Miroslav Vitous
Albums
Miroslav Vitous was the founding bassist in Weather Report, a band that by its end, had traveled very far from its roots. But it is indeed that band's musical [more]
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Appearances
One of the giants of American popular song gets his due with this three-disc Verve box, comprising a trio of separately released compilations. Though Mercer's [more]
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In an era when box sets are so plentiful and are basically de rigueur for any major, and some not so major labels, it's virtually a wonder that a Weather Report box set didn't [more]
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Pianist Chick Corea had a reunion with bassist Miroslav Vitous and drummer Roy Haynes for this double LP, 13 years after they had recorded Now He Sings, Now He [more]
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Herbie Mann has always been open to new trends in his music. For this 1969 studio session, he and three other top soloists (vibraphonist Roy Ayers and guitarists Larry Coryell [more]
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An otherworldly soundscape of aching beauty, this album is a must-have for aficionados of any member of this trio. Rypdal's guitar is [more]
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Like the weather itself, this band would assume a new shape with virtually every release -- and this album, half recorded in the studio and half live in Tokyo, set the [more]
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Weather Report's fourth recording finds Wayne Shorter (on soprano and tenor) taking a lesser role as Joe Zawinul begins to really dominate the group's sound. Most selections [more]
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This is the first of two (hopefully more) CD compilations coming from the Creative Music Studio's Woodstock Jazz Festival, a tenth-anniversary celebration for [more]
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Biography
- Born Dec 6th 1947 in Prague, Czech Republic
Best known as one of the foremost young bassists in the jazz-rock movement of the late '60s and early '70s, Miroslav Vitous is one of Europe's most versatile imports, equally at home in mainstream idioms and even pop music. A sometime leader, his bass dances and skitters around an ensemble as a co-equal member of the front line, and he makes very creative use of the bow. He is influenced not only by bassists like Scott LaFaro, Ron Carter, and Gary Peacock, but also by Czech folk music.
Vitous began his musical studies on the violin at age six, switching to piano from ages nine to fourteen before finally settling upon the bass. While studying at the Prague Conservatory, he played with a trio that included his brother Alan on drums and Jan Hammer -- another future jazz-rock mover and shaker -- on piano. After winning a scholarship to Berklee in 1966, he moved to New York the following year and wound up working with Art Farmer, Freddie Hubbard, Bob Brookmeyer, Clark Terry, and very briefly, Miles Davis.
Now one of the most highly touted prodigies in jazz, Vitous started playing in a recurring trio with Chick Corea and Roy Haynes on Corea's 1968 album Now He Sings, Now He Sobs. He then joined one of Herbie Mann's most popular groups from 1968 until 1970, with time-out for a tour with Stan Getz; Mann produced his first album, a pioneering series of extended jazz-rock workouts called Infinite Search on the flutist's Embryo label. As a founding member of Weather Report, Vitous helped define the band's freewheeling initial stage, leaving the group in late 1973 as its music began to evolve into more structured forms. A move to Los Angeles in 1974 led to a year-long session of woodshedding in private with a new custom-made instrument, a double-necked guitar and bass. However, that experiment did not pan out, and he returned to the bass, leading sessions for Warner Bros., Arista, and from 1979, a sporadic series of dates for ECM as a leader and in reunions of Corea's bop-to-free Trio Music group.
In the meantime, Vitous became immersed in academia, joining the faculty of the New England Conservatory in 1979 and becoming head of the jazz department in 1983. Although his profile isn't nearly as high as it was at the height of the jazz-rock era, he continued to play at jazz festivals and record into the '90s. ~ Richard S. Ginell, All Music Guide
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