The Porcaro Influence
Joe's father was a drummer in an Italian symphonic, those bands that would march in the street playing snare drum. Joe was a percussionist and jazz drummer who didn’t take formal lessons until he was about sixteen years old. Living in Connecticut, Joe wanted to be connected to the music scene and his good friend Emil Richards had moved to Los Angeles and had come back to Connecticut telling him about L.A. To Joe, it just seemed like L.A. was the place to be, especially with the demand for studio work and he moved to California in 1968.
If you’ve ever seen the TV serials Six Million Dollar Man, Bionic Woman, Wonder Woman, Baretta, Hawaii Five-O, and Medical Center...well in the 70’s that was Joe, playing percussion. Joe worked with Marty Paich! That’s right, TOTO’s David Paich’s father. Catch an old re-run of the Streets Of San Francisco and notice at the end credits who the music was arranged by. The Paich-Porcaro connection was all over the place! Talk about musical roots and making deep connections. That’s what is so great about TOTO- this group of guys are as strong as they come. No wonder their music is so tight.
Joe gave Jeff formal lessons along with a few others. Jeff said, "My dad was doing the Hartford Symphony and all of us...actually, all the Porcaro boys started out on drums. My other two brothers, Mike and Steve, were taking lessons from him at the same time. We would go down with him on the weekends to the drum shop in Connecticut and he would find some free time from his regular students and give us lessons. My brother Mike was much better on the drums than I was, who switched to bass and Steve took up piano prior to our move to California."
An average Sunday would find the Porcaro kids Jeff, Steve, and Mike gathered in the family room, drum sticks in hand, reverberating in cadence. "As far back as I can remember," says Jeff, "I wanted to be a musician. The players I listened to as a kid were studio players, and in my opinion some of the best all-around musicians happening. I remember hearing my uncle Emil Richards playing micro-tonal music with the Harry Partch Orchestra. I'm very thankful for that environment and for the experience of hearing so many talented players.”
Jeff remembers early on using his father's drums, and when he was thirteen he got into a rock band. Walking home from school one day a friend came running down the street and told him he got a new drum set. Some kid had won a Slingerland champagne sparkle set in a poker game and he sold it to Jeff’s father with cases and cymbals for something like $250.