JAMES PANKOW

trombonist with rock band Chicago

“Wow! I really don’t know what the first album was that I ever bought. When I was growing up, I was more into jazz than pop because being a horn player that was my bag. That was the music that applied to my instrument. Back then, there was no room in rock’n’roll for a bloody trombone.

“My earliest record collection consisted primarily of jazz records -- the Cannonball Adderly Sextet, the Crusaders, Lee Morgan, Miles Davis, J.J. Johnson. And big bands like Stan Kenton and Woody Herman, that kind of stuff.

“Nonetheless, I was into the Beatles and Sam & Dave and Wilson Pickett. Back in the ‘60s, soul music was the music of the day.”