabinets for me. He started with the George Van Eps file, with original lessons written in George's hand from a time when John studied with him years earlier. The Joe Pass file had everything from lead sheets and set lists in Joe's hand, to some of his legendary broken picks! Luckily I took a bunch of photos, they will be shared at another time.
The gig the next night was even more fun and free wheeling than the first one, as you can see in the final part of this video. Jamming on the old Ellington rhythm changes tune "Cottontail," it's the fun and the laughs that the four of us shared that warm my heart. This is jazz as I grew up with in Cincinnati with Kenny Poole and Cal Collins, creative, swinging and with a ton of fun and laughter! Bruce Lett on bass and Rod Harbour on drums added so much and we had a great night.
For this second visit, John was nice enough to loan me his prototype Eastman AR371 so I didn't have to travel and risk the airlines abusing my old Tal Farlow. Like the Joe Pass Gibson, John's prototype was an ES 175 style guitar with the neck pickup flush against the fingerboard. This small pickup placement change makes a HUGE difference and sounds better in my view - more lush and warm. It was a joy to play this axe, and John talks a bit about it at the end of the video. He's speaking to the wonderful Barry Zweig, who was in the audience that evening, as well as Ron Escheté and Pat Kelley.
I had plans to return to LA in 2020, but COVID came in and those plans were scratched. "Cottontail" was our last tune together. I'm just so fortunate and thankful to have had the chance to spend some time with this amazing man. For a person of his stature and accomplishment (employers/collaborators include Benny Goodman, Peggy Lee, Joe Pass, Billy Bean, Chico Hamilton, Herb Alpert) he could not have been a nicer, more giving and warm person. Hope you enjoy this slice of our time together!
1. Spoken Introduction 00:00
2. Solo guitar Matt Dennis tunes on Joe Pass Custom Gibson 03:53
3. Duo with John Pisano playing "If You Could See Me Now" on Joe Pass Custom Gibson 04:57
4. "Cottontail" on 7/2/19 at Guitar Night 07:40
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