Gato Barbieri, Latin Jazz Saxophonist, Dies at Age 83
Jazz saxophonist Gato Barbieri at The Friends Of Chile Benefit
Concert
at the Felt Forum at Madison Square Garden on May 9, 1974.
Latin Jazz saxophonist
Leandro "Gato" Barbieri, who composed the Grammy-winning music for the steamy Marlon Brando film
Last Tango in Paris and recorded dozens of albums over a career spanning more than seven decades, has died at age 83.
Laura
Barbieri, his wife of nearly 20 years, said her husband died Saturday
in a New York hospital from pneumonia. The musician recently had bypass
surgery to remove a blood clot.
"Music was a mystery to Gato, and
each time he played was a new experience for him, and he wanted it to be
that way for his audience," she said. "He was honored for all the years
he had a chance to bring his music all around the world."
The Argentine-born musician recorded some 35 albums between 1967 and
1982, when he stopped consistently making new records. He toured
regularly and went on to record four more albums, including 1997's
smooth jazz "Que Pasa," which reached No. 2 on Billboard's contemporary
jazz charts.
Though in poor health, Barbieri, still sporting his
trademark black fedora hat, had been performing monthly at the Blue Note
jazz club in New York since 2013. He last performed at the club on Nov.
23.
"He was my best friend," Laura Barbieri said Saturday. "I'm
so grateful we had these 20 years together." She said a public memorial
was being planned, but details have not been finalized.
Last year,
Barbieri received a Latin Grammy lifetime achievement award for a
career that covered "virtually the entire jazz landscape."
The
citation from the Latin Recording Academy credited Barbieri with
creating "a rebellious but highly accessible musical style, combining
contemporary jazz with Latin American genres and incorporating elements
of instrumental pop."
Barbieri won a Grammy for best instrumental composition in 1973 for his music for
Last Tango In Paris, the controversial erotic drama starring Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider that earned two Oscar nominations.
When director Bernardo Bertolucci needed sexy music for
Last Tango, he turned to Barbieri who was known for his distinctive, sensuous, huge-toned tenor sax sound.
"It
was like a marriage between the film and the music," said Barbieri of
the soundtrack that made him an international star, in a 1997 interview
with
The Associated Press. "Bernardo told me, 'I don't want the
music to be too much Hollywood or too much European, which is more
intellectual. I want a median.'"
Barbieri said tango had a special appeal because it is deeply tied to his Argentine soul.
"Always
in the tango is tragedy — she leaves him, she kills him. It's like an
opera but it's called tango," Barbieri said in 1997, noting that half of
Argentinians, including him, had roots in Italy. "The lyrics and the
melodies are very beautiful. It's very sensual."
Born on Nov. 28, 1932, in Rosario, Argentina, Barbieri grew up in a
family that included several musicians, but did not take up an
instrument until he was 12 when he heard bebop pioneer Charlie Parker's
recording of "Now's the Time" and began studying clarinet.
After
moving to Buenos Aires in 1947, Barbieri picked up the alto saxophone.
He earned the nickname "El Gato," which means "The Cat," in the 1950s
because of the way he scampered between clubs with his saxophone.
He gained national prominence playing alto saxophone in an orchestra led by
Lalo Schifrin, the pianist and composer who later made a big impact with his TV and film scores, including "Theme from Mission: Impossible."
Later in the 1950s, Barbieri switched to tenor saxophone as he began leading his own groups.
In the 1960s, splitting his time between Rome and New York, Barbieri became part of the
Ornette Coleman-inspired
free jazz revolution, working extensively with trumpeter Don Cherry
from Coleman's groundbreaking quartet. Influenced by other modern jazz
saxophonists — including
John Coltrane,
Albert Ayler and Pharoah Sanders — he developed a warmer, grittier
sound on the tenor sax. He recorded and performed with such avant-garde
jazz musicians as Cherry, Carla Bley and Mike Mantler.
But he soon rediscovered his roots, incorporating South American rhythms, harmonies and melodic themes on albums starting with
The Third World in 1969 — and eventually developed his own contemporary jazz sound. He followed that with the live album
El Pampero in 1971.
After releasing the
Last Tango album
in 1972, Barbieri signed with the Impulse! label, releasing a series of
mellower Latin-infused soul-jazz and jazz-pop albums, including
Caliente! (1976), which included his rendition of
Carlos Santana's "Europa," and four
Chapter albums, which explored Brazilian, Afro-Cuban and Argentine rhythms.
Barbieri
recorded new material consistently until 1982, when a dispute with his
record label led him to focus solely on touring. He recorded only
intermittently in the 1980s, and did not release any albums from
1988-97. He released
Que Pasa in 1997 after dealing with the
turmoil of losing his Italian-born wife of 35 years to a degenerative
illness in January 1995, and then undergoing triple bypass heart surgery
two months later.
He had to recover physically and overcome
depression at the death of his wife to finish the album, which he
credited with being a healing force.
"The only way I saw was to go out and do something every day," he said. "The music gave me life."
Barbieri would release only three more albums over the rest of his life — including
The Shadow of the Cat in 2002, a Latin-flavored smooth jazz session featuring guest trumpeter
Herb Alpert, and
New York Meeting in 2010 on which he played straight-ahead jazz standards, such as
Thelonious Monk's "Straight, No Chaser" and
Miles Davis' "So What."
Barbieri
married again in 1996 and had a son, Christian, who turns 18 on Sunday.
Besides his wife and son, he is survived by his sister Raquel Barbieri,
who lives in Buenos Aires.
In lieu of flowers, his family
requests that donations be sent to The Reciprocity Foundation, a
nonprofit that works to help homeless and foster youth in New York City.
