Cracks In Sidewalks

Having lived with a jazz guitarist for many years, there was a time I could tell you about all these obscure musicians and their styles, but I couldn’t tell you about the persons who were topping the charts of Billboard.  Guitar and jazz bands were in our house all the time and the music was non-stop.  After a while some of it rubbed off and I’ll always be grateful for all that I learned about music and musicians during those years.

My boyfriend who studied as a teenager with LA guitar guru Ted Greene, played guitar like a piano, a thumb style like Wes Montgomery, but with big chords like Lenny Breau and another favorite (both happen to be Canadian), Ed Bickert who played with Paul Desmond’s band.  He and his guitar friends would transcribe and study every note these players played.  And if they weren’t gigging that night, they’d be up til 3 or 4 in the morning until they learned the part they had been working on so hard that day.  And if  I wasn’t up with my boyfriend, whether I wanted to or not I would hear the music come floating through our bedroom door.  Another guitar player friend of ours wrote for Guitar Player Magazine and had the opportunity to visit with Lenny Breau on a number of occasions for articles he would later publish.  We listened attentively to his stories each time he would go to LA and return. From what I gathered Lenny was a great guy, but he lived a hard life.

A well-known studio guitarist in Canada he had his own show on CBS and regularly recorded for CBS Radio and CBS Television in Canada.  But he got his early start as a young boy playing with his musician parents who performed country and western music, and by the age of 15 he made his first professional recording entitled, “Boy Wonder.”  When Breau was about 16 his family moved to Winnipeg and the family band with Lenny as lead guitarist played around the province.  It wasn’t until a couple of years later that the young guitar player began to seek out local jazz musicians and began performing on his own without his folks.  From there the guitarist moved to Toronto where he formed the jazz band, “Three.”  “Three” developed a reputation and following playing in Canada and the U.S. and performed on national television shows such as the “Jackie Gleason” and “Joey Bishop” shows.  Breau’s styled developed.  Greatly influenced by Chet Atkins and Merle Travis his style not only incorporated a Bill Evan’s jazz piano feel, but also his many other influences including his country roots, classical music, and even flamenco and Indian.  Eventually his music found its way to one of his idols, Chet Atkins, and the two became friends.  At this point Lenny started to record for RCA and released his first two LP’s “Guitar Sounds From Lenny Breau,” and “The Velvet Touch of Lenny Breau.”

In the mid 70’s Breau moved to the U.S. and lived between Nashville, NYC, and the state where he was born, Maine.  In the early 80’s he moved to LA where he lived until his death in 1984.  The day he died I remember getting the phone-call from our friend so upset and sad on the other end of the line.  Lenny Breau who had had a serious drug problem all his life but had managed to stay clean the last year of his life, was found strangled in the swimming pool of the apartment complex where he lived.  The case has never been solved.
To view a short clip of the “Genius of Lenny Breau Excerpt 1,” either click on the link below or cut and paste it into your browser.  If you have any interest in jazz guitar it is very much worth viewing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9SvTtaQLC4&feature=related

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 9th, 2008 at 5:54 am and is filed under Daily Tune On. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.