Remembering Scott LaFaro, born on this day in 1936.

Rocco Scott LaFaro (April 3, 1936 – July 6, 1961) was an American jazz double bassist known for his work with the Bill Evans Trio. LaFaro broke new ground on the instrument, developing a counter melodic style of accompaniment rather than playing traditional walking bass lines, as well as virtuosity that was practically unmatched by any of his contemporaries. Despite his short career and death at the age of 25, he remains one of the most influential jazz bassists, and was ranked number 16 on Bass Player magazine’s top 100 bass players of all time.

Best Sheet Music download from our Library.

Like Jimmy Blanton before him, double bassist Scott LaFaro (April 3, 1936, Newark, New Jersey, USA – July 6, 1961, Flint, USA) had very little time to radically alter the way double bass was played in jazz, but he did so with elegant ease. LaFaro began his musical career on the clarinet while attending high school in New York City, where his family had relocated, and took up the double bass as a teenager.

He originally worked in rhythm and blues bands, but from 1956 to 1957 he played with trumpeter Chet Baker in Los Angeles. After a brief stint in Chicago in 1957, he returned West, where he worked with guitarist Barney Kessel at the Lighthouse in Hermosa Beach. He subsequently appeared with Cal Tjader and recorded with Victor Feldman before hitting the road with Benny Goodman in 1959. Shortly thereafter, he left Goodman’s touring lineup to settle in New York and form his own trio, while also working independently with Stan Getz and other musicians. Before the end of the year, he took a pivotal step in his career when he joined pianist Bill Evans’ new trio.

With Evans at the piano, he quickly developed a deep harmony with pianist and drummer Paul Motian, which remains one of the most admired in jazz. The music created by the group in the eighteen months of its existence remains some of the most influential of all jazz piano trios: LaFaro’s uncanny facility and ability to construct counterpoints to Evans’, in addition to his unusual and characteristic rhythmic patterns, were a fundamental contribution to that achievement. LaFaro continued to work outside of Evans’ group, playing and recording with Ornette Coleman, appeared on the stunning two-quartet album Free Jazz (Atlantic, 1960) with Charlie Haden, and was an astonishing melodic and rhythmic foil for Coleman on an album recorded by his quartet, Ornette! (Atlantic, 1961).

There’s no doubt Coleman appreciated him, even titling one of the tracks “The Alchemy of Scott LaFaro.” However, his immense promise would remain just that, as in the summer of 1961, after leaving his mother’s house to head to a rehearsal with Evans’ trio, LaFaro was killed when his car went off the road and crashed into a tree.

Please, subscribe to our Library.

If you are already a subscriber, please, check our NEW SCORES’ page every month for new sheet music. THANK YOU!

Beginning in 1955, he was a member of the Buddy Morrow big band. He left that organization to work in Los Angeles. LaFaro spent most of his days practicing his instrument. He practiced from sheet music for the higher-pitched clarinet to improve his facility with the upper register for bass. Fellow bassist Red Mitchell taught him how to pluck strings with both the index and middle fingers independently. For much of 1958, LaFaro was with pianist/vibraphonist Victor Feldman’s band.

In 1959, after working with trumpeter Chet Baker, bandleader Stan Kenton, vibraphonist Cal Tjader, and clarinetist Benny Goodman, LaFaro returned east and joined Bill Evans, who had recently left the Miles Davis Sextet.

With Evans and drummer Paul Motian he developed the counter-melodic style that would come to characterize his playing. Evans, LaFaro, and Motian were committed to the idea of three equal voices in the trio, working together for a singular musical idea and often without any musician explicitly keeping time.

By late 1960, LaFaro was in demand as a bassist. He replaced Charlie Haden as Ornette Coleman’s bassist in January 1961. For a time, Haden and LaFaro shared an apartment. He also played in Stan Getz’s band between jobs with the Bill Evans trio. Around this time he received a greeting card from Miles Davis suggesting that Davis wanted to hire him.

In June 1961, the Bill Evans trio began two weeks of performances at the Village Vanguard in New York City. The trio attracted attention for its style. The last day was recorded for two albums, Sunday at the Village Vanguard and Waltz for Debby.

LaFaro died in an automobile accident on July 6, 1961, in Seneca, New York, on U.S. Route 20 between Geneva and Canandaigua, four days after accompanying Stan Getz at the Newport Jazz Festival. According to Paul Motian, the death of LaFaro left Bill Evans “numb with grief,” “in a state of shock,” and “like a ghost.” Obsessively, he played “I Loves You, Porgy,” a tune that had become synonymous with him and LaFaro. Evans stopped performing for several months.

Evans said that LaFaro had been “one of the most, if not the most outstanding talents in jazz.” Legendary bassist Ray Brown added, “This was one of the most talented youngsters I’ve seen come up in a long time. For his age, he really had it covered. … It’s a shame, really a shame. It’s going to set the instrument back ten years.” Motian noted, “We were supposed to make a record date with Miles [Davis]: the trio, Bill, myself and Scott. … We were talking to Miles about it, it was all set up, and then Scott got killed and the whole thing got forgotten.”

LaFaro started his professional career playing a German-made Mittenwald double bass, but it was stolen in the spring of 1958.

Shortly after, he acquired a bass made in 1825 in Concord, New Hampshire, by Abraham Prescott. The top of the instrument is a three-piece plate of slab-cut fir; the back is a two-piece plate of moderately flamed maple with an ebony inlay at the center joint; the sides are made of matching maple. It has rolled corners on the bottom and very sloped shoulders on the top, making it easier to get in and out of thumb position. LaFaro continued to play this bass until his death. The bass was badly damaged in the automobile accident that killed him, but was eventually restored and is sporadically used in performance to honor LaFaro.

Bill Evans said of LaFaro’s Prescott bass: “It had a marvelous sustaining and resonating quality. He would be playing in the hotel room and hit a quadruple stop that was a harmonious sound, and then set the bass on its side, and it seemed the sound just rang and rang for so long.”

In 2008, Evans’s final bassist, Marc Johnson, played LaFaro’s bass on an Evans tribute album recorded by Johnson’s wife, Eliane Elias, titled Something for You: Eliane Elias Sings & Plays Bill Evans.

Scott LaFaro Discography (on Wikipedia)

DiscographyAs co-leader

West Coast Days (Fresh Sound, 1958, 1960 [1992]) – with Joe Gordon
1960 (PJL, 1960 [2005]) – with Steve Kuhn, Pete La Roca

As sideman

With Ornette Coleman

Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation (Atlantic, 1961)
Ornette! (Atlantic, 1962)
The Art of the Improvisers (Atlantic, 1959–60 [1970])
Twins (Atlantic, 1959–61 [1971])

With Buddy DeFranco

Live Date! (Verve, 1957 [1958])

With Bill Evans

Portrait in Jazz (Riverside, 1960)
Explorations (Riverside, 1961)
Sunday at the Village Vanguard (Riverside, 1961)
Waltz for Debby (Riverside, 1961 [1962])
The Complete Village Vanguard Recordings, 1961 (Riverside, 1961 [2005])
The 1960 Birdland Sessions (Fresh Sound, 1960 [2005])

With Victor Feldman

The Arrival of Victor Feldman (Contemporary, 1958)
Latinsville! (Contemporary, 1960)

With Don Friedman

Memories for Scotty (Insights, 1961 [1988])
    Five tracks reissued on Pieces of Jade (Resonance, 2009)

With Herb Geller

Gypsy (ATCO, 1959)

With Stan Getz and Cal Tjader

Cal Tjader-Stan Getz Sextet (Fantasy, 1958)

With Hampton Hawes

For Real! (Contemporary, 1958 [1961])

With John Lewis, Gunther Schuller and Jim Hall

Jazz Abstractions (Atlantic, 1960 [1961])

With Booker Little

Booker Little (Time, 1961)

With Pat Moran McCoy

This Is Pat Moran (Audio Fidelity, 1957 [1958])
    Eight tracks reissued under LaFaro's name as The Legendary Scott LaFaro (Audio Fidelity, 1978)

With Marty Paich

The Broadway Bit (Warner Bros., 1959)

With Tony Scott

Sung Heroes (Sunnyside, 1959 [1986]) – with Bill Evans, Paul Motian

Browse in the Library:

Bill Evans Trio Feat. Scott La Faro – Alice In Wonderland.

Album: Sunday At The Village Vanguard (1961)

Bill Evans, Scott La Faro, Paul Motian – Nardis