With Thompson and Acuña in the fold, things fell into place. After we finished playing, everybody came to say ‘hi’ and introduced themselves, and Wayne came to me and said, ‘Alejandro, if I were a percussionist I would play the way you play.’ I immediately began to understand the body language and the different way of communications that these giant musicians were displaying toward me - no ego but only truth and honesty about everything they were about.” For about 15 minutes I was just listening to how good they played, and later I went up and join them and played for another 15 minutes. Wayne was writing music on a little table. “When I arrived at the studio they were playing great stuff, Joe, Chester Thompson, Alphonso Johnson. In a 2001 interview, Acuña described his first rehearsal with the band. Of course, he also had the recommendation of three great musicians.” He never saw me play he just saw me walking. “Joe came to Las Vegas,” Acuña recalled, “and he saw me, and he said, ‘Man, just by looking at you I can see you are a great player! Can you come over? We’re gonna do a tour in Europe, and everything you need, instruments, we’ll take it, and you come with the band.’ And I said, ‘Great, Fantastic!’ That’s how everything started. Zawinul heard about him from Don Alias, Miroslav Vitous and Dave Leibman, and Zawinul hired him without an audition. Born in Lima, Peru, Acuña had been living in Las Vegas since 1973, playing with Elvis Pressley, Ann Margaret, and Ike and Tina Turner, among others. In October he was replaced by Alejandro (“Alex”) Acuña.
Initially joining Johnson and Thompson was 25-year old percussionist Alyrio Lima, a holdover from the Tale Spinnin’ sessions. Alex Acuña signed in the upper-left corner. Left-to-right: Chester Thompson, Wayne Shorter, Josef Zawinul, Alyrio Lima, Alphonso Johnson. I played funk, too, probably an equal amount, having grown up in the ’60s, with early James Brown and Motown going on.” Īutographed program page. I’d been in experimental kinds of bands, and in technically demanding kinds of bands - Zappa’s was the most technically demanding … I’d had a lot of chance to play jazz by the time I was 15, I was playing in really good jazz groups. I’d been interested in playing lots of different kinds of music. I had a large and pretty wide experience. I knew they’d had several drummers in the year before.
And it was one of those bands that just clicked.
#Weather report black market free#
“Alphonso was in the band,” Thompson recalled, “and we had already played together in a couple of situations, and he urged me to come down and jam, so I guess it was kind of an informal audition, just free playing. Early in the year the problematic drum chair was filled by Thompson, who was recommended by Johnson. The personnel for Black Market took shape over the course of 1975, following the release of Weather Report’s previous album, Tale Spinnin’. Why should people know? We’re not a bunch of individual musicians. “You don’t have to know who the concertmaster is to know that the string section is incredible.” Zawinul added, “I’ve been playing our new album for some other musicians, and even some of them can’t always tell who’s playing what, or what instruments are being used at a given time. “You can enjoy a symphony orchestra without knowing everybody’s name,” Shorter said. In that article, Shorter and Zawinul said it didn’t really matter who played what–it was the end result that counted.
Changing musicians gives us fresh blood, new ideas.” But sometimes they’re going in one direction and we’re going in another one, so we have to make a change. All the people who have played with us are great mother-fucking musicians. There are a lot of musicians out there in the world. Changing personnel marked each of Weather Report’s first five albums, and Black Market carried forth that tradition, with Chester Thompson, Narada Michael Walden, Alex Acuña, and Jaco Pastorius all making their Weather Report recording debuts.Īsked about the changes in a March 1976 article, Zawinul said, “We’re always happy with the group, because if we’re not happy, we change it.
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