Innovative guitarist 'knew what to do with just one note'
Jazz guitarist Pete Cosey used electronic distortion and innovative methods of stringing and tuning his guitar to impress his signature sound on recordings by artists from bluesmen Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf to jazz great Miles Davis.
“Pete's sound was something quite amazing," said Wendy Oxenhorn, executive director of the New York-based Jazz Foundation of America. “He took blues, funk, rap and jazz and combined it into a new sound."
“I describe his sound as Afro-spiritual," said bassist and composer Melvin Gibbs, who played with Mr. Cosey in the late 1980s in a trio called Power Tools. “I felt like he really captured what people are trying to get to when they go to church."
Mr. Cosey, 68, died Wednesday, May 30, of complications from surgery in Vanguard Weiss Memorial Hospital in Chicago, according to his daughter Mariama Cosey. He was a longtime resident of Chicago but most recently had been living in Evanston.
Mr. Cosey was born in Chicago, the only child of a piano-playing mother and a father who played saxophone professionally. Mr. Cosey learned music early, playing the violin before he went to grammar school, his daughter said.
His father died when Mr. Cosey was about 9 years old. He and his mother moved to Arizona, where he spent his teenage years. He began developing his unique sound by playing his guitar in the mountains around Phoenix.
“He believed in being creative and organic and finding a way to make the notes fit," his daughter said. He also believed everybody had a key, she said. “When we were babies, he'd play to see what our key was."
Raynard Miner, co-writer of hit songs including “Rescue Me" and “Higher and Higher," met Mr. Cosey in the early 1960s at Chess Records in Chicago, where Mr. Cosey was part of the studio band.
Jazz guitarist Pete Cosey used electronic distortion and innovative methods of stringing and tuning his guitar to impress his signature sound on recordings by artists from bluesmen Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf to jazz great Miles Davis.
“Pete's sound was something quite amazing," said Wendy Oxenhorn, executive director of the New York-based Jazz Foundation of America. “He took blues, funk, rap and jazz and combined it into a new sound."
“I describe his sound as Afro-spiritual," said bassist and composer Melvin Gibbs, who played with Mr. Cosey in the late 1980s in a trio called Power Tools. “I felt like he really captured what people are trying to get to when they go to church."
Mr. Cosey, 68, died Wednesday, May 30, of complications from surgery in Vanguard Weiss Memorial Hospital in Chicago, according to his daughter Mariama Cosey. He was a longtime resident of Chicago but most recently had been living in Evanston.
Mr. Cosey was born in Chicago, the only child of a piano-playing mother and a father who played saxophone professionally. Mr. Cosey learned music early, playing the violin before he went to grammar school, his daughter said.
His father died when Mr. Cosey was about 9 years old. He and his mother moved to Arizona, where he spent his teenage years. He began developing his unique sound by playing his guitar in the mountains around Phoenix.
“He believed in being creative and organic and finding a way to make the notes fit," his daughter said. He also believed everybody had a key, she said. “When we were babies, he'd play to see what our key was."
Raynard Miner, co-writer of hit songs including “Rescue Me" and “Higher and Higher," met Mr. Cosey in the early 1960s at Chess Records in Chicago, where Mr. Cosey was part of the studio band.
