By Bob Weinberg
In a grassy strip by the railroad tracks, a blue-hued portrait of Jaco Pastorius radiates intense energy. The mural, encompassing the eastern wall of a squat, rectangular community center in Oakland Park, was painted in 2010 by Bill Savarese in the style of Vincent van Gogh’s Starry Night. Pastorius, who grew up nearby, is immortalized in a signature stance, his electric bass held vertically, his gaze turned toward the swirling cosmos. An accompanying mural portrait on the southern wall is equally powerful.
The murals are a long overdue tribute to Pastorius, as is the small park at Northeast 38th Street and Dixie Highway that bears his name. The bassist’s meteoric rise and plummet have framed the legend as one of South Florida’s most influential musical figures. Like van Gogh, Pastorius flamed out early under tragic circumstances, leaving behind a paradigm-shifting body of work as a sideman (to Pat Metheny, Joni Mitchell and Weather Report) and as a solo artist. His liquid tone and use of harmonics, not to mention his jaw-dropping virtuosity and sweeping compositions, set the bar at a dizzying height in the contemporary jazz and pop worlds.
In the process, Pastorius transformed the role of the bassist from sideman to main attraction. Rather than just keeping time, he was playing melodic lines, defining songs as much as providing their rhythmic structures. His quicksilver sound and technique—plus his outsized charisma—propelled him to rock-star status, paving the way for show-stopping bassists such as Victor Wooten and Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Flea.
GRAND INFLUENCE: Jaco Pastorius gave way to a legion of today’s bassists, including Victor Wooten and Flea, demonstrating that bass playing does not have to be confined to the sidelines.
And yet, 20 years passed—following his death in 1987—before Oakland Park officials agreed to name a park for a man whose brilliance was shadowed by mental illness and substance abuse. Even the murals were sources of contention. The original artwork, near to completion in 2009, was whitewashed and replaced with Savarese’s portraits. Such controversies are common in the battle over Pastorius’s legacy, his music and likeness scrimmaged over by warring family, business and community factions.
But through it all, the music speaks most eloquently. Pastorius’s sound is recognized throughout the world, as is his legend, evoked by a single name—Jaco. And his roots are firmly planted in multicultural South Florida soil.
Pastorius was born in Norristown, Pa., in December 1951. But his musical coming of age begins in Oakland Park, where his family relocated in 1959. His dad, Jack, was a drummer. And so was Jaco, until he injured his wrist playing football at age 13. He left behind the drums, but not his desire to make music. When a local band, the Las Olas Brass, needed a replacement for its bassist, Pastorius bought a $15 pawnshop instrument and learned to play well enough to land the gig.
Trumpeter Melton Mustafa, who heads the jazz department at Florida Memorial University and was four years senior to Pastorius, remembers the lanky teen coming to his house in Liberty City to practice. “He always used to tell audiences that I was his teacher,” says Mustafa, who dismisses the notion. “And he was serious about it, because I guess the relationship that we had was good.” Pastorius later hired the trumpeter as part of his touring Word of Mouth ensemble. Although he had no inkling of the impact his friend would have upon the music world, Mustafa recognized Pastorius as someone special. “Jaco was always creative and wanted to do things in a way that was outside of the norm,” he says. “You know, if the line goes up, he would play it going down, at twice the tempo. He was a fascinating person. He was an extraordinary man.”
Pastorius’s talent was matched by an unshakable confidence, earning him a spot in soul man Wayne Cochran’s hard-grooving C.C. Riders. During that time, Pastorius realized that the frets on his bass were slowing him down. Legend has it that he pulled out the frets, sanded down and epoxyed the fingerboard, and took the next step in launching his signature sound.
A LEGEND LIVES: The newest album featuring Jaco Pastorius’s sounds, Modern American Music…Period! The Criteria Sessions, was recently released in conjuction with a documentary on the bassist.
Before it was near consensus, Pastorius was already referring to himself as the “world’s greatest bassist.” This didn’t endear him to everyone, but certainly musicians took notice. Veteran jazz trumpeter and reed player Ira Sullivan welcomed him into his band, playing gigs at places such as the Lion’s Share in North Miami. Peter Graves put Pastorius to work with his big band at Fort Lauderdale’s Bachelors III. And modern jazz pianist Paul Bley brought Pastorius into the studio, where he made his recording debut in 1974 alongside another rising star, Pat Metheny.
For a brief time, Pastorius and Metheny were faculty mates at the University of Miami. “He was a hero by then,” recalls bassist, educator and jazz radio host Bob “Be-Bob” Grabowski, a freshman music student at UM in 1974. “Everybody here knew who he was and who he would be—we had no doubts about that. And a sweet cat…He’d play music with anybody. Jaco was wide open, man. If there was a reggae band, he would sit in with them; he’d play with an old guy on the street corner with an accordion. It was all music to him.” He also strongly urged Be-Bob to give up the electric bass and embrace the upright. “It’s been upright ever since,” Grabowski says.
South Florida bassist and club owner Carl “Kilmo” Pacillo was another up-and-coming bassist whose life was changed by Pastorius. He was 15 years old when he heard Pastorius at Pirates World in Dania Beach. “I remember going, ‘Man, I can really hear every note the bass player’s playing,’” Pacillo says. “Not just the low-end, but high-end treble, mids, punching notes. You could hear the definition of the groove and the time and the feel.”
Years later, Pacillo, who was studying with instructor Vince Bredice, ran into Pastorius in the men’s room at the Village Zoo on Fort Lauderdale beach. Seizing hold of the opportunity—as well as the much larger Pastorius, who ignored him at first–—Pacillo asked him about a particular technique Bredice was urging him to master, one that Pastorius didn’t seem to employ. “And he said, ‘Oh, no, you have to be able to do that,’” Pacillo recalls. “So, I guess his message was [that] great technique and great foundation to execute your ideas is the only way to get your ideas out.”
America’s Bicentennial year, 1976, was a breakthrough year for Pastorius. His stardom shone even brighter as his ringing tones were heard on Metheny’s debut LP, Bright Size Life, and Joni Mitchell’s album, Hejira. He also brazened his way into the bass slot of the fusion superband Weather Report, winning over the group’s legendary leaders Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter, who needed a replacement for the departing Alphonso Johnson.
That same year, Pastorius released his eponymous debut recording. Its impact proved profound. From the opening solo bass track, a swift and melodic romp through Charlie Parker’s “Donna Lee,” he backed up every boast he’d ever made. And compositions such as “Continuum” and “Portrait of Tracy,” the latter of which he wrote for his wife, showed that he was about far more than just his blazing chops.
Working at WBUS-FM at the time, Ed Bell conducted the first on-air interview with Pastorius, who turned up with an entourage. “Jaco and his crew stayed with me for a couple of hours,” says Bell, a longtime host and producer at WLRN-FM. “We just kind of went through the release cut by cut. He was very assertive and egotistical and very sure of himself—‘I’m the greatest bass player in the world!’ And it was true. The music was quite unique, and it still is in so many ways.”
AND THE BEAT GOES ON: Those who knew Pastorius loved his kind nature. Tragically, his life was cut short at 35 years old, but his music still continues.
Several years later, Pastorius got in touch with Bell when he needed to complete community service hours for a legal infraction. Bell arranged for Pastorius to perform a concert at the Young Circle bandshell in Hollywood. He observed the bassist as he prepared for the show backstage. “He had his bass strapped on, and of course, he had a wireless hookup,” Bell remembers. “And he sent one of his guys out to crank up his bass amp. He was sitting in a dressing room, and he said, ‘Dig this.’ And he played a few notes, and you could hear a roar of 2,000 to 3,000 people. I get goose bumps thinkin’ about it.”
Pastorius’s fame spread like brushfire and proved to be just as destructive. A gifted athlete, he hardly ever drank beer in his younger days. But the prevalence of drugs in the music world overcame his reticence. Narcotics heightened his bipolar disorder, and his behavior grew more extreme.
Of course, there were ups and downs. By the summer of 1979, Pastorius had divorced his first wife, Tracy, and married Ingrid Hornmüller. The pair moved into a cozy house in Deerfield Beach. Their twins, Felix and Julius, were born in 1982. Pastorius still remained close with John and Mary, his children with Tracy. However, his mental health deteriorated, and he and Ingrid divorced in 1985. Medication helped, but dulled his senses. “We would see him at the Musicians Exchange, and he would be in a very relaxed, prescription-medicated mode, I’d guess,” Bell remembers. “It seemed like his fire had been taken away.”
Pastorius continued to wrestle with his demons, but they finally overcame him. In September 1987, he visited an after-hours club in Wilton Manors. He became involved in an altercation with a bouncer—who happened to be a martial arts expert—and suffered blows that sunk him into a coma. He died Sept. 21, 1987, at age 35.
Felix and Julius held tight to their father’s legacy. Ingrid homeschooled them at the Deerfield house, a creative and nurturing environment filled with musical instruments and memorabilia. Felix started performing professionally on bass as a teenager, and Julius took up drums. The twins formed the funky fusion Way of the Groove and became a mainstay at Pacillo’s nightclub, Alligator Alley, not far from where their father grew up. Ingrid, their No. 1 fan, died in 2011.
Felix has been touring with the contemporary supergroup Yellowjackets, led by his dad’s colleague, saxophonist Bob Mintzer. Last year, he recorded his first album with the band, A Rise in the Road, taking over for longtime bassist Jimmy Haslip. Meanwhile, Julius still resides in Deerfield Beach, performing with another Pastorius friend, guitarist Randy Bernsen, in his Snow Leopard band. Rounded out by bassist Brad Adam Miller and keyboardist Colin James, the group appears regularly at 33rd Street Wine Bar in Fort Lauderdale.
Pastorius’s former bandleader, Peter Graves, also continues to celebrate his legacy. The Sanibel Island fixture has helmed two brilliant albums of the bassist’s music with the Jaco Pastorius Big Band. Stocked with Pastorius’s bandmates such as Bernsen, trumpeter Randy Brecker and drummer Peter Erskine, the group has performed on stages from Sunrise to Tokyo. A third CD is in the works.
More than 25 years after his death, interest in Pastorius remains strong. A historical new release, Modern American Music…Period! The Criteria Sessions, presents early versions of songs from Pastorius’s 1976 debut recording, as he worked them out at Criteria Studios in North Miami. The album was released on CD and vinyl for Record Store Day, in conjunction with a new documentary about him.
And certainly, Pastorius’s influence remains indelible. Many of today’s jazz elite still attest to his importance, including bass virtuoso Marcus Miller. “I know I was pretty much influenced by him to the point where I had to consciously stop playing like him,” Miller relates. “I had to consciously search for my own voice, because I didn’t want my whole life spent being a clone. That’s the sign of [an influence]—either you’re playing like him, or you’re making an effort not to play like him. But either way, he’s there.”
Pacillo says, “What Jaco impressed upon me, and what I think a lot of people miss, is the groove and the feel and the soul. Nothing wrong with playing a million notes if they say something, but playing a lot of notes for the sake of it was something he eschewed totally.”
Bell reflects as well. “It was a modern sound,” he says. “He had a great rock ‘n’ roll soul, he loved American music, jazz, blues and R&B, and he put it all into his music. Plus Caribbean influences, South Florida influences…And I’m so glad that he’s being lauded by new generations of musicians, because he had a lot to say and a lot to deliver, and his legacy goes on.”
Jaco Pastorius’s discography
Solo Albums
Jaco Pastorius, 1976
Word of Mouth, 1981
Birthday Concert, 1981
Twins I & II (Live), 1982
Invitation (Live), 1983
Broadway Blues, 1986
Honestly Solo Live, 1986
Live In Italy, 1986
Albums with Joni Mitchell
Hejira, 1976
Don Juan’s
Reckless Daughter, 1977
Mingus, 1979
Shadows & Light (Live), 1980
Albums with Weather Report
Black Market, 1976
Heavy Weather, 1977
Mr. Gone, 1978
8:30 (Live), 1979
Night Passage, 1980
Weather Report, 1982
Album with Pat Metheny
Bright Size Life, 1976
Originally appeared in the Spring 2014 issue.
