Song:The Song Is You
Album:Virtuoso
After many years as a sideman in the Los Angeles jazz scene, the 1972 album Virtuoso made Joe Pass famous and established his legacy as a guitar icon. His technique is still widely admired and copied by guitarists today. He was born Joseph Anthony Jacobi Passalaqua Jan. 13, 1929 in New Brunswick, NJ and grew up in Johnstown, PA. He was inspired to play guitar by Gene Autry and was given a guitar on his ninth birthday. By age 14, he was playing local gigs with Tony Pastor and Charlie Barnet. He moved to New York and fell victim to drug abuse and landed in jail for several years. After two years at the Synanon drug rehab program, he was recovered and moved to Los Angeles in 1962. He recorded some albums for Pacific Jazz. But mostly he played sessions and also worked on a lot of TV and film music. Pass played a regular club gig with guitarist Herb Ellis. This resulted in the very first album on Concord Jazz in the early 70s and most fans first noticed Pass on that album. He also wrote guitar instructional books. Former Verve Records owner Norman Granz was starting his new label Pablo and Virtuoso was Pass' first album in 1972. The album was the first of several solo guitar albums by Pass and it became the best selling album in the Pablo catalog. The Song Is You was written by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II for the 1932 Broadway musical Music In The Air. The song isn't in the 1934 film version of the musical. The best known version of The Song Is You was recorded by Frank Sinatra on his 1958 album Come Dance With Me! but it has also been recorded by Dave Brubeck, Bing Crosby, June Christy and Art Blakey among others. Concord Jazz released a remastered edition of Virtuoso in 2010. Pass recorded many albums with other Pablo artists including six with Ella Fitzgerald. He died of liver cancer on May 23, 1994 at age 65. Joe Pass is one of the great guitarists of the 20th century and is still a big influence on today's musicians. Here's Joe Pass performing The Song Is You on the Las Angeles TV show Frankly Jazz 1962.
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