Weather Report bass legend Victor Bailey dies age 56

The bass world has been mourning the loss of revered virtuoso bassist Victor Bailey, who died on 11 November. He was 56. Famously Bailey replaced Jaco Pastorius in Weather Report from 1982-1986, at just 22 years old. When the group disbanded he went on to have a prolific career as a top jazz sideman for the likes of Sonny Rollins, Pharoah Sanders, Lenny White and Kenny Garrett, as well as forging a solo career and playing countless high profile sessions with the likes of Sting, Madonna, LL Cool J and Lady Gaga on more than 1,000 albums. Remarkably he achieved all this in spite of being born with Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a form of muscular dystrophy, which he fought long and hard before losing the battle last week.

Post-Weather Report, Bailey continued to work with the band's fiery founding keyboardist Joe Zawinul playing with both his Weather Update and Syndicate bands as well as recording a blistering 2006 live album, Brown Street, with Zawinul, the WDR Big Band, former WR percussionist Alex Acuna, on a stunning set of favourite Weather Report songs arranged by Vince Mendoza. An alumni of Berklee College of Music, Bailey was among the college's faculty until his illness confined him to a wheelchair earlier this year. His father Morris Bailey, who also had the disease but kept active as a saxophone player until his late seventies, was a renowned Philadelphia R&B figure who wrote and arranged for likes of Teddy Pendergrass, Billy Paul and Harold Melvin.

One of his final messages on his Facebook page read: "In the past days I heard from Stanley Clarke, Marcus Miller, Ralph Armstrong, Daryl Jones, Randy Jackson, Hadrien Feraud, and Chulo Gatewood. I am pinching myself to be sure this is only bass player heaven LOL."

His spirit and playing will be hugely missed.

– Mike Flynn

from www.jazzwisemagazine.com