Wayne Wright

Wayne Wright (September 4, 1932 — May 9, 2008) was an American jazz musician (guitar, banjo). 

For nearly 40 years, he played jazz guitar with many celebrated jazz legends including Les Paul, Buddy Rich, Mel Torme, Quincy Jones, Judy Garland, and Sammy Davis Jr.

Wright is also remembered as the man who brought the legendary guitarist Les Paul out of retirement. Paul, who was suffering from osteoarthritis at the time and had semi-retired, was persuaded by Wright to perform again at Fat Tuesday's—a well-known jazz club in New York. He told Paul that playing again would be a good therapy for him; Paul agreed.

Wayne Wright was born on September 4, 1932, in Cincinnati, Ohio, and was raised in Detroit after the family moved there when he was 7 years old. 

Wright learned to play by ear when he was just a boy growing up in Detroit and played the ukulele left-handed. While practicing his music, Wright was noticed by his friend's father who sang in a jazz band at various Detroit jazz clubs. Impressed, he invited him to play with his group.

In his early career, Wright worked for a phone company, where he met his future wife, JoAnn Karaschin, when he was 19.

In the early 1960s, Wright and his wife relocated to New York City, where they lived in an apartment in Flushing, Queens, then in Whitestone, Queens. They eventually lived in the Bay Park area of Long Island, New York. 

While in New York, he first appeared on the rhythm guitar, among others, as an accompaniment musician to stars such as Judy Garland, Peggy Lee, Sammy Davis Jr., and Tony Bennett. 

Wright's first recordings were made in 1963 when he was a member of the Quincy Jones Big Band. He was one of the guitarists—along with Jim Hall, Kenny Burrell, and Sam Herman—on Jones' album Plays Hip Hits on Mercury Records. In the following years, he worked with Buddy Rich, Mel Tormé, Bobby Vinton, Bobby Hackett, Les Paul, Warren Vaché, Marty Grosz, and Ruby Braff/George Barnes Quartet. 

He also performed as a short-lived member of the Count Basie Orchestra at Carnegie Hall in 1973 and 1974 respectively, and again in 1978 with Benny Goodman.

In July 1974, Ruby Braff, Sam Margolis, and Wright collaborated with Jimmy Andrews and Mike Burgevin to pay tribute to Louis Armstrong.

In the 1980s, Wright played with Barbara Lea, Peter Dean, Peter Compo, and Flip Phillips (A Real Swinger album on Concord Jazz, 1988). 

For many years, he worked as a musician in the Broadway musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying—a musical by Frank Loesser and book by Abe Burrows, Jack Weinstock, and Willie Gilbert, based on Shepherd Mead's 1952 book of the same name.

In the 1980s, he persuaded Les Paul (who suffered from osteoarthritis) to appear again in Fat Tuesday's in New York.

Between 1963 and 1988, Wright participated in 33 recording sessions in jazz. 

Wright was married to his wife JoAnn Karaschin. The two met when Wright worked for a phone company in Detroit. They married in 1956 and had two children, Nancy and Scott.

Wright died from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease on May 9, 2008, in Long Island, New York. He was 75.

• Ruby Braff / George Barnes Quartet with John Giuffrida & Wayne Wright (Chiaroscuro Records, 1973)
• Marty Grosz/Wayne Wright: Let Your Fingers Do the Walking (Acoustic Guitar Duets) (Aviva, 1977)
• Marty Grosz/Wayne Wright: Goody Goody (Aviva, 1979)
• Ruby Braff & Woody Herman: It Had to Be Us (Chiaroscuro, 1980), wuth John Bunch, Michael Moore, Jake Hanna