Jazz guitar virtuoso Joe Negri died over this past weekend. He was ten days shy off his 100th birthday.
When I say "jazz guitar virtuoso", I am not exagerating for Joe Negri was known throughout the world of jazz music as one of the very best. In his life, he has performed with a Hall of Fame line-up of jazz musicians from the 1940's to the end of his life. Born in the Mt. Washington section of Pittsburgh and a graduate of Taylor Allderdice High School, Negri served in the Army at the tail end of WW II, and, upon returning from the service, he toured with various bands and jazz groups, but he chose to stay in his native Pittsburgh, and you just cannot have grown up watching television or following The Arts scene in Pittsburgh over these last seventy plus years (like I have) without knowing who Joe Negri was.
He appeared and played on children's shows like "Ricki and Copper" and "Paul Shannon's Adventure Time". He was also in the house band at KDKA-TV, back when local television stations had such things, and appeared on locally produced programming like The John Reed King Show and Daybreak. He was one of those people who become completely ingrained in the fabric of the community, and when such people leave us, you feel like you've lost a member of the family.
However, many of my not-in-Pittsburgh friends who may read this, people who have never lived in The Burgh, will, if they or their children grew up watching "Mister Rogers Neighborhood" on PBS, know of Joe Negri as "Handyman Negri", an regular visitor to Rogers' Land of Make Believe on that landmark children's program.
He continued to play the guitar and perform right to the end of his life. The world of jazz music has lost one of its very best performers, and Pittsburgh has lost one of its Legends.
RIP Joe Negri.
No comments:
Post a Comment