Johnny Smith, acclaimed jazz guitarist, dies at 90 - Washington Post

The sumptuous melodic style, understated precision and remarkable consistency of Mr. Smith's playing over the decades brought him countless admirers at the highest levels of his craft. Those he accompanied included clarinetist Benny Goodman, saxophonist Stan Getz, singers Bing Crosby and Beverly Kenney, and pianist Hank Jones.

A hallmark of Mr. Smith's playing was an intricate but seemingly effortless approach to jazz and bossa nova standards.

"He took very logical solos, like someone had written them all out ahead of time, but that was not the case," said Vincent Pelote, acting director of the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University. "That's how organized a mind he had, and he had the technical ability to pull it all off. And that's what floored a lot of musicians, too."

Mr. Smith was largely self-taught as a guitarist and worked his way into the top ranks of New York's music scene in the late 1940s. He played on the radio with the NBC studio orchestra, led by conductor Arturo Toscanini, and performed on the concert stage daunting works by Arnold Schoenberg under conductor Dimitri Mitropoulos.

Mr. Smith also was immersed in the jazz world. After committing himself to a solo career in the early 1950s, he became a mainstay of the New York nightclub Birdland.

His recording breakthrough was the 1952 album "Moonlight in Vermont," in which he led a quintet that included Getz. The title song, which became one of the best-selling jazz singles of the era, was nothing short of virtuosic — a marriage of exquisite delicacy, dexterity and surprise.

Mr. Smith starts "Moonlight in Vermont" by creating the melody as a series of chords instead of single notes, which is hard to pull off. He said he settled on the technique after seeing a musician play a Hammond organ.

"The hardest thing to do on the guitar, is to play a melodic chord progression in smooth, even fashion without leaving space between chords," he told the Colorado Springs Independent. "Then one day I noticed how an organist managed to keep a tone going between chords by holding down one of the notes of the chord while he pivoted to the next chord. I picked up on that and applied it to chord progressions on the guitar."

His most enduring composition was "Walk, Don't Run," recorded by Mr. Smith in 1954 and later covered by guitarist Chet Atkins. The Atkins version inspired the Ventures, whose interpretation became a pop hit in the early 1960s.

Mr. Smith toured in bands led by Count Basie and Stan Kenton and was frequently listed in magazine polls as a favorite jazz guitarist in the 1950s. At the peak of his career, he left the jazz center of New York for Colorado. His wife had died in childbirth in 1958. As the only caregiver for their 4-year-old daughter, he decided to raise her in Colorado Springs, where he had family.