hypersongs
?

Weather Report

A New York jazz fusion band founded by Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter, whose 1977 album Heavy Weather, with Jaco Pastorius on bass, produced "Birdland".

Origin
New York City
Years active
1970-1986
Genres
jazz fusion, jazz-funk
Labels
Columbia, ARC

Zawinul and Shorter

Weather Report formed in New York City in 1970 (MusicBrainz says 1971), founded by the Austrian keyboardist Joe Zawinul and the American saxophonist Wayne Shorter, who had met in 1959 in Maynard Ferguson's big band, with the Czech bassist Miroslav Vitous, the drummer Alphonse Mouzon and the percussionists Don Alias and Barbara Burton. Zawinul credits himself and Shorter with recruiting Vitous, and Vitous says he and Shorter founded the band. The debut, Weather Report (1971), leaned acoustic, with Shorter on soprano saxophone only. I Sing the Body Electric (1972) had a studio side and a live side recorded in Tokyo, and Sweetnighter (1973) shifted toward funk and groove; Vitous left after disputes with Zawinul.

Alphonso Johnson played bass on Mysterious Traveller (1974) and Tale Spinnin' (1975), and Black Market (1976) brought Jaco Pastorius, with the band at Montreux in July 1976. The band's approach abandoned the soloist and accompaniment model for continuous collective improvisation.

Heavy Weather

Heavy Weather was released in March 1977 on Columbia, produced by Zawinul with Pastorius as co-producer and Shorter assistant producer, engineered by Ron Malo at Devonshire Sound Studios in North Hollywood, recorded in December 1976 and January 1977 except "Rumba Mama", which is live from Montreux in summer 1976. The liner notes thank Tom Oberheim and his polyphonic synthesizer. It runs 37:50 and reached number 30 on the Billboard 200 and number one on the jazz albums chart, was certified platinum, and DownBeat gave it five stars and named it its readers' album of the year. Neil Tesser wrote in Down Beat that the group had never employed the studio as an instrument as thoroughly or as well. Shorter told Don Heckman in 2014 that it was the album that turned the corner for the band. It was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in February 2011.

Brian Risner of Modern Recording noted in 1977 a live echo chamber at Devonshire, just a tiled room with lots of ambience, which gives the record so much air. Pastorius said in 1978 that it was the first time he had been involved from a producer's standpoint too, and Zawinul called him a hands-on producer.

The later band

Mr. Gone (1978) was number one on the jazz albums chart, though DownBeat gave it one star, and the live double album 8:30 (1979) won the Grammy for best jazz fusion performance. With the drummer Peter Erskine the band was a quartet from 1978, and played Havana Jam in Cuba on March 2 to 4, 1979, and filmed a concert at the Offenbach Stadthalle in autumn 1978 for German television. Night Passage came in 1980, and Pastorius left after Word of Mouth in 1981. Victor Bailey, Omar Hakim and Jose Rossy joined in 1982, Mino Cinelu in 1984, and the albums Procession (1983), Domino Theory (1984) and Sportin' Life (1985) used drum machines and MIDI. Shorter left in February 1986 to focus on solo work, and This Is This! (June 1986) fulfilled the Columbia contract.

Zawinul formed Weather Update and then the Zawinul Syndicate in 1988. Joe Zawinul died on September 11, 2007 and Wayne Shorter on March 2, 2023, aged 89. Setlist.fm logs 591 setlists, with "Birdland" the most played song, 55 times.

Members

Records

Songs

Jaco Pastorius, Pat Metheny Group

Where to go next

Reference

Writing and criticism

Live performance archives

Fan sites and communities

Sources

  1. Weather Report, Wikipedia
  2. Heavy Weather (album), Wikipedia
  3. CD/DVD review: Weather Report, Forecast: Tomorrow, London Jazz News (2014-12-09)
  4. Weather Report statistics, setlist.fm