Rare Joe Pass footage not seen for over 30 years

Adelaide Festival 1990

[@stlev99]

There are some great guitarists in the world, and then there is Joe Pass.

[@robinwatson4282]

What, you mean, he's not that great?

[@stlev99]

@@robinwatson4282 no, I mean has has no peer. He is number 1

[@Arianrhod6]

That piece with John Williams and Joe Pass, master guitarists in different genres, that should have spawned an album. Would have been great...

[@stefanodonato538]

No matter what the top guitarists leaderboard say. Joe was the best, especially in solo. I've been listening to him for decades and I am still surprised of his taste, talent and personality. Plus he was a real gentle guy, modest, funny. He still is the best to me.

[@tonybmusic1166]

I’m a geezer who studied with him from 1973-75. I had just moved to Van Nuys from Vegas and even though I was short on funds would scrape together the money for the lessons. I moved down to Huntington Beach in ‘75 for work….I was playing clubs in a cover band and couldn’t make the commute to Northridge anymore but he was still teaching classes at Dick Grove School of Music on Ventura Blvd and that was a commute I could make on Saturday mornings. When I first moved to the Valley Joe was doing a jazz gig with Herb Ellis at a place called Diamonte’s (it is Diamonte’s and NOT a misspelling of Donte’s) on Ventura Blvd and I would nurse the two drink minimum in order to hear them play all night. I don’t play like him though….I don’t know why, but nothing rubbed off. I’ve been a working pro since 1964, doing nothing but music in order to support myself and keep from eating my kids and there was a period when I was playing nothing but piano at a 950 seat dinner theater (also kicking left hand bass…cheap bastards couldn’t afford a bassist?) and only played guitar on my breaks in one of the dressing rooms. I was going crazy at that place for 13 years not being able to play guitar. I also taught piano during the day….in California, you have to wear many hats in music in order to eat. But, yes….he was an incredible human being….very easy to be around and learn from.

[@ClarenceHW]

Wonderful, thank you!! I had a couple of Lessons with Joe in the early 70's, I brought his book (Joe Pass Guitar Style) into the lesson.... he said "don't bother with that, I can't read". My lessons consisted of him playing changes and me singing two or three notes for each chord, then I would play the chords and he would play back what I sang with stylistic jazz phrasing. Great lessons... then we would go out have pizza and beer, it was at a weeklong clinic in Mesa AZ. Also, he had his ES-175 at the time, I asked him if I could play it.. jeeze..... a bowed neck, high action and medium gauge flat wounds. 10 minutes on it and I was fried. Loved Joe.. a gentleman, and funny in a sly quiet way.

[@m.allengibson9438]

Wow! He was a treasure.

[@LucasLucasMusic]

What an amazing story!

[@tombstoneharrystudios584]

What a great way to learn how to improvise and train your ear at the same time!

[@BigSmartArmed]

I heard his ES-175 went MIA before he passed Great story to cherish May he RIP and Happy Birthday!

[@monat_son]

That must have been great! :) I stumbled upon Joe recently. It was a video with Ela Fitzgerald, loved it.

[@WeirdBeach]

This footage is fucking priceless.

[@Robbannno]

were is the rest of the video? damn I want more!

[@valentinakaramazova1007]

Holy shit Joe Pass playing over Bach

[@erivers71]

Omg. Joe Pass was a musical genius. Nobody can play like Joe. The passages he plays are absolutely insane.

[@jamro217]

Brilliant. Did you ever notice how the really talented people are often humble, funny, everyday folks? Joe Pass is a perfect example of that.

[@yunesbb]

this video proves that jazz guitarists (unlike other genres) are capable of improvising in any situation. jazz musicians are comfortable with any progression no matter how difficult it is.

[@Jplent1]

Jazz guitarists play circles around rock players who rely mostly on volume, distortion and various effects...not to mention theatrics.

[@mjsmcd]

@@Jplent1 hendrix,beck were pretty good

[@peterblock6964]

@@mjsmcd Jeff Beck is incredibly expressive musically. Check out the DVD "Live at Ronnie Scott's" kzbin.info/www/bejne/d6C0eaGwfdeknac especially: 04. Cause We've Ended As Lovers 07. Nadia 13. Goodbye Pork Pie Hat / Brush With The Blues 17. A Day In The Life

[@doitnowvideosyeah5841]

Pure jazz players, that never teally got rock usually cannot play it. They can do some of the tricks but lack the over the top element tock requires. Classical cats play better than anyone...as long as they have sheet music. They have a hard time improvising. Today many jazzers started with rock so they can do both.

[@MrRubenrivera9649]

​@@Jplent1 ⁶×awyr+!!aaaaa!!aaaaaaaaaaar6wryw6r6w6wr6wywa

[@richw.6296]

Joe Pass is my Michael Jordan.

[@gman4321]

No, Michael Jordan is Joe Pass.

[@JazzgutsVGvanKampen]

Joe's words, I can improvise on those chords because I more or less know where you're going, that's a true improvisor.

[@kenster865]

If you do enough improvising over time, you'll learn that what Joe said is quite the norm. It's about learning theory and you learn, even anticipate, what changes are likely coming up in any given tune. Yet many folks never develop improvising skills. My mom, an accomplished sight-reader for piano and organ, couldn't improvise worth a damn. Take her music away from her and she hadn't a clue what to do!

[@shaalis]

"Blues"...[plays anything but]

[@ChromaBlue13]

I know right! Lmao

[@giothemath]

He bends a string once lol

[@PANDORAZTOYBOKZ]

By "blues" they meant that he was playing lines over a minor blues progression. He's a classical player, so the point was less that he'd stylistically play "bluesy" and more that he could improvise in his aquired musical language over a progression that is considered to be from another dialect.

[@curtrod]

@@PANDORAZTOYBOKZ blues is as blues does

[@ianledesma3527]

@@PANDORAZTOYBOKZ i'm like 99% sure they just labeled him wrong

[@bobbygoesbig]

This group of guitarists (with Pepe Romero in place of JW) toured as the "Guitar Summit" in 1993, shortly before Pass' death. For their encore in Melbourne FL, Romero and Pena played Tarrega's "Recuerdos de la Alhambra", and Pass and Kottke improvised a blues. It was the most stunning evening of guitar playing that one could ever hope for.

[@somesquirrel]

Is that on youtube? It would be awesome to see.

[@bawseeeee602]

Wow! Sounds amazing. That was before my time but I would have loved to have been there to listen. Thanks for sharing.

[@theopaopa1]

great joe pass, he wanted a horse and he got a guitar ...

[@henrikduende]

ricardo moyano Im glad he did

[@stlev99]

Lucky us!

[@prototek-6582]

Thank you for this. Joe's playing, as well as his personality and sense of humor, never fails to bring a smile to my face. I get the feeling that those lucky enough to have called him "friend" must feel truly blessed.

[@DavidSmith-ss1cg]

Joe Pass was a National Treasure of the US. He was also, as we see, quite a character. His instruction videos are the very best teaching tools for guitar, and his album, "Virtuoso," is still jaw-dropping amazing to this day.

[@GordiansKnotHere]

These guys sitting there and improvising to Bach's Ciaccona is possibly one of the most beautiful moments I have ever seen or heard. Joe Pass and John Williams together? They are my most favorite guitarists! I never even knew this existed. Thank you very much for this!

[@guitarman6742]

What a character Joe was. I sat next to him one night in Venice CA. He was smoking a cigar and listening to Joe DiOrio. The manager told him to put out the cigar...which Joe did after calling the guy a F...in' hippie.

[@112358dave]

Had to pick my face up off the floor after hearing Joe’s lines. So great! Thank you for posting.

[@czgibson3086]

Outstanding footage. Would love to see the whole film.

[@dansusan]

Fantastic video. I was hoping a video like this existed. Joe Pass...what is there to say? Marvelous!!!!

[@GypsyFly]

lol joe killed it :D he is really true legend , PLZ give us more of this footafe please

[@Arianrhod6]

...somebody will probably now tell me that it did! :)

[@grruuuuuuuuuu]

(One can improvise over anything).... WAIT "Don't play some obscure Leo Brouwer piece.." hahahaha.

[@PigWrench]

not 30 years.... 2012 (posted) less 1990 = 22 years. musicians can count but math is beyond them, apparently, heh heh

[@tmjcbs]

A few more years and the title will be right :-)

[@ianledesma3527]

@@tmjcbs yep :P

[@jimpollicita3945]

Great to see and hear this clip. Joe is at the peak of my Pyramid of Favorites. Unfortunately, after all these years, I have succeeded in looking like him more than playing like him!

[@docwill184]

George (pronounced horhay) Romero substituted for Williams on these tours to some extent. Sat ten feet from them in a church in Pismo Beach several months before Joe passed away from cancer. He was a little unsteady on his feet but played great as always;

[@reuelray]

That Leo guy ain't playing no blues. What are they doing? I shut it down after that. They lost all credibility...👎

[@KimchiSpringRoll]

Man the amount of fun they were having there.... I can only imagine

[@merl038]

the best of the best of the best of the best period!

[@mitasaron2735]

Joe is the man. Definitely! =)

[@stick321]

A true gentleman and a musician Mr. Joe Pass. RIP.

[@meekrob]

Never really thought of Kottke as a "blues" guitarist before, but whatever. Anybody know the name of the piece he was playing?

[@srj34]

"I Yell At Traffic" is the piece...I imagine the people putting this together weren't really sure how to categorize him. I've been a fan for 25 years and I'm still not sure myself, but it's gold nonetheless. At one of the shows I went to, Leo mentioned being part of this event and a discussion around blues came up. Joe Pass asked him about playing a 12-bar blues and Leo wanted to make sure he understood what Pass was asking. And he said, addressing Joe Pass, "So, if you start with an inverted one chord, and move on to a 6/9 five, and before you resolve to the tonic you move to a doubly diminished minor (apologies if I'm getting some of the jargon wrong, it's from memory of 17 years ago)..." And Pass interrupted playfully, saying, "Leo, if you don't get it now, you never will!"

[@HenryMcGuinnessGuitar]

A bit of Bach's Chaconne in Dm (I think) on a loop, with Joe Pass having fun with it. I love his sense of humour

[@luigizanellato2959]

This is a real treasure. Shows how all styles can be improvised tastefully.

[@mofoshrimp]

What a collection of talent... if only they had Paco de Lucia in there to top it off!!

[@overtone_audio]

is there more of this?? wow man...

[@tonybmusic1166]

I studied with Joe from 1973-75 and went on to earn? a masters in music comp. Most of my college professors either hated jazz or at least didn’t respect it. One professor said: “isn’t it just a bunch of eleventh chords?” And later one of my piano students (if you do music for a living in California, you have to wear many hats or you wind up eating your kids) concurred…..yet later on, wanted to learn some jazz tunes. For some reason my grad school professors gave zero credibility to the art of improvisation yet in the late 18th century a prospective student would be required to improvise over a figured bass while being interviewed by a music teacher. So, I don’t know what happened in the intervening centuries but jazz or improvising over a set of harmonies or sonorities is no longer a respected musical genre. Musicians who have spent a lifetime improvising over the “Great American Songbook harmonies plus Giant Steps or Moments Notice can play over any chord changes.

[@cartnhorse]

More please! Is there more of this?

[@bobrichardson5905]

Eric Clapton? bwahahahahaha I love rock (I really do) but a lot of those guys are so one dimensional that it hurts to hear it after watching stuff like this.

[@dessonf2]

What a beautiful improvisation from Joe !!! Legend

[@Silverlining1111]

I’m glad that we can enjoy this in 2025. ❤

[@CPUTests]

Great Joe Pass. I laugh so much with this video.

[@melodiclines2990]

I really need to know how to improvise on guitar

[@johnlindstrom9994]

Just heard Martin Taylor. He didn't cite Pass as an influence. Strange! He cited piano players such as Evans.

[@zu0832]

That is wierd. I never heard Bill Evan's influence in Martin TTaylor. Maybe he just liked Evans

[@guilhermefilipe2368]

Whats the name of the song of 1:26 and 2:19?🎸🎸🎸

[@TheHerki666]

we want more!!!! please!!!

[@benzonex]

Two of my teachers together: Paco and Joe 1990! Shortly thereafter Joe passed away...

[@donnlarossa9173]

Love my Pass Ibanez I heard he was never excited about it and it took a long time fir him to approve it with Ibanez

[@zdzislawrusin2620]

po prostu dziekuje za jego gre na gitarze ... przenosi mnie.w I nny klimat

[@MrEarldawkins]

Amazing playing Joe Pass

[@ebrahimalfardan8823]

The whole thing please.

[@keepdiggintheblues]

Great stuff, thanks for posting! Such tremendous talents all!

[@gerrittenberkdeboer7763]

Pass is a music knowlege cosmos

[@郭子勋]

rest in peace joe

[@raymondlaracuenta746]

Great guitar player!!

[@edudzzaj]

Good old Joe, haha.

[@livendihp8768]

anyone can bring this video in full version please ?

[@geordieboy9336]

Loved this. Thanks for posting.

[@freddym223]

When i lived and played gigs in Los Angeles I went to joe's house a few times in the San Fernando Valley . I expected to see tons of guitars hanging from the walls and a mess of sheet music all over the place like my messy house . But no . just a gig bag with a gibson es 175 in it . he played out every nite , whether it was his gig or to sit in at a club . I wrote out an arrangement of a tune called "LOVE" that was well received at gigs i played . He took one look at it and said "that"s wrong . I crumpled up the paper and threw it in his waist basket and never played that tune again ! to this day i don't know what was wrong with it . 8-(

[@rickjason215]

freddym223 You should have asked him. How do you learn if you don’t ask questions? Of course I would probably have done the same thing.

[@royrich]

What a gem of a video !!

[@mubinhambira]

Pass me that guitar

[@rwjazz1299]

Joe is laughing a little bit, because he knows the guitar chords he's hearing are entirely diatonic.

[@BernieHollandMusic]

Maybe - but when you get into the depths of the Chaconne - diatonic it certainly is not ! However, yes, this opening theme is just Dminor - Gminor6 -A7th - Dminor - repeated - and that is not at all difficult to improvise over. Hit the Road Joe ! John on the other hand has allowed himself to be trained to believe that he cannot improvise - I know - because he told me so.

[@larryjohnson450]

Saw Leo Kottke 2 years ago in Ardmore, Ok. at the Goddard Center..still a good player but not what I remembered as a college student..never sings. Doesn't really need to.

[@willae1]

+Larry Johnson idk what albums u listened to but he was singing in them very early on, first one i know of is mudlark

[@greatvanzini]

+Larry Johnson Yes I think he sang one or two as early as his 2nd LP. HE wasn't fond of his own deep rich voice which he said sounded, "like a goose fart on a muggy day" or something close to that.

[@srj34]

You mean a guy pushing 70 wasn't as technically proficient as he used to be? Well, I never.

[@jimmaculate5]

@@willae1 i had leo's Happy Feet record i believe it was called. he sang "Louise" with that distinctive voice. great.

[@gxtmfa]

First 5 guys were who I grew up on. Hot damn. If you’re a guitarist’s guitarists, you know what’s up watching these guys speak.

[@colonb3]

Wow. Great improvisation.

[@richw.6296]

Truly rare to see Joe Pass playing the JP20.

[@jay10249]

I would really appreciate info on where to purchase a copy of this complete video.

[@markharry172]

With regard to Paco Pena, he is playing a Fandangos de Huelva, which is in 12/8 time and very tricky to play and has one chord change that falls on a weak beat. Paco handles it effortlessly and I won't even get into the technique required to play the alzapua; those fast runs he played with the thumb!

[@dennisg.582]

Joe's a showoff.

[@docwill184]

Can you post more of the concert footage or interviews?

[@stratotega]

yea please upload more if you have them

[@DeOmnibusDubitandum76]

What a moving experience to see Joe Pass improvise over Bach's Chaconne, played by John Williams. A convergence of two of my main musical passions and influences in one setting. I love both on their own merits: the beauty of the sound palette coupled with the charming repertoire in the classical guitar, then the freedom and creativity of the jazz idiom. Beautiful!

[@jazzman1954]

Some great players here showing respect for each other’s abilities in their own particular department of guitar music.

[@gitarwoman2]

Thank you for posting this.

[@conradopaulinoguitar]

wowwww, thanks for share!!

[@RavnerRavner]

did joe pass throw shade at leo Brouwer before blusing up Bach's chaconne?!?!

[@VW421]

wish they hadn't cut it short and let Leo get in on it. WHERE'S THE REST OF THAT VIDEO PLEASE!

[@MrDSchaller]

Unforgetable

[@edwardsingleton2248]

The Great Masters.

[@overtone_audio]

amazing stuff.

[@jfdiaz28]

Does anyone know the piece that Kottke was playing????

[@gitarwoman2]

jfdiaz28 Don't know but I have Segovia playing it.

[@srj34]

It's called "I Yell At Traffic", and to Gia Murray, I doubt Segovia would have played it since the piece was released one year after he died. Unless you mean you'd like to have heard him play it...?

[@BeatsAndGuitars]

We love you Joe and miss you. Thanks for all you gave us.

[@BernieHollandMusic]

After all is said and done - it is a 4 bar blues

[@jeffcook3277]

That ain't nuthin, I knew him 50 years ago, met him at Dante's on Monday, Guitar Night.

[@Mingxieplays]

ICONIC!!!!!!!

[@bassplayer1966]

NOW THAT IS BAD ASS!! IMPROVISATION BABAY!!

[@rhysdrader9972]

Long live the music 🎶 🎵

[@robdeshane321]

Riffing off Chaconne....ridiculous and tremendous

[@GusPrzygora]

excelent. ThAnks for sharing!

[@marcomiceli7743]

Ha! Talking about playing..

[@liberosantavenere8890]

Vaiii MO PASS..

[@sumyunguy4150]

That TONE!!!

[@josemarcelino1826]

4:10 why everyone laughed?

[@fredriknerli9197]

Blues lick in a classical song? Pretty funny if you ask me

[@PANDORAZTOYBOKZ]

He played a very cliche Jazz/Blues guitar lick and the juxtaposition against the classical backing was funny

[@aadityakiran_s]

Which DVD is this a part of? Is there a complete version somewhere?

[@guitarsofold100]

Not to my knowledge it was recorded on VHS the day it was aired on Australian television..

[@Blackjawreen]

After wes montgomery he was known as the best jazz guitar innovator of all time

[@renjay3743]

+Magatte Diagne Very different players. Both incredible but both very different. Ultimately Joe Pass had the better knowledge of the fretboard but then he lived a good bit longer so that would come as no surprise. Wes had a style that was so unique it would be hard to say he was anything other than unique.

[@jsbrules]

“known”?? Any statement about musicians beginning with “known as the best” is bound to be, well, wrong. How about saying, “I think so and so is the best and some people agree with me”... but many others don’t

[@Ruvfua]

La secuencia de improvisación con Pass es lamentable por parte de john Williams …Pass tiene pinta de estar pensando….este tío tocará mucho pero no sabe nada…..Williams es incapaz de crear un ambiente propicio para el solista….

[@birdsunion3294]

Legend

[@GuitarBySamMartinez]

Cool

[@jason-ow8cq]

ahhhh more!!!!!!!