Joseph Anthony Jacobi Passalacqua, better know as Joe Pass.”He looks like somebody’s uncle, and plays like nobody’s business,” according to New York Magazine. We’ll let it rest there. Sometimes things are said properly right out of the gate, and require no filigree.

The cameraman has the distinctive traits so common to his tribe. He will point his lens at any goddamned thing but what you want him to. I half expected him to lay down on his back and point the camera at the ceiling for a spell, to forestall boredom. There appeared to be, by my watch, one-hundred-and-fourteen minutes of footage of Joe’s patent leather shoes in the middle of the proceedings. This is only meet, and just. They’re really nice shoes. First-rate. Joe’s wife has shined them, it’s evident. Joe keeps them in good repair. Joe is solicitous of his appearance in this regard. There was a chance — dare I call it what it was: a danger — that we would not have gotten a good, hard, stare at Joe’s footwear, had not the cameraman had the presence of mind to ignore Joe’s hands, and face, and torso, and uvula, and his guitar, and his aura, and his shakra, and various other trivial aspects of his performance and persona, in order to fill our desperate need to see Joe tapping his feet.

I have an award for that cameraman, which he could pick up if he comes within arm’s length of me.