Gene Wright was the bassist for Dave Brubeck’s most famous group from 1958 to 1968, cutting some 30 albums with the quartet. I saw him play with Dave in Moscow in 1988, but didn’t get to talk to him, as I did with Dave. Gene was one of Dave’s kids’ godfather. A good life that brought music and enlightenment to hundreds of thousands (possibly millions) of fans.
I can’t believe this passed me by.
I missed it too Well, good show Eugene.
I tend to scan the deaths page of Wikipedia.every two or three days. I bet a lot of older folks do likewise (perhaps in the newspaper or some other online source - what’s your favorite?). When you get to a certain point in life, the odds of someone you’ve heard of dying are somewhat higher.
My method: go to the Wiki page. Don’t look at the names directly but scan your eyes over the descriptions. “Indonesian footballer”, “Latvian politician”, “New Zealand businessman”, etc. Nothing there for me to recognize. (I mean, you Indonesian football fans do have my sympathy, but…) I keep going until something catches my eye - say “American astronaut”, “French film actor” - wait, someone I might know? List of notable films: “Le chat et la fromage”, “Coup de merveille”, nope, move on. Then: American test pilot - oh, Chuck Yeager died! Gosh, how old was he anyway? Gosh. Gosh.
This is how we stay informed. Now and then something might escape notice, or perhaps the news of someone’s death might not be announced for some number of days, so it might be added to a date you already scanned so you don’t see it (in this regard Wikipedia is helpful in that it will post a name on the day it becomes known, with the notation “death announced on this date” then later move it back to the day it actually happened).
I’ve always tried to keep up with the death notices. I’m not sure why. At least, you’ll seldom hear me say I didn’t know so-and-so was still alive. I kind of hate when people do that. Don’t you follow the obits?
I usually see them on the NYT. I heard about Wright’s death on KSCM (a jazz station in SFO) this morning. They’re doing a tribute to Dave Brubeck this week, and I heard in an interview with one of Brubeck’s sons that Gene had died recently. I just did a search and I see that they posted his obit on January 8th, which means I was as distracted as the rest of the country by the doings in WDC.
That’s his relieved chuckle and the end of “Unsquare Dance”, correct?
That’s Joe Morello, I believe.
ETA: Wiki confirms.
Yup. Brubeck commented on that way back in the day. That 7/4 about did them in.