I want to keep it real. Where did you all record that record? It was out in a studio in Brooklyn. It seems to me that you make a point of working with younger musicians. They add their thing, and you try to keep it open.
This is how I hear it. You can hear a song, and hear yourself actually playing it. I hear that. I can feel myself and hear myself playing it before I do. You just get on the organ, and you play it like you feel it. What kind of plan is that? Hip-hop has re-imagined lots of your music. They heard it, they hit it, and it worked.
They do the heck out of it. For 40 years now, rap, jazz, funk, and gospel have been in perpetual conversation with one another. What do you make of that conversation?
I think it all stems from the gospel. It stems from truth and conversation. The music stays true to itself, and it carries on. You can probably count on one hand the number of people who have mastered the Hammond organ in jazz.
Lonnie Smith. As a band leader in the s and '70s, he wrote timeless music. It safely earned that label during the '80s and '90s when hip-hop producers sampled his work left and right.
And he's got a personality as big as any hip-hop star. He's called doctor because, well, he thinks he deserves the title and I'm not going to argue with him. And for the longest time, I thought he was a Sikh. But his turban and beard are all about style - nothing to do with religion. As you can imagine, with a catalog that reaches back six decades, dozens of his older songs have just been lost to time.
Take this one, for example. You're listening to a piece from called "Turning Point. Recently, he decided to comb through his archives and revisit some old numbers with young musicians. Lonnie Smith's album "In the Beginning. It was really nice - underneath, in other words - what I had going on.
And it worked that way at that moment because every time I really play a song, it's hard for me to do it the exact same way. I have a tendency to want to change. RATH: Right. I mean, when you solo - you have these great, long, improvised solos - and I feel like you're telling a story, but each time it's a totally different story. I really do. It takes me on a journey. RATH: We'll listen to another cut off the album. This is one of my favorites.
This is "Aw Shucks. I remember that when I was at Blue Note, I really got known for those really slow and easy grooving songs. I remember I wanted to change up. When I got a way to change up, I asked Frank Wolff I said I wanted to do something a little bit different. You know, he didn't really know how to dance, but he danced his way.
A native of Buffalo, New York, Smith converted the organ grooves of his primary influence, Jimmy Smith, into a unique, genre-busting style. His music became a foundation by way of sampling of the acid-jazz movement of the early s, sparking a renaissance in a career that had then lain dormant for a decade.
His trademark was a turban, which he adopted in the mids; reports in some corners said that Smith had become a Sikh, while others insisted that the new headgear was purely an affectation. Smith declined to answer questions about it. The more mysterious aspects of his presentation were offset by his playful demeanor—rather than a shadowy enigma, the Doc simply enjoyed messing with you.
His mother was his earliest musical influence, a music lover who sang around the house and exposed her son to jazz, classical, and especially gospel music. Smith himself began as a vocalist, singing in a doo-wop group called the Teen Kings later the Supremes—no relation to the Motown group for six dollars a night.
Saxophonist Grover Washington Jr. As he became a teenager, Smith began experimenting with brass instruments, including trumpet and tuba, but also began learning piano by ear.
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