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Mercury rising
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rock revisited Weather Report succeeded from gypsy strains to electric jazz
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Steady Josef Zawinul with Wayne Shorter were the only constants
Between its inception in 1970 and its 1987 breakup, Weather Report was the premier electric jazz ensemble. Born of the Miles Davis groups of the late ’60s that also spawned many other fusion bands,
Rock, jazz and classical
Weather Report was one of the very few groups that managed to win commercial success while going its own way. The band’s music had the drive of rock, the harmonic sophistication of jazz, the formal ingenuity of classical music and hints of Brazilian, African, and Asian traditions.
Global carnival
The best-known Weather Report tunes, such as Birdland, sounded like electrified global carnivals.
Josef Zawinul and Wayne Shorter were the only constants of Weather Report. The first music Zawinul heard and played was the Gypsy folk music of his family and his first instrument was the accordion.
Around the age of 12, when he was living in Nazi-occupied Vienna, he began studying classical piano.
In the post-War years, he played jazz at U.S. Army clubs and Viennense cabarets.
On the basis of a record he cut in a local studio, he was awarded a scholarship to study at the Berkley College of Music in Boston, and he arrived in the United States in 1959.
Three weeks after classes began, he dropped out and went to New York, where he met Shorter, who had been in the city since 1951.
When he entered New York University to study music after graduating, he played tenor saxophone with Horace Silver before joining Maynard Ferguson’s band.
Miles Davis quintet
Through Shorter, Zawinul began playing with Ferguson as well. Shorter joined the Miles Davis quintet (with keyboardist Herbie Hancock, drummer Tony Williams, and bassist Ron Carter).
In 1964 Shorter’s work with Davis and on a half dozen solo albums had established him as one of the outstanding saxophonists of the John Coltrane School although he later tempered the Coltrane influence with his own lyricism.
Heavy weather was Weather Report’s most popular cut. It sold over 500,000 copies-the first gold album for the group.
A. GEORGE ANTONY
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