Jazz/fusion emerged as a musical subgenre from the late 1960s through the mid-1970s by blending traditional acoustic jazz with instruments more associated with rock, namely electric guitar. And some names rose to the fore in the process that are now practically household, including guitarists John McLaughlin, Pat Metheny, Allan Holdsworth, Jeff Beck, and Larry Carlton.
Carlton, a 74-year-old native of Torrance, Calif., (www.larrycarlton335.com) appears at the Funky Biscuit in Boca Raton for four shows between July 23 and 24. Which in itself constitutes major news, but that takes on greater context because the guitarist is the headliner for the venue’s four-night 11th anniversary celebration, preceded by singing blues guitarist Joanna Connor (July 20), folk/pop icons Pure Prairie League (July 21), and veteran roots music quintet the Honey Island Swamp Band (July 22).
To sweeten the pot, Carlton — whose lengthy Los Angeles session career included work with Joni Mitchell, Michael Jackson, Joan Baez, Tom Scott, Linda Ronstadt, Donald Fagen, and hundreds of others — will play not only the all-instrumental “Greatest Hits” from throughout his 50-plus-year solo recording career, but also selections from the jazz/fusion and heady pop bands he’s most associated with, The Crusaders and Steely Dan.
“I’ll really focus on that period of my career for these shows,” Carlton says by phone from his home in Lebanon, Tenn. “So it’ll be some of my material that people most expect to hear, plus a focus on two bands that were very popular, and in which my guitar made substantial statements. Each show will be roughly evenly split between my tunes and the familiar ones I played on with those two bands.”
The Crusaders were led by pianist Joe Sample (1939-2014), who relocated the traditional acoustic band from his native Houston to Los Angeles as The Jazz Crusaders in the early 1960s. A decade later, through the inclusion of Carlton and Sample’s addition of electronic keyboards, the group shortened its name, fused elements of funk and pop, and found commercial success. The guitarist was part of the group’s apex through the ’70s, including the albums Southern Comfort (1974), Chain Reaction (1975), and Those Southern Knights (1976).
“Those guys were all big influences on my playing,” Carlton says. “Especially Joe. Harmonically, it was so great to be able to hear everything he could do, every night, on a consistent basis for years. That was great input for my ears.”
Carlton’s longtime use of Gibson guitars has his name intertwined with the company’s in both his website address (which features the number associated with the guitar maker’s famed, hollow-bodied electric ES-335 model) and his former longtime private recording studio, Room 335 in Los Angeles. That location, however, was where the four-time Grammy Award winner’s career was interrupted, and his life nearly cut short, in 1988. Shot in the throat during an act of random violence, Carlton suffered a shattered vocal cord and significant nerve damage, putting his playing on hold because of the subsequent hospitalization and rehab and effectively ending his singing career.
“I only have one vocal cord that works now, so I’m all-instrumental,” Carlton says. “I’m thankful that I can still talk, and feel very fortunate. I sold that studio when I moved east to Tennessee years ago. But here at my lake house, I have a studio with a Pro Tools recording setup in my basement. For a recent album I did with [fellow guitarist] Paul Brown [Soul Searchin’, 2021], he produced everything in L.A., just sending me the tracks, and I did my overdubs downstairs and sent them back to him. I hadn’t done much recording over the past 12 to 14 years, but the opportunity came up because everybody was homebound because of COVID.”
The veteran guitarist has a son, acclaimed bassist Travis Carlton, who’s recorded with a next-generation fusion guitar hero in West Palm Beach-born, Los Angeles-based Scott Henderson. At the Funky Biscuit, the son will join his father on stage for favorites like Best Pop Instrumental Performance Grammy winners “Theme From Hill Street Blues” and “Minute By Minute,” and the Crusaders and Steely Dan material.
“Travis has also toured with [guitarist] Robben Ford, and just started touring with [drummer] Steve Gadd,” Carlton says. “I’ll also have John Ferraro on drums, who I discovered in L.A. when he was in his early 20s. Quinn Johnson, a first-time player with me, will be on keyboards. And I’ll have two horn players, Barry Green on trombone and Mark Douthit on tenor saxophone. They’ll help us get that Crusaders sound. And on the Steely Dan material as well.”
Formed by singing keyboardist Fagen and guitarist/vocalist Walter Becker (1950-2017) in 1971, the still-active Steely Dan has fused pop, jazz, rock, blues and R&B into its own unique synthesis ever since. And Carlton was part of one of the group’s most creative and productive periods between 1975 and 1980, as one of several prominent guitarists on the albums Katy Lied, The Royal Scam, Aja, and Gaucho.
In fact, when the online music site Gooseneck ran a 2020 poll of 100 readers to name “Steely Dan’s Greatest Guitar Solos,” it was Carlton’s momentous break on “Kid Charlemagne” (from The Royal Scam) that won over other banner solos by himself (“Third World Man”), Becker (“Home At Last”), Elliott Randall (“Reelin’ In the Years”), Denny Dias (“Aja”), Dean Parks (“Haitian Divorce”), Jay Graydon (“Peg”), and Jeff “Skunk” Baxter (“Bodhisattva,” “My Old School,” “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number”).
“If ‘The Royal Scam’ is the definitive Steely Dan guitar record,” Becker said afterward, “then Larry Carlton is the reason why.” Fagen has estimated that the guitarist only required two takes to complete “Kid Charlemagne.”
“Sometimes you play something one night and the world agrees,” says Carlton. “You can’t plan those blessings. ‘The Royal Scam’ was the first record where my function was to chart everything from their demo tapes. So those creative voicings that make them sound like Steely Dan were obviously already built into the tunes. But for my overdubs, they just had me come in and play. When I was soloing, there wasn’t much input from Donald or Walter. I’d done some live shows with them, and they actually remembered what they wanted in detail more than I did, because I was so busy at that time with session work.”
The Funky Biscuit opened in July of 2011 primarily as a stately blues venue, booking some of the artists previously featured at the Bamboo Room in Lake Worth, which has since turned into a dance music club featuring mostly deejays. In recent years, though, the Boca Raton destination has delved further into jazz/fusion, booking acts like the trio Aristocrats, the quintet ProgJect, bands led by famed fusion drummers Billy Cobham and Simon Phillips, and the trio of Israeli guitarist Oz Noy.
In addition to closing the venue’s 11th anniversary weekend, Carlton’s shows will be part of a career de-acceleration as the legendary guitarist heads toward an eventual retirement, meaning an appearance at any venue could be his live coda there.
“I’ll take everything that comes in this year that I want to take,” says Carlton, who’d returned from a COVID-delayed tour of Japan only days earlier, “and probably next year, when I’m 75. After that, I’ll probably only do 20-30 shows a year. No more years of 60-80 shows, or tours of Europe, going from venue to venue and country to country in a van. It’ll be time to enjoy my family more. And go fishing.”
If You Go
Larry Carlton performs Greatest Hits/Steely Dan at 6 p.m. July 23, Greatest Hits No. 2/The Crusaders Remembered at 9 p.m. July 23; Greatest Hits No. 2/The Crusaders Remembered at 6 p.m. July 24, and Greatest Hits/Steely Dan at 9 p.m. July 24.
Tickets: $60-$90
Info: 561-395-2929 or 561-465-3946, funkybiscuit.com