![]() Kaukonen began his solo career several years prior to the breakup, when he recorded the 1974 album Quah. Casady left to form the new wave band SVT, while Kaukonen played as a solo act at venues that had been booked for Hot Tuna's cancelled 1978 tour. Hot Tuna toured vigorously throughout the 1970s in both the United States and Europe, but with Hot Tuna's break up in 1978, the first phase of the band's career ended. During this period, the trio was known for their very long live sets and instrumental jamming. At this time, Kaukonen's songwriting began to dominate, as further evidenced by the next album, The Phosphorescent Rat, which featured only one cover song.īeginning with their fifth album, America's Choice (1974), the addition of drummer Bob Steeler encouraged a rise in volume and a change of band personality-a rampaging, Cream-like rock with often quasimystical lyrics by Kaukonen. Hot Tuna scored an FM radio hit with "Ja Da (Keep on Truckin')" from their third (and first studio) album, Burgers. Amid the gradual dissolution of Jefferson Airplane from 1971 to 1973, Hot Tuna went electric in earnest, with Airplane fiddler Papa John Creach joining for the next two albums. The group's self-titled first album was a September 1969 live recording of this ensemble. A concurrent semi-acoustic configuration (including Kaukonen, Casady on electric bass and harmonica player Will Scarlett) enabled the guitarist to show off his Piedmont-style acoustic blues fingerpicking skills. This grouping (which came to include guitarist Paul Ziegler after the younger Kaukonen's departure) came to an end after an unsuccessful recording jaunt in Jamaica, the sessions of which have never been released. An early incarnation of Hot Tuna included Airplane vocalist Marty Balin, Kaukonen's brother Peter on rhythm guitar, and Joey Covington on drums and vocals. In 1969–70, Kaukonen and Casady formed Hot Tuna, a spinoff group that allowed them to play as long as they liked. Left to right: Jack Casady, Jorma Kaukonen, and Barry Mitterhoff King's " Rock Me Baby" " Third Week in the Chelsea," which detailed his feelings about the disintegration of the band and " Trial by Fire"-all of which he continues to play. Though never a prolific singer or songwriter during his Airplane tenure, Kaukonen contributed notable material to each of the group's albums, including the instrumental " Embryonic Journey" arrangements of the traditional " Good Shepherd" and B.B. ![]() ![]() With the group still looking for a name, Kaukonen suggested the name Jefferson Airplane, inspired by an eccentric friend who had given his dog the name " Blind Lemon Jefferson Airplane." When their original bass player was fired, Kaukonen recommended his friend Casady (who still lived in Washington at the time) as a replacement. As a self-described country blues purist, Kaukonen was initially reluctant, but found his imagination excited by the arsenal of effects available to electric guitar, later remarking that he was "sucked in" by technology. In 1965, friend and former Santa Clara classmate Paul Kantner invited Kaukonen to join a band he was forming with Marty Balin. He played as a solo act in coffee houses and accompanied Janis Joplin on acoustic guitar on the 1964 recording known as "The Typewriter Tapes" because of the obtrusive sound of Kaukonen's first wife, Margareta, typing in the background. During this time, he gave guitar lessons at Benner Music Company in San Jose. In 1962, Kaukonen moved to the San Francisco Bay Area and enrolled at the University of Santa Clara. Buchanan also introduced Kaukonen to the music of Reverend Gary Davis, whose songs have remained important parts of Kaukonen's repertoire throughout his career. Kaukonen departed Washington for studies at Antioch College, where friend Ian Buchanan taught him fingerstyle guitar playing. As a teenager in Washington, he and friend Jack Casady formed a band called The Triumphs, with Kaukonen on rhythm guitar and Casady on lead. During his childhood, the Kaukonen family lived in Pakistan, the Philippines, and other locales as they followed his father's State Department career from assignment to assignment before returning to the place of his birth. He is the older brother of Peter Kaukonen, who is also a musician. He had Finnish paternal grandparents and Russian Jewish ancestry on his mother's side. ![]() to Beatrice Love (née Levine) and Jorma Ludwik Kaukonen, Sr. Jorma Kaukonen was born in Washington, D.C.
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