Jamming for Joy with Jaco

Watching this is bringing me joy.

Jaco Pastorius is one of my favorite musicians; but I never saw him play live before his untimely death in '87. In fact, I've never even seen video of him playing. Until tonight.

I'm watching him play Montreaux '82 with Randy Brecker. Streaming on Netflix, natch.

You might know Jaco as the bass player on several of Joni Mitchell's albums, like Hejira (the one with Coyote on it).

He also played on several of Pat Metheny's best albums like his debut, Bright Size Life, which some say is one of the 100 Greatest Jazz albums of all time.

Jaco was a member of Weather Report with Wayne Shorter and Joe Zawinul - listen to Birdland on Heavy Weather.

Finally check out his masterpiece, Word of Mouth, with an all-star big band of fusion jazz greats, from Herbie Hancock to Toots Thielman and Jack DeJohnette. I rank it with Sergeant Pepper and Uh-huh as one of my personal favorite albums.