14 Facts About Joe Zawinul

1.

Josef Erich Zawinul was an Austrian jazz and jazz fusion keyboardist and composer.

2.

Joe Zawinul co-founded the groups Weather Report and The Zawinul Syndicate.

3.

Joe Zawinul pioneered the use of electric piano and synthesizer, and was named "Best Electric Keyboardist" twenty-eight times by the readers of DownBeat magazine.

4.

Joe Zawinul worked as a jazz musician with Hans Koller, Friedrich Gulda, Karl Drewo, and Fatty George.

5.

Joe Zawinul spent most of the 1960s with Cannonball Adderley.

6.

However, Joe Zawinul started making changes with their third album, Sweetnighter.

7.

Shorter and Joe Zawinul went separate ways after recording Sportin' Life, but it was discovered they had to do one more album to fulfill their contract with CBS Records.

8.

In 1991, Joe Zawinul was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Music from Berklee College of Music and on this occasion performed with a group consisting of Matthew Garrison, Torsten de Winkel, Abe Laboriel Jr.

9.

The Joe Zawinul Syndicate was a jazz fusion band formed in 1988.

10.

Joe Zawinul himself stated that he gave the band its name due to a syndicate bearing more resemblance to a family than "just" a band.

11.

Joe Zawinul wrote a symphony, called Stories of the Danube, which was commissioned by the Brucknerhaus, Linz.

12.

Joe Zawinul became ill and was hospitalized in his native Vienna on 7 August 2007, after concluding a five-week European tour.

13.

Joe Zawinul died a little over a month later from a rare form of skin cancer on 11 September 2007.

14.

Joe Zawinul was cremated at Feuerhalle Simmering and his ashes buried in Vienna Central Cemetery.