Joe Puma was an American jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 guitarist.

Puma's first professional experience came with Joe Roland

Joe Roland

Joe Roland is an American jazz vibraphonist.Roland began as a clarinetist, attending the Institute of Musical Art from 1937 to 1939. He started on xylophone in 1940 and began playing vibraphone in the middle of the decade, playing in jazz clubs in New York City...

 in 1949-50. He acted as a session musician

Session musician

Session musicians are instrumental and vocal performers, musicians, who are available to work with others at live performances or recording sessions. Usually such musicians are not permanent members of a musical ensemble and often do not achieve fame in their own right as soloists or bandleaders...

 for many jazz musicians of the 1950s, including Louie Bellson

Louie Bellson

Luigi Paulino Alfredo Francesco Antonio Balassoni , better known by the stage name Louie Bellson , was an Italian-American jazz drummer...

, Artie Shaw

Artie Shaw

Arthur Jacob Arshawsky , better known as Artie Shaw, was an American jazz clarinetist, composer, and bandleader. He was also the author of both fiction and non-fiction writings....

, Eddie Bert

Eddie Bert

Eddie Bert is an American bebop jazz trombonist.His first job as a musician came in 1940 when he joined the Sam Donahue Orchestra, and then joined up with Red Norvo in 1941, later performing also with the bands of Stan Kenton and with Benny Goodman's bebop orchestra.He also recorded extensively as...

, Herbie Mann

Herbie Mann

Herbert Jay Solomon , better known as Herbie Mann, was a Jewish American jazz flutist and important early practitioner of world music...

, Mat Mathews

Mat Mathews

Mat Mathews, born Mathieu Hubert Wijnandts Schwarts , was a Dutch jazz accordionist.Mathews was born in The Hague and learned to play accordion while the Netherlands was under Nazi rule during World War II. After hearing Joe Mooney on a radio broadcast after the war, he decided to begin playing jazz...

, Chris Connor

Chris Connor

Chris Connor was an American jazz singer.-Biography:She was born as Mary Loutsenhizer in Kansas City, Missouri to Clyde and Mabel Loutsenhizer. She studied and became proficient on the clarinet, having studied for 8 years throughout junior high and high school...

, and Paul Quinichette

Paul Quinichette

Paul Quinichette was a jazz tenor saxophone musician. He was known as the Vice President or Vice Prez for his uncanny emulation of the breathy style of Lester Young, known as Prez. Young, who affectionately called everyone "Lady ****" , called him "Lady Q"...

; he also recorded extensively as a leader at this time. In the 1960s he worked with Morgana King

Morgana King

Morgana King is an American singer and actress. She is a noted jazz singer, who is regarded as a "musician's singer." The musical œuvre of her stylized vocal artistry spans a period of more than four decades and has an "appeal that bridges generations, tastes and life styles"."She is, like all...

, Bobby Hackett

Bobby Hackett

Robert Leo "Bobby" Hackett was an US jazz musician who played trumpet, cornet and guitar with the bands of Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman in the late thirties and early forties.-Biography:...

, Gary Burton

Gary Burton

Gary Burton is an American jazz vibraphonist.A true original on the vibraphone, Burton developed a pianistic style of four-mallet technique as an alternative to the usual two-mallets. This approach caused Burton to be heralded as an innovator and his sound and technique are widely imitated...

, and Carmen McRae

Carmen McRae

Carmen Mercedes McRae was an American jazz singer, composer, pianist, and actress. Considered one of the most influential jazz vocalists of the 20th century, it was her behind-the-beat phrasing and her ironic interpretations of song lyrics that made her memorable...

, and between 1972 and 1977 he and Chuck Wayne

Chuck Wayne

Chuck Wayne was a jazz guitarist who came to prominence in the 1940s. He is best known for his work with Woody Herman's First Herd, and for being the first guitarist in the George Shearing quintet...

 led an ensemble. He continued to perform and teach into the late 1990s. Joe Puma Jr, his son, currently resides in Galveston, TX. And his daughter Rosalie Ann resides in Michigan. His music was featured in "Good morning Vietnam".

As leader

• East Coast Jazz Series (Bethlehem Records
  Bethlehem Records
  Bethlehem Records was a record label based in New York and Hollywood founded by Gus Wildi in 1953. It was bought by King Records in the early 1960s....
  
  , 1954)
• Joe Puma Quintet (Bethlehem, 1954)
• It's a Blue World
• Wild Kitten (Dawn Records
  Dawn Records
  Dawn Records was a subsidiary of Pye Records. Active from 1970 to 1975, it was set up largely as Pye's 'underground and progressive' label, a rival of the EMI and Phonogram equivalents, Harvest and Vertigo....
  
  , 1957)
• Joe Puma Jazz Trio and Quartet (Jubilee Records
  Jubilee Records
  Jubilee Records was a record label specializing in rhythm and blues along with novelty records. It was founded in New York City in 1946 by Herb Abramson. Jerry Blaine became Abramson's partner. Blaine bought out Abramson's half of the company in 1947. The company name was Jay-Gee Recording...
  
  , 1957)
• Like Tweet (Columbia Records
  Columbia Records
  Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
  
  , 1961)
• Interactions (Choice Records, 1973)
• Shining Hour (Reservoir Records, 1984)

as sideman

With Gary Burton

Gary Burton

Gary Burton is an American jazz vibraphonist.A true original on the vibraphone, Burton developed a pianistic style of four-mallet technique as an alternative to the usual two-mallets. This approach caused Burton to be heralded as an innovator and his sound and technique are widely imitated...

• The Groovy Sound of Music
  The Groovy Sound of Music
  The Groovy Sound of Music is an album by vibraphonist Gary Burton recorded in 1964 and released on the RCA label which features jazz interpretations of tunes from the Broadway musical The Sound of Music written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II.-Reception:The Allmusic review by Ken Dryden...
  
  (RCA, 1963)