Plas Johnson

Plas John Johnson Jr. ( born July 21, 1931 in Donaldsonville, Louisiana) is an American tenor saxophonist of the hard bop and soul jazz. He will be remembered for his play in Henry Mancini's " The Pink Panther Theme ".

Life and work

Plas Johnson learned soprano saxophone by his father and studied at the Westlake School of Music in Los Angeles. He took with his brother Ray, a pianist, the late 1940s as The Brothers Johnson in New Orleans on plates; after that he toured with the rhythm and blues singer Charles Brown. After his military service, he moved to Los Angeles, where he worked in the studios as a session musician and accompanied artists such as BB King and Johnny Otis, and many other musicians in the R & B scene. An early supporter was Maxwell Davis, who hired him for recording sessions for the record label Modern Records.

Mid-1950s, Johnson worked for the label, Capitol Records and worked on many recordings, as Peggy Lee, Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra and others. As a session musician he worked for the next twenty years in a wide musical spectrum, including film music and rock ' n ' roll, as for title of Ricky Nelson. He participated also in many albums by the Beach Boys and was a member of popular instrumental bands such as B. Bumble & the Stingers. 1957/8, he played with Irving Ashby. In addition, he contributed to recordings of many jazz musicians, such as Benny Carter (1959 ), Johnny Hartman, Les McCann, Gerald Wilson and Zoot Sims.

In 1963 he was involved in the recording of the legendary "Pink Panther theme " ( The Pink Panther). He had solos even with themed music from television series like The Odd Couple. In addition, Johnson participated in recording sessions of the Motown label and played on hits by Marvin Gaye, The Supremes and others with. In the early 1960s he also took his own boards under the pseudonym Johnny Beecher on ( Sax Fifth Avenue, 1962).

In 1970 he played in the house band of the Merv Griffin Show. Over the next fifteen years he worked also regularly with musicians such as Ray Brown, Jimmy Cheatham, Herb Ellis ( 1974/5 ), Nat Pierce, Jake Hanna, Gene Harris ( European tour 1990), Benny Powell, Jack Sheldon and Kai Winding together and occasionally performed at jazz festivals. In 1991, he was with the Newport Festival All Stars in Europe. Furthermore, he laid albums under his own name in front of as Hot, Blue & Saxy, Evening Delight or Keep That Groove Going! ( with Red Holloway ).