Imagine picking up the double bass at 18 only because a music education degree at Ithaca College required a string instrument, then completely reinventing how the instrument is played before your 26th birthday. That is the story of Rocco Scott LaFaro, and this episode explores how a restless kid from Geneva, New York, who bounced from piano to bass clarinet to tenor saxophone, became obsessed with the bass within three months and went on to change the DNA of jazz.

We follow his move from the Buddy Morrow big band to Los Angeles, where he practiced clarinet sheet music on a six-foot bass and adopted an independent two-finger plucking technique from Red Mitchell, then into gigs with Chet Baker, Benny Goodman, Victor Feldman, and Hampton Hawes. The conversation centers on the Bill Evans Trio with drummer Paul Motian, where LaFaro's counter-mel ...