The other night I was playing a gig in a tavern with Brother Bill. For our second selection we did Wave, an unusual item for the Great American Bar Band Rock and Roll Songbook. When we finished, a guy at the bar said approvingly Wow, a Jobim tune! Bill asked him what he wanted to hear and the guy said Pithecanthropus Erectus! I had to laugh. After the set I went up and said We dont get a lot of Mingus fans in here. I introduced myself and asked for his name, and he said PhillyJoe. I said Wait a minute... whats your last name? and he said it was Littel. I said Oh, hell, I know you, man, were Face Book friends! And that is how I met Philly Joe Littel for the first time, when in the cosmic random walk of life he showed up at one of my gigs.We talked and laughed straight through the break and the band damn near started without me. His girlfriend asked where I was from and said she was from Chicago, too. Irving Park and Elston! It turns out she was in rock bands in the 60s and used to hang at the Earl of Old Town. The guitar player in one of her bands was Mike Bloomfield, which I guess was before he joined up with Paul Butterfield. I am looking forward to getting together with Philly Joe to do some playing soon. Hes from Philly (duh) and has run some big bands and is a very diverse guitarist. I looked out in the crowd later that night and saw Lisa LaFaro was there, too. I had met her and her boyfriend Danny (from Evergreen Park) at random on a golf course a couple of years ago and we began talking about music. It turns out she is the younger sister of one of my heroes, Bill Evans fabulous bassist Scott LaFaro, who died so tragically young in 1961. I told her of my deep admiration for Scott, a reverence shared by so many, and she told me some great stories about him. She and Danny showed up at one of our steady gigs a month later. They were surprised when they recognized me, and became regulars at our appearances. Lisa would always sit in and sing Dreams by Fleetwood Mac, and she did the other night. After some time went by, Lisa brought her sister Helene LaFaro-Fernandez in to a gig to meet me when she was visiting. Helene wrote a book on her brothers life called Jade Visions: The Life and Music of Scott LaFaro (North Texas Lives of Musician Series), published September 1, 2009. Helene gave later gave me an autographed copy of the book, which I treasure. I was sad to hear that Lisas boyfriend passed away about 5 - 1/2 months ago. He was a wonderful guy, Rock Star handsome, and a big fan of our band. About two weeks after he died, Brother Bill got Lisa up on stage to sing again for the first time, and Lisa is working again now and trying to form a new group. It really is a small world.
Posted on: Sun, 14 Dec 2014 07:48:21 +0000
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