Carol Kaye (March 24, 1935) is an American musician, who is one of the most prolific recorded bass guitarist, playing on an estimated 10,000 recordings in a career spanning over 50 years. She was born in Everett, Washington, to professional musicians Clyde and Dot Smith. Her mother bought her a steel string guitar aged thirteen and she soon began playing sessions in jazz clubs around Los Angeles. During the 1950s, Kaye played bebop jazz guitar with several groups, including Bob Neal's group, Jack Sheldon backing Lenny Bruce, Teddy Edwards and Billy Higgins. She played with the Henry Busse Orchestra in the mid-1950s, and toured the US with them.
n 1957, Kaye was playing a gig at the Beverly Cavern, when producer Robert "Bumps" Blackwell invited her to a recording session for Sam Cooke's arrangement of "Summertime".
She realised she could make significantly more money with sessios. work
than playing in jazz clubs, so took it up as a full-time career. In 1958, she played acoustic rhythm guitar on Ritchie Valen's "La Bamba", recorded at Gold Star Studios, Hollywood. Through Gold Star, she began to work with producer Phil Spector, playing electric guitar on Bob B. Soxx & Blue Jeans' "Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah" and The Crystals' "Then He Kissed Me", and acoustic guitar on The Righteous Brothers' " You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'".
In 1963, after a bass player failed to show for a session at Capitol Records and she was asked to fill in on the instrument, she quickly discovered she preferred playing bass, and found it was a
key component of a backing track and allowed her to play more
inventively than the relatively simpler guitar parts she had been
playing until then. Kaye became the most in-demand session bassist in Los Angeles. Kaye was the sole regular female member of The Wrecking Crew, a group of studio musicians who played on a
large number of hit records from Los Angeles in the 1960s. Kaye appeared on sessions by Frank Sinatra, Simon and Garfunkel, Stevie Wonder, Barbra Streisand, The Supremes, The Temptations, the Four Tops and The Monkees. She played electric bass on Nancy Sinatra's "These Boots Are Made For Walkin'" and on several Beach Boys sessions, including the albums Beach Boys Today, Summer Days (and Summer Nights!), Pet Sounds and Smile.
By 1969, Kaye had become exhausted and disillusioned from session work, saying that music had "started to sound like cardboard". Additionally, newer rock bands disapproved of using session players, preferring to play the instruments themselves. She decided to change career from pop to soundtrack work, as well as writing and teaching. Her soundtrack sessions from this time included playing on the themes to M.A.S.H. and Shaft and worked closely with Lalo Schifrin, playing on the theme to Mision: Impossible and the soundtrack for Bullitt. She regularly collaborated with Quincy Jones.
In 1976, she was involved in a car accident, and semi-retired from music. She continued to play sporadically, appearing on J. J. Cale's 1981 album Shades. In 1994, Kaye underwent corrective surgery to fix injuries stemming from the accident, and resumed playing and recording. She collaborated with Fender to produce a lighter version of the Precision Bass that reduced strain on her back and made it more comfortable to play. In 1997, she collaborated with Brian Wilson again, while in 2006, Frank Black asked her to play on his album Fast Man Raider Man. She was featured in the 2008 film The Wrecking Crew along with a cast of other studio musicians.
