Jim Dejulio at The Merc

Described as “the consummate bass player,” the legendary Jim De Julio began his musical career in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: a city that has honored this favorite son by inducting him into the Pittsburgh Jazz Hall of Fame along side such jazz greats as Ray Brown, Earl Gardner, George Benson and the Tarentine Brothers. A common element in Jim's playing is melody — something that not all bass players are proficient in utilizing. As Jim states, "I learned something from Bill Evans years ago — he said [to] learn the melody well, not just how to play it, but play it with your heart. [Then] when you want to improvise, you can do anything. You'll sound so good on those changes because they'll always have a flavoring of where the tune came from. It's a wonderful way to make the lay- man — who doesn't really know anything about jazz — say, 'I can always hear the song when you play.' I think of myself as a horn player, like a tenor player or something. That's the way I think it should be. You have to know the instrument of course, or you're dead."...

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Described as “the consummate bass player,” the legendary Jim De Julio began his musical career in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: a city that has honored this favorite son by inducting him into the Pittsburgh Jazz Hall of Fame along side such jazz greats as Ray Brown, Earl Gardner, George Benson and the Tarentine Brothers. A common element in Jim's playing is melody — something that not all bass players are proficient in utilizing. As Jim states, "I learned something from Bill Evans years ago — he said [to] learn the melody well, not just how to play it, but play it with your heart. [Then] when you want to improvise, you can do anything. You'll sound so good on those changes because they'll always have a flavoring of where the tune came from. It's a wonderful way to make the lay- man — who doesn't really know anything about jazz — say, 'I can always hear the song when you play.' I think of myself as a horn player, like a tenor player or something. That's the way I think it should be. You have to know the instrument of course, or you're dead."

http://jimdejuliomusic.com/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=051-X2ITPtQ

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