Pat Martino at the 1967 Berkeley Jazz Festival. In 1980 Pat suffered a severe brain aneurysm that nearly killed him and left him without a memory or an ability to play the guitar. At the age of 36 he started to relearn guitar and became a top player in jazz again until he passed at the age of 77.
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specifically, what happened was the surgery he had to have to remove the aneurysm and save his life involved the part of his brain where the memories of playing were stored. he said he actually preferred how he played after he relearned to play. i saw him in person at ronnie scott’s in 2005. sat four feet away from the stage. it was pretty great.
Wow that’s inspiring … I’ve lost all my skill due to a few years of self-medication (in the worse sense) and have been clean for a year completely terrified of my guitar
A monster player before and after the aneurysm. His swing and deep groove didn’t change much as far as I could tell. Maybe the rhythm part of his brain went through intact.