Bucky Pizzarelli, guitarist, innovator, leader and sideman-beyond-compare has joined the Coronavirus toll.*

One of the most renowned names in swing jazz guitar, Pizzarelli and his famed 7-string guitar spent more than 20 years on NBC and ABC TV, first with Johnny Carson’s The Tonight Show and then The Dick Cavett Show; he recorded thousands of sessions, ranging from Ray Charles’ “Georgia” to Dion’s “The Wanderer” to Bryan Hyland’s “Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini” to Sir Paul McCartney’s 2012 standards album, Kisses on the Bottom, but never stopped playing live. He told Elmore that adding the extra, low-A string allowed him to play solo gigs, without a bassist.

“I toured with Benny Goodman until he died—all because he saw me solo on The Tonight Show,” Pizzarelli recalled. “In 1968, half the Tonight Show band would get on a plane on Friday after the TV show and play the weekend with Sinatra in Chicago or Baltimore or Detroit—you name it,” Pizzarelli told Elmore in 2007. “Monday morning we’d fly back to New York.” In addition, he performed at the White House for Presidents Reagan and Clinton and worked with countless other musicians, including Les Paul, Miles Davis, Sarah Vaughan, Tony Bennett, Stéphane Grappelli, Dizzy Gillespie and Nat King Cole.

Bright, unassuming and hardworking, Pizzarelli passed on his talents and his sly sense of humor to his two sons, bassist Martin and guitarist John Jr., with whom he often played.

Always ready when the phone rang, he’d head to London for a week of shows with Rufus Wainwright or the West Coast for sessions with McCartney. “I love the freedom of playing live,” he said. “They call, and boom—if I’m open—I go. That’s what great about the music business.”

Bucky Pizzarelli leaves behind his wife Ruth, two sons, two daughters, four grandchildren, millions of fans, and a rich legacy that will last as long as music.

—Suzanne Cadgène

*A week to the day after Bucky passed away, Ruth, his beloved wife of 66 years, joined him.