Wesward Ho, or A Day in the Life

The time is 1943. Scene: the 440 Club in Indianapolis. A chunky, exuberant 20-year-old named Wes Montgomery sits on the bandstand. Inspired by the recordings of the great jazz guitarist Charlie Christian ("they burned my ears"), he has bought a guitar with his day-laborer's wages and learned Christian's solos by rote. Now, in his first professional appearance, he plays them through faultlessly.

Listeners at the tables (astonished):

More! More!

Wes plays the same solos through again, note for note. They are all that he has learned so far. Except for them, he can barely pick out a scale.

Other musicians: No, man. Improvise like we do.

Cut to San Francisco's Jazz Workshop in 1960. Wes has learned to improvise, to say the least. But only now, at 37, has he finally budged from In dianapolis in order to join his brothers Monk and Buddy in a group called the Mastersounds. His playing, though bristling with authority, is unorthodox: he plucks the strings with his thumb in stead of his fingers or a plectrum, giving a rounded, intense tone, and he phrases in short, jabbing bursts instead of the looping legatos of most post-Christian guitarists. Enter Jazz Critic Ralph Gleason.

Gleason: You're the most exciting and original jazz guitarist in a decade.

Wes: For a long time guys have told me my playing is different, but I couldn't hear it myself. I thought they just wanted me to buy them a drink.

Cut to a recording studio just outside Manhattan in 1965. Wes is now firmly ensconced as the top guitarist in jazz, admired and imitated by fellow musicians, triumphant in critics' polls. But in the commercial music world beyond jazz he is still a nonentity. Enter Record Producer Creed Taylor.

Taylor: Your records haven't sold very well. My idea is for you to adapt established hits like Coin' Out of My Head and record them with big orchestras—strings, woodwinds, the works.

Wes: Man, to me that would be as bad as doing Elvis Presley tunes. Besides, technically I don't know what I'm doing. I get nervous when I see other musicians with paper all over their stands—and me with nothing.

Taylor: Try it. I'll send you tapes of the songs in advance so you can learn the melodies. Then in the studio I'll talk you through the arrangements.

Cut to the present. Scene: a jazz club anywhere. Starting with Coin' Out of My Head, Wes's pop-jazz albums have brought a huge, diverse new audience thronging to his in-person appearances. For a solid nine months, one or the other of his recordings has held the No. 1 spot in Billboard's bestseller chart of jazz LPs. This week A Day in the Life, which has sold a whopping 250,000 copies, is at the top of the chart for the 32nd consecutive week.

Chorus of jazz purists: You're popular! You have an accountant, a lawyer, a publicity man. You've sold out.

Wes: Jazz or any other music doesn't mean anything if you just play for yourself. You've got to project it to people.