Lee Mack "Captain Fingers" Ritenour is a guitarist, recording artist, composer and producer. He began his career at the age of 16 and has appeared on over 3000 sessions, recorded over 40 albums, and has charted over 30 instrumental and vocal contemporary jazz hits since 1976. [1] He is probably best known for the hit "Is It You" in 1981. Ritenour is considered to be a pioneer in the smooth jazz and jazz-funk genres of music.

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Biography

Ritenour was born January 11 1952 in Los Angeles, California. He played his first session when he was 16 with the Mamas & the Papas and given the moniker, "Captain Fingers", because of his manual dexterity on the guitar. Ritenour was a sought-after session guitarist by the mid-1970s, and won Guitar Player Magazine's Best Studio Guitarist twice in the 1970's. He is noted for playing his red Gibson ES-335 and his Gibson L5 guitars.

Lee on stage One of his most notable influences is the pioneering jazz guitarist Wes Montgomery among others like Joe Pass, Kenny Burrell and John Mcglaughin. His prolific career includes a Grammy Award for the collaboration work Harlequin (1985), and 17 other Grammy nominations. Ritenour also holds the distinction of having two of the promotional videos for his songs "Is It You" and "Mr. Briefcase" being played during MTV's first day. Ritenour has been at the top of many guitar polls throughout the world.

Throughout his career, Ritenour has experimented with different styles of music. A true fusionist, he has often incorporated elements of funk, pop, rock, blues, Brazilian and most recently with Amparo (2008), classical music with jazz. In the early 1980s, Ritenour was given his own Ibanez signature model guitar, the LR-10. The LR-10 was produced from 1981 to 1987. It can be heard exclusively on his album Rit . Currently, Ritenour plays the Gibsons that he first played in the 1970s (the ES-335 and L5), and now also plays his signature Lee Ritenour Model archtop guitar made by Gibson.

Style

Ritenour's solo career began in 1975 with the recording of his album First Course . Released in 1976, the album gave a strong representation of the mid-1970s L.A. Jazz/Funk sound. Critics did, however, complain that his first album was "lightweight." So Lee countered this with his strongly fusion-based follow up, Captain Fingers . This was followed by two more fusion efforts—The Captain's Journey (1978) and Feel The Night (1979). On these albums, Ritenour primarily used something of a rich, yet rock-oriented distorted guitar sound, coming from his Gibson ES-335 guitar. In other instances on these albums, clean sounds were heard coming from his Gibson L5 and classical acoustic guitars (he played his classical acoustic guitars almost exclusively on his album Rio in 1979). In the 1970s, Ritenour would often use effects like wah-wah, phasers, chorus, and flangers on his electric instruments. Also, during the late 1970s, Ritenour can be heard using the 360 Systems guitar synthesizer (he is pictured sitting in front of it on the back cover of his Captain Fingers album). He can be heard using the synthesizer on the track Captain Fingers (from the album with the same title), and can also be heard playing solo with the synthesizer on the song "What Do You Want?" from "The Captain's Journey."

In 1979, Ritenour "was brought in to beef up one of [ Pink Floyd's ] The Wall s heaviest rock numbers, 'Run Like Hell'." ^[2] He also played "uncredited rhythm guitar" on "One Of My Turns". ^[3]

As the 1980s began, Ritenour began to add stronger elements of pop to his music, beginning with Rit in 1981. For this, he kept with his distorted sound, now using his Ibanez LR-10 signature model guitar. He continued with the pop-oriented music for two albums after Rit (Rit/2 in 1982 and Banded Together in 1984), while releasing a slick, yet more fusion-styled, Direct-Disk instrumental album in 1983 called On The Line . He also provided rhythm guitar on Tom Browne's hit, Funkin' for Jamaica . thumb In 1985, he recorded his first album for GRP with Dave Grusin, entitled Harlequin . It featured Lee primarily on his classical acoustic guitar and also featured Brazilian singer/songwriter Ivan Lins. Up to this point, this album along with Rio arguably gave the strongest representation of Lee's Brazilian influences.

The following year, 1986, Ritenour released the album Earth Run , which featured him using the then-newly designed SynthAxe guitar. He used nine different guitars on the album, most notably the SynthAxe, his Valley Arts guitar, and his Gibson Chet Atkins acoustic. The album also featured long-time collaborator Phil Perry for the first time, on the track "If I'm Dreaming, Don't Wake Me" — a song also featuring David Foster and Maurice White. He also produced songs and played guitar on Deniece Williams's LP Hot on the Trail during that same year.

Ritenour continued in a direction strongly featuring other artists in 1987, with Portrait . The album itself has something of a strong smooth-jazz sound, and Ritenour can be heard here playing with The Yellowjackets, Djavan, and Kenny G.
In 1988, his smooth jazz-influenced Brazilian music came to the forefront with Festival — another album strongly featuring his work on nylon-string acoustic guitars. The following album, Color Rit , continued with a similar mood. He did however, change direction completely again with his straight-ahead jazz album Stolen Moments . Sounding similar to Wes Montgomery, Ritenour played alongside long-time collaborator, saxophonist Ernie Watts, pianist Alan Broadbent, bassist John Patitucci (playing only acoustic) and drummer Harvey Mason. Continuing in a Wes Montgomery mood, Ritenour paid tribute to the man himself in 1992, with his album Wes Bound . The album featured a number of covers of Montgomery compositions, as well as some seemingly tributary pieces from Ritenour himself.

Also seen in this decade was a 1994 collaboration album with guitarist Larry Carlton called Larry & Lee .

In 1991 Lee Ritenour, together with keyboard player Bob James, formed the Grammy-nominated contemporary jazz group Fourplay. Lee left the hugely successful group in 1998 to continue with his own solo works. He was replaced by Larry Carlton. 2002 saw the release of his album, Rit's House .

In February 2004, Ritenour completed a project looking back on his career involving musicians he has worked with throughout his career called Overtime . Overtime was recorded live in a studio in front of a small audience. It was released in early 2005, and is currently available as a singular audio CD, double-DVD set or singular HD DVD. Some of the musicians featured include Dave Grusin, Patrice Rushen, Harvey Mason, Alex Acuna, Chris Botti, Anthony Jackson, Melvin Lee Davis, and Ernie Watts, amongst many others.

His latest album, entitled Smoke n' Mirrors was released in late August 2006. His son Wesley is a drummer, and makes his debut appearance on the album at the age of 13. This album contains Ritenour's version of Bill Withers' 1978 hit "Lovely Day".

Ritenour joined the 9th annual Independent Music Awards judging panel to assist independent musicians' careers. ^{[4] [5] [6]} He was also a judge for the 8th Independent Music Awards. ^[7]

Discography

Albums

Date	Title	Label
1976	First Course	Epic #EK 46114
1977	Lee Ritenour and His Gentle Thoughts	JVC #VDJ-1001
1977	Captain Fingers	Epic #PE 34426
1977	Sugar Loaf Express	JVC #JIMI-2008-2
1978	Friendship (Different from 1979 release)	Jasrac #VDJ-1003
1978	The Captain's Journey	Elektra #6E-136
1979	Rio	GRP Records #GRD-9524
1979	Feel the Night	Discovery #71010
1979	Friendship (Japan) (Currently reissued with The Captain’s Journey on Wounded Bird Records)	Jasrac #VACZ-1032
1980	The Best of Lee Ritenour	Epic #EK 36527
1981	Rit	Discovery #71013
1982	Rit 2	Discovery #71017
1982	Dave Grusin and the N.Y. /L.A. Dream Band , with Dave Grusin	GRP Records #A 1001 & GRD 9501, JVC #28022
1983	On The Line (This version differs in some takes to the 1985 GRP Release, and is available reissued with Rio on Wounded Bird Records), with Dave Grusin	GRP Records #GRD-9525
1984	Banded Together	Discovery #71018
1985	Harlequin , with Dave Grusin	GRP Records #GRD-9522
1985	GRP Live in Session , with Dave Grusin	GRP Records #A-1023 & #GRD 9032
1986	Earth Run	GRP Records #GRP-D-9538
1987	Portrait	GRP Records #GRD-9553
1988	Festival	GRP Records #GRD-9570
1990	Color Rit	GRP Records #GRD-9594
1990	Stolen Moments	GRP Records #GRD-9615
1991	Collection	GRP Records #GRD-9645
1991	Fourplay, Fourplay	Warner Bros. #26656-2
1993	Wes Bound	GRP Records #GRD-9697
1991	Fourplay, Between The Sheets	Warner Bros. #45340-2
1995	Larry & Lee , with Larry Carlton	GRP Records #GRD-9817
1995	Fourplay, Elixir	Warner Bros. #WPCR-293
1997	Alive In L.A.	GRP Records #GRD-9882
1997	A Twist of Jobim	I.E. Music #314 533 893-2
1997	Fourplay, Best Of Fourplay	Warner Bros. #9 46661-2
1998	This Is Love	i.e. Music #314 557 290-2
1999	Two Worlds , with Dave Grusin	Decca #012 157 960-2
2001	A Twist Of Marley	GRP Records #UCCR-1003
2002	Rit's House	GRP Records #VERF 01197-2
2003	The Very Best Of Lee Ritenour	GRP Records #314-589-281-2
2003	The Best Of Lee Ritenour	Sony Music Entertainment Inc #EK 85795
2003	A Twist of Motown	GRP Records #B0000115-02
2005	Overtime	Peak Records #PKD-8531-2
2005	World Of Brazil	GRP Records #B0004926-02
2006	Smoke N Mirrors	Peak Records #PKD-30018-2
2008	Amparo , with Dave Grusin	Decca Records #UCCU-1192

References

1. www.leeritenour.com
2. Comfortably Numb: The Inside Story Of Pink Floyd by Mark Blake, page 270
3. The Complete Guide To The Music Of Pink Floyd by Andy Mabbett, page 80
4. Independent Music Awards
5. MicControl
6. Top40-Charts.com
7. Independent Music Awards - 8th Annual IMA Judges