Walt Namuth: Lost Guitarist

March 28, 2023

Walt Namuth: Lost Guitarist

All of the jazz musicians you know are familiar because they recorded and toured. Beyond these high-profile artists were hundreds of amazing musicians who never bothered to record because they weren't asked or weren't willing to leave home towns to tour to promote LPs. Each city had these under-recorded jazz legends who today are known only by name and reputation by those who remember them. Occasionally, if we're lucky, a tape is found or a home-made CD surfaces and we suddenly have an example of their work. [Photo above of Walt Namuth, center, in 1981]

One of these phantom legends was guitarist Walt Namuth, who recorded with a few prominent artists in the 1960s and early '70s but then preferred to stay close to home, which was Baltimore. In 1964, he recorded backing vocalist Ethel Ennis. In 1968, Namuth was hired by Buddy Rich and appears on one of the drummer's best big band albums of the period—Mercy, Mercy: Recorded Live at Caesar's Palace. He can be heard distinctly on Channel 1 Suite and he solos on Mercy, Mercy, Mercy, Preach and Teach and Big Mama Cass. His comping in the rhythm section throughout the album is a revelation. Later that year, he recorded with singer Lou Rawls on his album The Way It Was, and he recorded again with Rich on Stick It in 1972.

"So what?," you say. "Why should anyone care about this sideman vs. others?" Give a listen to this video of Namuth that Bill Kirchner sent along last week. Namuth is playing alone on There Will Never Be Another You. I guarantee you will listen to it over and over again. His chord voicings and sense of swing are spectacular...

Namuth grew up in Glen Burnie, Md., and attended music school after graduating high school. He tried to establish himself as a studio musician in Los Angeles and, in his spare time, created tapes of experimental music playing all of the instruments overdubbed. In July 1970, Earl Arnett, vocalist Ethel Ennis's second husband, writing in the Baltimore Sun, observed: "It is not easy to service this creative impulse. More than once, Mr. Namuth has offended other musicians by his insistence that the notes be played right. On other occasions, he has annoyed more established musicians by suggesting improvements. His intensity and absorption in music sometimes makes lesser musicians uncomfortable."

If you live in the Baltimore area and you have tapes of Namuth, please email me at [email protected] so I can refer you to record producers who would be interested in hearing what you have for the possible release of an album. This is how history is preserved.

Namuth died February 13, 2011, at age 68.

JazzWax tracks: Here's Namuth in July 1964 backing Ethel Ennis singing But Beautiful...

Here's Namuth with the Buddy Rich Big Band playing Channel 1 Suite...

Here's Mercy, Mercy, Mercy...

Here's Walt on guitar with Buddy Rich singing Bein' Green...

Here's Sassy Strut...

To the best of my knowledge, Namuth recorded only one small-group album as a leader—Left Bank '66, Walter Namuth's Quintet Featuring Mickey Fields (Left Bank Jazz Society) in 1966—and as a sideman, on The Dawn (American Record Society), a 1966 album with Leslie J. Schnierer on harpsichord, Namuth on guitar and Don Bailey on drums with the St. Anthony CYO Teen Club. You can hear it for free here...