Carol Kaye “From The Projects To VIP Studio Musician” was born in Everett, Washington on March 24, 1935, to musician parents, Clyde and Dot Smith, both professionals. She has played and taught guitar professionally since 1949, played bebop jazz guitar in dozens of nightclubs around Los Angeles with top groups (also in Bob Neal’s jazz group with Jack Sheldon backing Lenny Bruce, with Teddy Edwards, Billy Higgins etc.), accidentally got into studio work late 1957 with the Sam Cooke recordings and other big recordings on guitar for the 1st 5 years of studio work in Hollywood.
In 1963 when a Fender bassist didn’t show up for a record date at Capitol Records, she picked up the Fender bass (as it was called then) and augmented her busy schedule playing bass and grew quickly to be the no. 1 call with record companies, movie & TV film people, commericals (ads), and industrial films. She enjoyed working under the direction of Michel LeGrand, Quincy Jones, Elmer Bernstein, Lalo Schifrin, David Rose, David Grusin, Ernie Freeman, Hugo Montenegro, Leonard Rosenman, John Williams, Alfred & Lionel Newman, etc. as well as the numerous hits she recorded for hundreds of recording artists.
Beginning in 1969, she wrote her first of many bass tutoring books, “How To Play The Electric Bass” effectively changing the name of Fender Bass to Electric Bass and began teaching 100s of Electric Bass students, many of them now famous themselves.
Her tutors are endorsed by such notables as Professor Joel Leach, 10-year winner of the Pacific Jazz Festival Awards with his famous Cal-State Northridge Jazz Bands, and Plas Johnson, jazz/blues studio sax legend (“Pink Panther”). She stepped out to perform live with the Hampton Hawes Jazz Trio in the mid 70s, has given many seminars all over the USA, and is a leader in Electric Bass education.
Bass used in 1960s studio work: Fender Precision w/Fender Flatwound Strings, always with a pick. Fender Concertone 4-10 amp, then in late 60s, Versatone amp
Having to adapt to whatever the session might throw their way, these studio giants had to be able to sight-read sheet music as well as be top-drawer improvisers, well accustomed to adapting to those times when they’d merely be given a chord chart.
“Studio time was very expensive in those days. You’d have to record three or four tunes in three hours. We’d never heard the music before and had to be able to invent our lines and make sure the music sounded good. If you didn’t, you never got hired again. It was that simple!” Carol states. “The producers were there to make hit records and they booked the musicians that could deliver musically as well as be ultra professional on the record date.
Lifetime Achievement Award, Pittsburgh Jazz Society, Duquesne University, “Outstanding Dedication to Bass Performance and Pedagogy” and Lifetime Achievement Award from Bass Player Magazine 2008
Source: Carole Kaye Website, Guiter World Mag
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