TABLE OF CONTENTS Jaco Pastorius – Jaco Pastorius Donna Lee…………………………………………………………………………………………… 1 Come On, Come Over………………..……………………………………………………………… 4 Continuum……………………………………………..…………………………………………….. 6 Portrait of Tracy……………………………………………….………………….…………………. 10 Opus Pocus……………………..……………………………………………………………………. 12 Pat Metheny – Bright Size Life Bright Size Life…………………………….………………………………………………………... 16 Joni Mitchell – Hejira Black Crow…………………………..………………………………………………………………. 20 Weather Report – Black Market Cannonball………………………………….……………………………………………………….. 24 Barbary Coast….………………………………..…………………….……………………………... 27 Weather Report – Heavy Weather Birdland…………………..………………………………………………………………………….. 28 A Remark You Made…………….………………………………………………………………….. 32 Teen Town………………………..………………………………………………………………….. 34 Palladium…………………………..………………………………………………………………… 35 Havona…………………………………….………………………………………………………… 38 Weather Report – Mr. Gone River People………………………………………….……………………………………………… 44 Mr. Gone……………………………………………….……………………………………………. 46 Punk Jazz…………………………………………………..………………………………………… 47 And Then…………………………………………………..………………………………………… 50 Joni Mitchell – Mingus The Dry Cleaner from Des Moines………………………..………………………………………… 52 Weather Report – Night Passage Port of Entry……………………………………..…………………………………………………... 56 Jaco Pastorius – Word of Mouth Crisis………………………………………………..………………………………………………...60 Chromatic Fantasy……………………………………..…………………………………………….. 61 Weather Report – Weather Report Dara Factor Two…………………………………………..…………………………………………. 62 Jaco Pastorius – Invitation (a.k.a. Twins) Amerika………………………………………………………..…………………………………….. 66 Soul Intro / The Chicken…………………………………………….………………………………. 68 Bireli Lagrene & Jaco Pastorius – Stuttgart Aria Stuttgart Aria I………………………………………………..……………………………………… 72 Performance Notes……………………………………………………………………………………………..77 Discography…………………………………………………………………………………………………… 80
PERFORMANCE NOTES DONNA LEE The thing to watch on this one is the way that Jaco switches from straight eighth notes to swing. At a fast tempo like this, the difference between the two is somewhat slight, but the shifting back and forth is definitely there. Don’t let the time changes throw you off. I’m sure Jaco wasn’t thinking consciously in terms of changing time signatures like at the bottom of page 1, he was probably just playing the music he heard it in his head. If you get hung up on trying to read some of the more difficult rhythmic phrases, just try to hear them and play it by ear instead of reading them. COME ON, COME OVER Listening to this song was like a revelation for me – it was the first time I was really introduced to the genius of how muted notes can funkify a bass line. Probably the hardest part then, is in getting a perfectly steady stream of notes, with a perfect rhythm clipping along regardless of whether your fret-hand is holding down the note or lifting up just a bit to mute the note. This is a perfect spot to take the written music and play it alongside a metronome, concentrating on a perfect, steady stream of notes clicking along at a slow, steady rhythm before attempting to take the whole thing up to the speed of the recording with Jaco cruising full-steam ahead. The intro lick may throw you off a bit with the quick slide from F to F# and back, that three note slide is so fast that it can be mistaken for a single note with vibrato. It’s a unison lick with the keyboards, however, so if you listen to the keyboards playing the same three notes without the fretless slides, you’ll be able to hear the rhythm of those notes a bit more distinctly. This is a common Jaco blues lick which you’ll hear him revisit in other songs as well. CONTINUUM Jaco used his picking-hand thumb as an anchor, anchoring down on the string beneath the string being picked. With the thumb anchoring, the picking finger is pulled towards the thumb and through the string being played. This explains how the open E note is cut off at the beginning of most of the new phrases. He’s not coming over and stopping the open E note with his fret-hand, the muted open E notes happen naturally as the thumb anchors on E at the exact moment that the new phrase begins with notes being picked on the A-string. At the end of page 7 and the top of page 8, there are some fourth licks. The fourths are played on the same string while the unisons are played on adjacent strings. It takes a bit of a stretch, and it’s a little strange at first when you play the same note twice on two separate strings, but it makes for an innovative and very cool riff. Looking at the last six notes of page 7 and the first three notes of page 8: 16-G, 11-G, 16-D, 11-D, 11-A, 11-A, 16-E, 11-E, 0-E. PORTRAIT OF TRACY The F# harmonic in bar 4 and subsequent bars is played by fretting the 2nd fret A-string with your index finger and while holding that down reaching over with your pinky and lightly touching the string just before the sixth fret bar. While still fretting with the index and lightly touching with the pinky, pick the note with your picking-hand. What you’re effectively doing here is creating a capo at the 2nd fret and then getting the harmonic at the 3.8 fret past that capo. This is a variation on artificial harmonics, which is discussed more thoroughly in the notes to Birdland. This example differs from the artificial harmonics in Birdland, Port of Entry and Amerika in that it’s the fret-hand that does double duty of holding down the fretted note and touching for the harmonic while in the other songs, it’s the picking-hand that both touches for the harmonic and picks the notes as well. OPUS POCUS The minor 2nd double-stops are played with your index at 10-G and your pinky at 14-D. I left out the vibrato marks because everything longer than an eighth-note gets vibrato. BARBARY COAST Some of the muted notes ring out slightly as harmonics, but I made it a rule to only write the notes out as harmonics when they were obvious or obviously intended. I think it’s easier to read this way and also truer to the actual intention.
BIRDLAND The harmonics with the 8va sign are played in the following manner. First, fret the note with your left hand as if there was no 8va sign. Thus, the first note will be fretted at 14-G. Now, with your picking-hand thumb, lightly touch the string at the point exactly halfway between where the note is fretted and the bridge. In other words, you’re cutting the vibrating length of the string in half with your thumb. While still fretting the note and lightly touching the string with your picking-hand thumb, use the picking-hand index finger to pick the string, using what Jaco called a “firm touch”. To make the harmonic ring out, the thumb placement must be exact and it also helps to have newer strings. What you are doing in essence, is getting the 12th fret harmonic from a fretted note instead of an open string. This is known as an artificial harmonic, as opposed to the natural harmonics of the open strings. Just as you can get a G harmonic by combining the open string G with a light touch at the 12th fret, you can get a G# harmonic by combining the 1st fret G# with a light touch at the 13th fret. Just like the 12th fret harmonic of open G is 12 frets above the open G, the 12th fret harmonic of the 14th fret A is 12 frets above it at the 26th fret, but you may have to visualize where that 26th fret is if your bass doesn’t have that many frets. Keep in mind that the distance between the frets gets smaller and smaller as you go up the neck. As you change the fretted note, the thumb must move accordingly, always remaining 12 frets above the fretted notes. Since the spot 12 frets above is always half the distance of the vibrating string, you may find it easier to visualize the spot your thumb must touch as being halfway between the fretted note and the bridge. And when you think you have that down, you’re ready to tackle the 15a section. This time you’ll be getting 24th fret harmonics the fretted notes still the same, but now the thumb moving among the really small imaginary frets, lightly touching the spot ¾ of the way between fretted note and bridge. The A notes in the intro are bent, not slid, to Bb. Get the harmonic as explained above, then bend the string with the left hand and as soon as you bend up the half-step, mute the string with your right hand. On the 7th measure on page 29 makes, Jaco uses the open G to make that quick shift up to the double-stop. A REMARK YOU MADE Don’t let all the 32nd note slides and hammer-ons worry you. At this tempo, they’re not fast at all. Try reading them, and if that doesn’t work, just try playing it by ear. HAVONA I know a lot of you are going to think that I messed up on the phrase that ends each chorus, but contrary to popular opinion, the bass is not in unison with the keyboards. This is not to say that you can’t play the line in unison, but I did take the note-for-note thing very literally. Use the open G on the triplets at the end of the bass solo on page 40. RIVER PEOPLE There are three separate bass tracks on this song. The low and high octaves are panned on separate tracks so that they bounce between the speakers. The parts diverge a bit on the coda, so I tried to consolidate them into one part. MR. GONE There is no variation in the bass part, so it’s safe to say that this one is sequenced. Zawinul wrote the song, so this might be his bass part, but it does have the fretless slide at the beginning and the sound of the bass and the line itself sound like something Jaco might have come up with, so I thought it wouldn’t hurt to include this one. PUNK JAZZ When the open G is accidentally struck at the 5th line, 3rd measure, you may want to leave it out, so I put it in parenthesis. It momentarily rattled his lock with the drums, so I wrote the rhythm of the next phrase to what it was closest to. The first note after is actually ahead of the fourth beat, but by the last note of the phrase, he’s already back on. Anyway, it sounds cool because it’s Jaco. The half-time section is played very freely, so don’t try to read it too literally. AND THEN Those percussive slides are fun and easy to play. Put your hand parallel to the face of the neck, whack the bottom of your palm against the top of the fretboard and slide that palm down the strings. As for the three really staccato notes, just slap all four strings with your open hand.
THE DRY CLEANER FROM DES MOINES The licks that start and end the song are played in the following manner: play the first two notes with your index finger at 9-A. Hold the index finger down as the ring finger plays the third note, which will be staccato as you lift up the ring and slide the index up a half-step. The ring finger is now in position for the fourth note. The ring finger played both the third and fourth notes so the middle finger would be available for the fifth note. The sixth note will be the index finger again, still held down from the last slide. That completes the six note pattern, now slide the index up a half-step to the next triplet. The six-note pattern is played three times, the final six notes of the lick are played in a normal fashion. PORT OF ENTRY The artificial harmonics use the same technique as in Birdland. These ones aren’t as high up, however, and you will be able to line your thumb up with the fret bars. The first note will be fretted at 7-G and thumbed at 19-G. CRISIS Good luck getting this one up to speed. If you didn’t know it, you’ll probably wish I hadn’t told you, but this is a sequenced bass line. I included it because it’s interesting compositionally and also because you’re going to have a real fun time trying to get this one up to speed. CHROMATIC FANTASY Some of the rhythms were a bit awkward to write. Please, no angry letters about the 4 2/3 over 8 time. What else could I do? It’s accented so that there’s no doubt that it’s a group of triplets and then one’s kicked out, and then another group of triplets. I wrote this one as music notation allows. It’s going to take a lot of listening as well as reading to get this one down. DARA FACTOR TWO Whatever you do, don’t ignore those staccato marks!!! All of the funk in this bass line is deep down in the way Jaco snaps off those short notes, so make sure you’re paying attention to those little staccato dots above and below the note heads. As in all of your practicing, it will benefit you the most if you start out at a tempo where you’re in control and playing cleanly with the proper articulation (in this case, focusing on the staccato notes) and then work your way up to speed from that. STUTTGART ARIA I At the heart of Jaco’s playing was Jaco the R & B man. This one is a great example of Jaco groovin’ hard, keeping it strong and simple. It’s very important to read the rests. A nice technique you can use is to attack the rests, using your picking fingers to land ahead of the next note, coming down on the rests to mute the strings. This is often a much better method of getting the rests than lifting the fret-hand off the string every time.
Props go out to Jim Flood for helping correct a couple notes on Teen Town. In advertising this book as “note-fornote”, please realize that while perfection is rarely attained, it’s something I always strive for. If you think you’ve found a suspect note or rhythm, or if you’d just like to send a shout out and say hello, you can reach me at:
[email protected].
A JACO DISCOGRAPHY 1974 Little Beaver - Party Down (listed on the original LP as Nelson (Jocko) Padron, one track: I Can Dig It Baby) Pastorius, Metheny, Ditmas, Bley - Jaco 1975 Ira Sullivan - Ira Sullivan (Jaco plays acoustic bass on one track: Portrait of Sal La Rosa) Pat Metheny - Bright Size Life 1976 Jaco Pastorius - Jaco Pastorius Al Di Meola - Land of the Midnight Sun (one track: Suite- Golden Dawn) Ian Hunter - All-American Alien Boy (all but one track) Joni Mitchell - Hejira (four tracks: Coyote, Hejira, Black Crow, Refuge In The Roads) Weather Report - Black Market (two tracks: Cannonball, Barbary Coast) Albert Mangelsdorff - Trilogue: Live at the Berlin Jazz Days (five tracks: Trilogue, Zores Mores, Foreign Fun, Accidental Meeting, Ant Steps On An Elephant' s Toe.) 1977 Airto - I' m Fine, How Are You? (Jaco plays bass and percussion on one track: Nativity) Joni Mitchell - Don Juan' s Reckless Daughter Weather Report - Heavy Weather 1978 Flora Purim - Everyday Everynight (four tracks: The Hope, Five-Four, Las Olas, Blues Ballad) Herbie Hancock - Sunlight (one track: Good Question) Tom Scott - Intimate Strangers (Jaco plays on one brief interlude: Lost Inside The Love Of You (Reprise)) Weather Report - Mr. Gone 1979 Havana Jam I & II - (two tracks w/Weather Report: Black Market, Teen Town, three tracks with Trio of Doom: Dark Prince, Para Oriente, Continuum) Joni Mitchell - Mingus Manolo Badrena - Manolo (one track: The One Thing) Michel Colombier - Michel Colombier (8 of 11 tracks: Sunday, Dreamland, Overture, Bird Song, Layas, Do It, Spring, The Dancing Bull) Michel Polnareff - Coucou Me Revoilou (one track: Une Simple Melodie) Weather Report - 8:30 (the double CD has all the tracks, a re-release on a single CD is missing Scarlet Woman) Joni Mitchell - Shadows and Light (original CD release was a single CD missing 3 tracks from the double LP, also now available as an import on double-CD and on DVD video, each featuring the entire concert. See below.) Herbie Hancock - Mr. Hands (one track: 4 A.M.) 1980 Weather Report - Night Passage 1981 Jaco Pastorius - Word of Mouth Jaco Pastorius - The Birthday Concert 1982 Jazz At The Opera House (Jaco is not mentioned in the credits of the original LP version, but plays on Footprints) Bob Mintzer - Source (Jaco plays on two tracks: I Don' t Know, Spiral) Weather Report - Weather Report
Jaco Pastorius - Twins I & II (released in U.S. as “Invitation” - a single CD taken from the full 2 disc release) Jaco Pastorius - Holiday for Pans (bootleg, also released as 3 CD box set with alternate takes and incomplete tracks) 1984 Randy Bernsen - Music for Planets, People & Washing Machines (two tracks: Olde Hats, Windsong) Essence featuring Jaco Pastorius - Last Flight 1985 Brian Melvin - Brian Melvin' s Night Food Deadline - Down by Law (part of one track: Makossa Rock) Pastorius - Live in New York City, Vol. 1 – 7 (seven separate CDs of often dubious quality) Jimmy Cliff - Cliff Hanger (one track: Brown Eyes) Francisco Mondragon Rio featuring Jaco Pastorius - Natural (bootleg, three of four tracks: Phlegeton, The Foreigner, Leap Frog) 1986 Brian Melvin - Jazz Street Brian Melvin' s Nightfood - Nightfood (five tracks: Fever, Dania, Mercy Mercy Mercy, Bahama Mama, Mile' s Mode) Brian Melvin Trio - Standards Zone Bireli Lagrene & Jaco Pastorius - Stuttgart Aria Mike Stern - Upside Downside (one track: Mood Swings) Randy Bernsen - Mo'Wasabi (three tracks: Swing Thing, Jac Attack/Dover Days, Califoric) Randy Bernsen - Paradise Citizens (one CD-only bonus track: "Paradise Citizens") 1986 Japanese Bootlegs (unauthorized, all released under Jaco’s name) Broadway Blues, Honestly Solos Live, Live in Italy, PDB, Golden Roads (single song, 30 min. bass and keyboard improv.), A Good Stitch For Golden Roads (30 min. keyboard improv., no bass), Heavy' n Jazz, Heavy' n Jazz & Stuttgart Aria, Broadway Blues & Teresa, Live in Italy & Honestly Compilations: Punk Jazz: The Jaco Pastorius Anthology (two CD Warner/Rhino 2003 release) Portrait of Jaco - the early years (two CD 2003 Holiday Park Records) Weather Report - Live & Unreleased Jaco Pastorius - Rare Collection Jaco Pastorius - Jams (Rare Collection)
A little suggestion as to where you might want to start when building your Jaco CD collection: you can’t go wrong with the recordings from 1982 and earlier, so stick with those. The real standouts are Jaco’s solo albums, the albums with Weather Report, the Joni Mitchell albums and Pat Metheny’s Bright Size Life. Most of the recordings from ’84 – ’86 should probably be avoided by all but the most compulsive of Jaco collectors, many are cheap cassette recordings and, sad to say it, but Jaco’s really a shadow of his former self. Holiday for Pans is even rumored to be a counterfeit bassist laying down the tracks in a Jaco-esque style. You’ll notice a lot of albums where Jaco was only on a couple tracks, making it an expensive proposition to purchase all those CDs for only one or two Jaco songs. The Warner/Rhino “Punk Jazz” double-CD and Polydor’s “Rare Collection” CDs both do a nice job of compiling a lot of those one-off Jaco tracks from different albums. A great source that I highly recommend is www.audiophileimports.com, where you can find almost all of the CDs listed here. While you’re at the website, make sure you check out two DVDs that are must-haves for any true Jaco fan – Jaco playing in concert with Weather Report on the “Young and Fine” DVD and Jaco playing with in concert with Joni Mitchell on “Shadows and Light.” Seeing Jaco playing live with each of these two incredible bands is nothing short of a life-changing event.
