Joe Zawinul

Born in Vienna, Austria in 1932, Joe Zawinul was a driving force behind the late-'60s and 1970s electric jazz-rock revolution, and later he would explore fusions between jazz-rock and ethnic music from across the globe. He immigrated to the United States in 1958 and played piano with Cannonball Adderley for most of the '60s, penning the major pop hit "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy," and recorded several pioneering records with Miles Davis, contributing the title tune of Davis' In a Silent Way album. In 1970 Zawinul co-founded Weather Report, which became a vehicle for his synthesizer mastery and appealed to a wide audience thanks in no small part to his hit song "Birdland." The keyboardist later formed the Zawinul Syndicate, noted for its groove-oriented world music influences. ~ Richard S. Ginell