Guitarist’s Heart Is in the Jazz World : Rick Zunigar left touring with Stevie Wonder to write and play ‘real music.’

There were the days when guitarist Rick Zunigar was touring with Stevie Wonder or the Crusad ers, but now he’s pretty low-key, mostly hanging out, writing a book and playing occasional engagements at area jazz haunts.

Zunigar, who lives in Reseda, says he doesn’t miss the thrills and spills of life in the musical big time: “I had that already. Now I want to get out and play some real music.” He plays with his quartet tonight at Jax.

Not that Zunigar didn’t like playing with Wonder, with whom he toured from 1979 to 1986. After recording seven albums with the pop star, including “Secret Life of Plants” and “Hotter Than July,” he considers Wonder “the most influential guy” in pop music, besides the Beatles. “His stuff isn’t simple,” Zunigar said. “He writes these nice melodies and good chord progressions to solo over.”

Still, even if he made a lot of money playing in pop’s fast lane, Zunigar’s heart is in the jazz world. He fell in love with guitar whiz Wes Montgomery’s sound and style as a teen-ager, and the bloom is still on the relationship, even if big bucks aren’t part of it.

“Jazz obviously is not about the money,” said Zunigar, 40. It goes back to the basic love of the music, he said.

A native of Queens, N.Y., who moved to Los Angeles with his family in 1960, Zunigar said: “When I was a kid, I was mesmerized by music in general, and jazz in particular. It was a whole feeling that it gave me. It was like a friend when everyone else wasn’t, a close buddy in all situations.”

Once strictly a melody-driven be-bopper in the Joe Pass-Montgomery vein, Zunigar changed his approach some years back when he began to discover such 20th-Century classical giants as Paul Hindemith, Bela Bartok and Arnold Schoenberg. Now his playing, though still revealing the impact of the Pass-Montgomery school and consistently propelled by a glowing, radiant sound, also exhibits the profound influence of those classical masters.

“I’m a be-bopper with a 20th-Century attitude,” he said. “Hindemith and others got me thinking differently about sound textures, dissonances. They have a different language than jazz musicians, who talk about chords and scales.”

Zunigar said he started to visualize music from the standpoint of intervals rather than the traditional scales. This approach could be described as someone bounding up a staircase and landing on every third step, as opposed to someone who landed on every step.

“It feels natural to me, and as I dive into it, it works; it takes me new places,” he said. “But I’m able to do this, break the old rules, only because I know about traditional jazz concepts.”

In the book he’s writing on guitar technique, Zunigar has drawn a lot of his current philosophies from the directions espoused by Hindemith and others. The book, about three-quarters finished, is designed to help students find “ways to create their own ideas, find new possibilities,” Zunigar said.

One staunch fan is John Sterling, producer of “The Jazz Network” cable TV show, on which Zunigar has been a guest several times.

At Jax, Zunigar will offer mostly jazz standards, working with a band that includes saxman Benn Clatworthy, bassist Troy Millard and drummer Dick Weller.

What’s next? “I hope to make an album and get out and do some touring, maybe get to Europe,” he said. “But I haven’t made an album since 1988’s ‘New Frontier’ on Head First Records, and these days, you need the thrust of a new album to get hired.”

Where and When Who: Guitarist Rick Zunigar. Location: Jax, 339 N. Brand Blvd., Glendale. Hours: 9 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. tonight. Price: No cover, no minimum. Call: (818) 500-1604.