Collection
The Joe Zawinul Collection contains extensive materials from all phases of his work and documents Zawinul's work in all its breadth. In addition, the collection consists of numerous life documents dating back to his early childhood in Austria, selected private and professional correspondence, and various collectibles.
Joe Zawinul Collection:
Works
- Music manuscripts (handwritten drafts, fair copies)
- Orchestrations
- Performance versions
- Supplementary material (drawings, arrangements by third parties, texts by third parties, film scripts and screenplays by third parties)
Correspondence
- Letters from Joe Zawinul to his parents
- Business correspondence
- Correspondence from musicians and colleagues
Life documents
- Notebooks, diaries, tour books
- ID cards, certificates and other official documents
- Private and professional financial and legal documents
- Studio recording documents
Collectibles
- Photographs
- Awards
- Press documentation
- Posters
- Scores
- Small instruments
- Artistic works of third parties
Biography
Joseph "Joe" Zawinul was born in Vienna on July 7, 1932. He grew up in Vienna/Erdberg and in the Vienna Woods community of Oberkirchbach, where his mother's relatives ran a farm. At his grandfather Leopold Hameder's farm, Zawinul was involved in music from a young age: his Viennese grandfather bought him an accordion, and he regularly played for his relatives in the countryside. In Vienna, Zawinul studied classical violin and piano at the conservatory, but he already developed a passion for dance and jazz music as a teenager.
In 1944, Zawinul heard "Honeysuckle Rose", the first jazz piece of his life. He was already playing jazz at school after the war, including with his schoolmate, the future Federal President Thomas Klestil (clarinet). From 1951, he played in Johannes Fehring's dance orchestra and from there joined the Austrian All Stars with saxophonist Hans Salomon. At a performance in Seefeld in Tyrol, he was discovered by the clarinetist Franz Pressler, alias Fatty George, whose Two-Sound band he joined. The Viennese music world soon became too small for the ambitious musician Zawinul: he longed for America, the birthplace of jazz.
In 1959, Zawinul received a scholarship to the Berklee College of Music in Boston, a school of music founded in 1945 that quickly developed into a training ground for talented jazz musicians. Zawinul travelled across the Atlantic to New York by ship and quickly established himself in the scene around the legendary jazz venue Birdland. He played in the Maynard Ferguson Big Band with the singer Dinah Washington and, from 1961, in the band of saxophonist Cannonball Adderley. In this ensemble, he also flourished as a successful composer, penning "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" in 1966, one of the most-played jazz pieces worldwide.
In 1969, Zawinul made jazz history together with trumpeter Miles Davis: his use of synthesizers on the album "Bitches Brew" set the style for the fusion of jazz and rock. With his band Weather Report, founded in 1971, Zawinul became a pioneer in playing electronic keyboard instruments. The band became a globally acclaimed live act and recorded a total of 15 albums. The piece of music called "Birdland" (1977), composed by Zawinul, finally lifted him into the jazz Olympus. With the Zawinul Syndicate project, Zawinul shaped another pioneering genre from the end of the 1980s: "world music". Over the course of his career, Zawinul successfully bridged the gap between the European musical tradition and African-American styles as well as the fusion of acoustic and electronic music. His impact as a musical innovator extends to the present day.
Joe Zawinul passed away on September 11, 2007, in Vienna.