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The musician collaborated with Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra and Peggy Lee
NEED TO KNOW
- Plas Johnson, the saxophonist behind the classic Pink Panther theme song, has died at age 94
- “He was blessed with a warm, full tone and beautiful phrasing that he carried with him his whole life,” said harmonica player Bob Corritore in a tribute
- Johnson collaborated with Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra and Peggy Lee
Plas Johnson, the saxophonist behind the classic Pink Panther theme song, has died.
The musician died on Wednesday, July 15, at his home in Los Angeles, his children Eric Johnson and Stephanie Oliver confirmed to The New York Times. He was 94.
His children said their father had recently performed at his retirement community.
Johnson died about a week before his 95th birthday on July 21.
Harmonica player and record producer Bob Corritore paid tribute to Johnson in a Facebook post on Sunday, July 19.
“I just heard that we lost saxophone master Plas Johnson,” he wrote. “Best known for his famous sax part on the Pink Panther theme, his mid 1950s sides were raw, rockin’ jump blues instrumentals!”
“The one time that I met him and tried to talk to him about those sides, which I find to be excellent, he dismissed them as primitive and beneath the Jazz eloquence that he later achieved. He was blessed with a warm, full tone and beautiful phrasing that he carried with him his whole life. A musician’s musician,” Corritore continued.
Johnson was born in Donaldsonville, La. in 1931 to a musical family. His father played banjo and saxophone while his mother played piano, per Concord.
Johnson made his professional debut at age 10. He performed as a singer before learning the saxophone.
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The musician moved to Los Angeles in 1965 and was introduced to Capitol Records. He went on to collaborate with several top artists, including Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra and Peggy Lee.
“My solos always seemed to bring the record up another notch. I could do that in eight bars, I could do that in 12 bars, and I was used to maybe [doing] fills behind the vocalist after that,” Johnson told Concord.
He is most known for being a soloist on Henry Mancini’s “The Pink Panther Theme” for the 1963 movie.
The movie ranks at No. 20 on the American Film Institute’s list of the 25 greatest film scores of all time.
Read the original article on People
