Like => Africa, "Rosanna" is one of Toto's immortal hits. It spent five weeks at number 2 on the => Billboard Pop Charts and helped propel Toto to six => Grammy awards including Record of the Year and Best Rock Duet.


Despite the rampant inaccuracies in Rock Encyclopedias all over the world, “Rosanna” was never a song meant to be dedicated to => Rosanna Arquette and she also was never Steve Lukathers girlfriend, but Steve Porcaro’s. After David Paich had written the song, he had yet to choose a girl’s name for the title and chorus. So they "just took" the first name of Rosanna Arquette, as they thought it would fit the song and chorus very well.

Dave wrote it, pretty much came to us with the tune all finished. We don't rehearse, so when we do a record we just go in, dig the tune, someone writes out a quick chord chart and then we do it. Rosanna was basically live.(Steve Lukather, Guitar Techniques, March 2003)

Bobby Kimball comments on how "Rosanna" became a duet:

"That's a good - a really good - question. We were over at David's (Paich) studio doing some writing and just fiddling around, which is something we did really well - especially the fiddling part," recalls Bobby. "Dave started playing the little parts from Rosanna. When he started singing the melody I just listened and suggested, 'well, I think it needs to be higher."


“I meant that it needed to be in another key, a higher key. So he went from playing it in the key of C and changed it to F. The melody went up. As the melody went from here to there, lower to higher in mid-song, the jump was very cool. We all looked at each other and just said 'perfect, that's how we have to do it.' It was a natural progression. Because of the dramatic change, you needed two different vocalists. So Steve Lukather sang the lower part and I jumped in to sing the high part and that's how we recorded it, and how it ultimately became a duet - or a collaboration, if you will!"

"Once we released Rosanna it went crazy, straight to the top (five weeks at Number Two). It was a great surprise. We didn't think we could top it, but once we won the Trophy (Grammy) for Rosanna, the record company released =>"Africa" and it went to number one." (Rockfever.com, 2000)

The iconic drum-shuffle of 'Rosanna' was developed from John Bonham's playing on “All Of My Love,” speeding up the tempo and adding a bugaloo bass drum figure. Jeff Porcaro on developing the track:

Yeah, but the thing is I didn't go out and buy a John Bonham drum book and read the part. There are things, and I know this from my own experience, that you have to have an ear to hear before you can play them. Even if you have the best set of reading chops around, your ears have to be open enough to hear. If you're the kind of drummer that has to see something written before you can feel it, then you should quit school, stop buying books and open your ears to the music.(Hitmen, vol.1, nr.1, 1982)

Steve Lukather on the drums and his phenomenal guitar solo outro:

That's pretty funny. You know where that [drum rhythm] came from? Jeff and us were really into Led Zeppelin, and Jeff morphed “Foolin the Rain” (from Zeppelin's “In Through the Out Door”) and a Bernard Purdie drum groove (from Steely Dan's “Home at Last”) and came up with that “Rosanna” groove. So we went from there - by the end of that afternoon, we had done the basic rhythm track and I'd overdubbed some of the solo. Bang! The end vamp was never supposed to happen, we just started jamming and that's exactly what you hear. We still record that way... (Guitar Techniques, March 2003)

In an interview with Keyboard Magazine, David Paich and Steve Porcaro discuss how the keyboard solo in "Rosanna" was created:

David Paich: It's a combination of both of us playing. It's mainly Steve, but we both start at the beginning. When we were doing that song we found we had to put a solo in the middle of it. It was a question of what do we do now. Steve has always said we should use our imaginations. So I kind of started out with trying to incorporate everything we have at our home studio. Instead of doing a regular Wurlitzer or Hammond solo we decided to try different things. We started playing lines and finally sat down and Steve wrote out the initial basis for the solo that you hear now played mostly on the modular system.


Steve Porcaro: It's actually a hilarious story. We thought about how to do that solo for weeks, and it all came together one day at five in the morning.


David Paich: When you hear the opening lines, that's Steve playing a modular trumpet sound. Then we knew we wanted a sequence running down so I programmed a little thing into the Micro-Composer that Steve dropped into the solo. Then there's a Minimoog part, and at the end it's a combination of Steve and I both playing CS-80s, Prophets, a Hammond organ, and a GS1.


Steve Porcaro: There's even a line in there that was from an older solo that David did which I forgot to erase. It was a very pieced-together solo. It was a great example of what can happen when two keyboard players get together and start messing around with technology. You get stuff that you don't plan on getting. Everything was written out and then the written-out stuff was abandoned. It's the right combination of discipline and non-discipline. It's also a good example of what can happen when you're not stuck in a studio with a bunch of people hanging over you saying, "Okay, let's do the keyboard solo now." We did it at home, and I was able to spend a couple of weeks at it. The way it happened wasn't in the norm at all.

Steve Lukather elaborates on his guitar solo in this song:

Yeah, that was straight off. I just went for it and everyone said 'but the thing at the end is just blowing'. That's not doubled. It was a one-off which luckily you happen to get once in a while. As a matter of fact, the song was supposed to end but Jeff carried on and Dave started playing the honky-tonk piano and we all just followed on. We've done that a few times, we've been playing together so long that it's like that. (International Musician, 1991)

Luke continues:

That first solo was made up on the spot the first time we played 'Rosanna'. The other guys liked that solo so much, they asked me to do it again. So I had to re-play my improvised solo for the recording. (Gitaar net magazine, 2002)

In 2003, Luke recalled in great detail about the guitar solo in this song:

(Question) For Rosanna's first solo, you've got a very unique bending technique - you bend a tone with your third flnger and then fret that bend with your fourth finger for an additional note. Other players would choose the more 'country' approach of splitting those notes over two strings. What influenced that technique?


SL: "1 don't know, that's just the way I feel it. I like strange bends. When I was young, I loved => Larry Carlton in that (Steely Dan) Kid Charlemange/Royal scam era - all the bending, sleazing in between,'finding the great note that goes into the change. I was greatly influenced by Larry, who's a good friend of mine now. He's one of my heroes - and I came more from a hard rock background and he's more a bebop-er, and we sort of switched where he played jazz with a bit more rock and I came from the other end. We both understand where we're going. His concept of harmony is fantastic..."


(Question) : As Rosanna's solo is so melodic, was it pre-planned?


SL: "No, I had just started playing and it was one-take. What I did do was after I had played, the guys said I should double it. So I went back and learnt it and then doubled it. But the end solo is not doubled..."


(Question) : And that was a one-take too?


SL: "Yeah, you get lucky sometimes with stuff like that. In those days it used to be I'd get the track and everybody would say 'do the solo now', and everybody would be partying in the studio. You'd have the whole vibe of people and friends hanging out, just great. Nowadays, it's more technical than it used to be. Now everything is so different, so I'm glad I had the experience I did back then. We were in the last era of session guys, as it doesn't exist in the same way anymore..."


(Question) : On that outro solo, you've got big two-tone bends. Had you been listening to a lot of Jimmy Page and => Jeff Beck the night before?


SL: "Yes, of course! The first time I felt up a girl, I was listening to Led Zeppelin! Page has been really nice to me too since, as we've met up for different things. He said: 'Don't let anyone give you shit, Steve. I used to be a session guy too, as was John (Paul Jones). Don't let anyone tell you you don't rock because of that.'"


(Question) : The outro solo displays your very able picking-hand technique...


SL: "1 use everything; down-up-picking, down-picking, I use fingers. I don't ever think about what I'm playing now. But what I did do when I was a kid, which is the most important thing to remember so you don't hurt yourself, was stiffening up when I was trying to play fast. You have to learn to relax your fore arm and wrist. "lf you start practising and it begins to hurt, then stop practising. Otherwise, you'll get tendonitis, and you won't be able to play the guitar for a year, and you won't be able to accomplish what you want." (Guitar Techniques, March 2003)

Since Rosanna was released, it has become a staple of the Toto discography and has appeared on every live set list since 1982. In 2006 for the => Falling In Between tour, the band re-arranged Rosanna into a jazzy/funky version which allows the band to stretch their legs a bit on a song that has undoubtedly grown a bit tiring for them after 25 years!

Related Pages
Bobby Kimball
Steve Lukather
David Paich
Steve Porcaro
Toto IV