Gary McFarland

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Gary McFarland (born October 23, 1933) was a largely self-taught jazz vibraphonist, composer, arranger and vocalist, prominent on Verve and Impulse! Records during the 1960s, when he made "one of the more significant contributors to orchestral jazz".^[1] He attained a small following after working with Bill Evans, Gerry Mulligan, Johnny Hodges, John Lewis, Stan Getz, Bob Brookmeyer, and Anita O'Day, but is largely forgotten today.

As well as his own albums and arrangements for other musicians he also composed the soundtrack to the film "13" (also known as "Eye Of The Devil"). By the end of the 1960s he was moving away from jazz towards an often wistful or melancholy style of instrumental pop, as well as producing the recordings of other artists on his Skye Records label (run in partnership with Gabor Szabo and Cal Tjader until its eventual bankruptcy in 1970). He was considering a move into writing and arranging for film and stage when, on 2 November 1971, he was poisoned by a drink spiked with methadone in a New York City bar.

[edit] Discography

Point Of Departure (1963, Impulse!)
Soft Samba (1964, Verve Records)
Tijuana Jazz (1965, Impulse!)
The In Sound (1965, Verve Records)
Profiles (1966, Impulse!)
Simpatico (1966, Impulse!) w/Gábor Szabó
The October Suite (with Steve Kuhn) (1967, Impulse!)
Does The Sun Really Shine On The Moon? (1968, Skye Records)
Scorpio And Other Signs (1968, Verve Records)
America The Beautiful: An Account Of Its Disappearance (1968, Skye Records)
Today (1969, Skye Records)
Butterscotch Rum (with Peter Smith) (1971, Buddah Records)
Requiem for Gary McFarland (1972, Cobblestone Records)
Eye Of The Devil (recorded 1966 but first released 2008, Phantom Sound & Vision)