Used-Bin Bargains: Gabor Szabo

Gabor Szabo - Gypsy Queen (Impulse! 1966)

Gabor Szabo – Spellbinder / Impulse!

Gabor Szabo resides in an odd niche of jazz musicians. The innovative Hungarian guitarist came to prominence in the 60s with his truly idiosyncratic style incorporating jazz, pop, rock and classical with Latin, Gypsy, Indian and Asian influences, but while most of his contemporary jazz musicians were heading towards the spiritual, energetic and earthy side of the genre closely following the masterful teachings of John Coltrane, he reverted to a very sophisticated, clean-cut manner of playing. Szabo also would frequently look to reinvent pop standards rather than push his music into the uncharted, atonal areas of the late 60s jazz explorations, so he often looked to the emerging rock scene for inspiration with the likes of Carlos Santana, George Harrison and Eric Clapton acting as substantial influences. Maybe because he was always looking towards the commercial side of jazz, Szabo is not typically mentioned with the great individual musicians during that unparalleled era of musical innovativeness, but his enchanting, sophisticated, mellifluous and literate style of guitar playing still has a resounding emotional impact some 25 years after his passing. Albums like 1966’s Spellbinder still act as invigorating peeks into a brand of jazz that is as breezy as it is soul plucking. It’s exotic music without a particular geographic or temporal locale making Szabo that much more mysterious and hypnotizing.

Born in Budapest, Hungary in 1936, Gábor István Szabó’s came from humble beginnings. Inspired by a guitar-wielding Roy Rogers in one of his many cowboy movies of the late 40s, a teenage Szabo received one lesson on his poorly made acoustic and proceeded to develop a style so individual, it’s foundation was in his own improvised fingering system. His musical education came mostly from the local Hungarian folk and gypsy musicians, but his tastes were significantly widened after hearing Willis Conover’s influential Jazz Hour on the internationally broadcasted Voice of America in the mid-50s. This new interest in America culture no doubt spurred his departure from Hungary to the States on the eve of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, which briefly opened the borders with Hungary’s temporary withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact. The twenty-year-old Szabo eventually lead his family and girlfriend to San Bernadino, California with only his guitar strapped to his back and his eyes fixed on musical stardom.

Like all young musicians, Szabo had to fail a number of times before blooming into the musician he is known as today. The first group he formed in Los Angeles, the Three Strings, failed to make any sort of impact and Szabo was forced to work as a janitor while setting his sights on attending the Berklee School of Music in Boston to receive a formal education. By 1958 he did just that and attended the influential school for four terms where he developed his composition skills as well as the metallic but mellifluous guitar style that would become his signature sound. While in Boston, Szabo participated in the much-acclaimed 1958 Newport Jazz Festival where he befriended Chico Hamilton, a L.A. drummer best known for his talent scouting skills. Hamilton, who had been playing with Charles Mingues, Dexter Gordon and Illinois Jacquet, was currently sporting innovative reedman Eric Dolphy in his group and looking to replace guitarist John Pisano. The pairing of Szabo and Hamilton proved to be a substantial team, and from 1960 to 1965 Szabo rose through the ranks and eventually became the prominent soloist, primary composer and star of the quintet. Hamilton continuously encouraged the blooming guitarist to stem out on his own, and while Szabo continued to record with the drummer’s group, he began to collaborate with fellow Berklee student Gary McFarland, a renowned orchestral jazz arranger who shared Szabo’s increasing interest in more harmonious music than the budding spiritual jazz scene. After two albums under McFarland’s name, Soft Samba and The In Sound on Verve, the duo recorded Szabo’s solo debut, Gypsy ’66 on Impulse!, which established his penchant for successfully branding pop tunes, this time The Beatles’ “Yesterday” and “If I Fell” and Burt Bacharach’s “Walk on By” and “The Last One to Be Loved,” with his own style. It garnished enough attention to inspire a follow-up just six months later, the excellent Spellbinder.

I think Spellbinder, released in May of 1966 on Impulse!, is such an invigorating and defining album for Szabo because it captures his guitar style matured but not yet completely developed. At somewhat of a crossroads, he has a good grasp of jazz, pop and Hungarian folk music and was just beginning to experiment with flourishes of Indian raga, Latin percussion and improvisation. Spellbinder features Szabo’s youthful, exploratory spirit with masterful musicianship, an absolute potent combination in any setting. Szabo’s lyrical and humble electric guitar is backed by the non-evasive drumming of Chico Hamilton, the elegant bass playing of Ron Carter and embellished by by the swinging Latin percussion of Willie Bobo and Victor Pantoja. They seemed to touch upon just the right combination of pop standards, originals and improvs that fans of both jazz and pop music came to embrace the album. Szabo’s guitar is certainly the center of attention, but not in a showy kind of way. His springy, even-toned electric tiptoes and two-steps over the intricate grooves laid down by the incredibly talented rhythm section creating a breezy and exotic psychedelia vibe. It’s both technically impressive and melodically pleasant, which makes his re-imaginings of standard pop tunes like the Coleman/Leigh-penned “Witchcraft” and “It Was a Very Good Year” (popularized by Sinatra) or Sonny Bono’s “Band Bang (She Shot Me Down)” so infectious and individualistic. Szabo takes the recognizable melodies, strings out the themes and then proceeds to snake through them effortlessly all the while caringly garnishing with somber, droning strings, flurries of improvised arpeggios and almost bossa nova-like rhythms. Originals like “Spellbinder,” “Cheetah,” and most importantly “Gypsy Queen” showcase Szabo’s increasingly proficient and innovative composition skills. Admirer and friend Carlos Santana included a brief rendition of “Gypsy Queen” in his widely famous cover of Fleetwood Mac’s “Black Magic Woman” in 1970, which would keep royalties rolling in for many years to come. In fact, Santana reportedly cites that hearing Spellbinder forced a turning point in his career inspiring him to stem out from the blues he was purveying to concentrate on crossover possibilities incorporating in jazz, Latin and rock music. To many, Spellbinder marks the peak of Szabo’s career though it was only his second album, mostly because he would never quite parallel this particular combination of youthful exploration and popular accessibility (his later albums sometimes weighed to heavily on the latter).

The rest of the 60s saw Szabo explore a few different musical paths, most notably being influenced by Ravi Shankar and picking up the sitar in 1966. Featuring a budding Bernard Purdie on drums, Jazz Raga found Szabo overdubbing sitar over his own guitar playing equally infusing his jazz chops with Shankar’s Indian style and heavy inspiration from rock guitarists like George Harrison and Eric Clapton. In 1967, he once again hit a chord with the jazz audiences thanks to his recommended live recordings The Sorcerer and More Sorcery. This was probably the peak of his popularity as at the time he was living in Hollywood, neighbor to Elizabeth Taylor and Katherine Hepburn, and starting Sky Recording Co. with McFarland and vibraphonist Cal Tjader, which put out one of my personal favorite album of his pop/rock covers, Gabor Szabo 1969. Though the Skye label only lasted a couple years, it did result in teaming with Lena Horne for yet another boost in popularity with Lena & Gabor. In the 70s, Szabo went in an increasingly pop and rock-influenced jazz direction that while producing a couple well received albums like 1970’s High Contrast with Bobby Womack and 1972’s Mizrab, further separated him from the jazz crowd. He returned to Hungary in the latter half of the 70s to reunite with family and even joined the Church of Scientology upon his return to the States in an attempt to kick the lingering heroin habit he developed in the mid-60s. Though it did result in a productive friendship with Chick Corea, his association with the church turned sour even escalating to a failed $21 million lawsuit. In the early 80s, a frustrated and sickly Szabo returned to his home in Hungary where he spent his final years before succumbing to liver and kidney ailments in 1982. While not the most acclaimed jazz guitarist, Gabor Szabo was certainly influential with his meshing of styles and he left behind an incredibly enjoyable discography of masterful guitar playing and pleasant pop grooves.