Rotella Gives Proof at Rocco: Jazz Guitar Rules on Mondays

John Pisano’s Monday night guitar sessions at Rocco in Bel-Air are rapidly becoming an effective antidote for the start-of-the-week blues.

The atmosphere is relaxed and casual, and each Monday brings a slightly different perspective on the art of jazz guitar playing. With the guitar clearly the prominent instrument of the last few decades, Pisano--who occasionally adds his own guitar to the mix--is not likely to have any problem maintaining an attractive schedule of players.

Thom Rotella, who appeared at Rocco Monday night, has a fairly widespread reputation as a smooth jazz guitarist. But the trio he showed up with--Bill Cunliffe on organ and Ray Brinker on drums--was a straight-down-the-middle mainstream jazz group.

The influence of Wes Montgomery was ever-present in Rotella’s soloing, which made frequent use of the famous Montgomery technique of playing octave lines. But Rotella varied the style by adding rapid-fire single note lines and heavily rhythmic chording to his always probing solos.

Cunliffe was a perfect musical partner. Although he is far better known as a pianist (he is a regular in the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra), his work on the Hammond organ revealed a comfortable familiarity with the instrument’s wide panoply of sounds. And his crisp, articulate improvising, melodically based but rhythmically driven, was frequently strong enough to steal the spotlight from the leader.

The program took a familiar format--a blues tune, a couple of Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock numbers, a standard or two and a Cunliffe original. But it was executed with impressive proficiency, especially in the pieces that were launched at high speed; Rotella and Cunliffe had no difficulty moving from languorous ballads to roaring up-tempos.

In that sense, their performance was similar to what one can expect on almost any Monday night at Rocco, when the jazz guitar rules.

* John Pisano’s Guitar Night at Rocco Ristorante, 2930 Beverly Glen Circle, Bel-Air, (310) 475-9807. Gene Bertoncini, Jan. 17; Frank Potenza, Jan. 24; John Stowell, Jan. 31. From 8:30 p.m. No cover.