Dom Minasi

Guitarist Dom Minasi entered the world on March 6, 1943, in New York City, sharing the same birth date as Wes Montgomery. A largely self-taught and instinctive player, he began supporting vocalists and performing rock & roll, church dances, and small jazz combos from the age of fifteen. Early on he also instructed numerous private pupils while establishing his professional path through two mid-1970s albums issued by Blue Note.

When the label changed hands, however, promotional backing proved scarce, prompting Minasi to withdraw from recording and spend the following fifteen years working locally as a freelancer. During that period he occasionally collaborated with pianist Dennis Moorman, later enrolling at Lehman College and earning a composition degree in 1990. By 1993 he was appearing in off-Broadway productions, had composed nearly three hundred pieces, and was leading workshops for children throughout the New York public schools while shaping an improvisational comeback.

Refining extended techniques alongside sophisticated harmonic concepts, he authored several instructional volumes covering improvisation, theory, and chord substitutions, and he maintained his children’s workshops. Full activity resumed in 2000 as he released recordings on CIMP and his own CDM imprint in partnership with vocalist Carol Mennie, his wife. Extended compositions, reinterpretations of Duke Ellington’s music, and daring purely improvisational explorations attracted fresh listeners. Among those sharing the stage were Michael Jefry Stevens, Blaise Siwula, Ken Filiano, Joe McPhee, Tomas Ulrich, Steve Swell, Borah Bergman, Perry Robinson, Bryan Olson, Matthew Shipp, Jackson Krall, Jon Hemmersam, and John Bollinger. His volume A Singer’s Guide to Reading Rhythm appeared in 2007, and he participated in the International Society for Improvised Music conferences held in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in 2006 and Evanston, Illinois, in 2007. Dom Minasi died on August 1, 2023, at the age of eighty.