Jimmy Smith

Jimmy Smith (December 8, 1925 or 1928 – February 8, 2005) was a jazz musician whose performances on the Hammond B-3 electric organ helped to popularize the instrument. In 2005, Smith was awarded the NEA Jazz Masters Award from the National Endowment for the Arts, the highest honor that the United States bestows upon jazz musicians.

Early years
His birth year is of some confusion, with various sources citing either 1925 or 1928. Born James Oscar Smith in Norristown, Pennsylvania, at the age of six he joined his father doing a song-and-dance routine in clubs. He began teaching himself to play the piano. When he was nine, Smith won a Philadelphia radio talent contest as a boogie-woogie pianist. After a stint in the navy, he began furthering his musical education in 1948, with a year at Royal Hamilton College of Music, then the Leo Ornstein School of Music in Philadelphia in 1949. He began exploring the Hammond organ in 1951. From 1951 to 1954 he played piano, then organ in Philly R&B bands like Don Gardner and the Sonotones. He switched to organ permanently in 1954 after hearing Wild Bill Davis.

Career
He purchased his first Hammond organ, rented a warehouse to practice in and emerged after little more than a year. Upon hearing him playing in a Philadelphia club, Blue Note's Alfred Lion immediately signed him to the label and his second album, The Champ, quickly established Smith as a new star on the jazz scene. He was a prolific recording artist and, as a leader, dubbed The Incredible Jimmy Smith, he recorded around 40 sessions for Blue Note in just eight years beginning in 1956. Albums from this period include The Sermon!, House Party, Home Cookin, Midnight Special, Back at the Chicken Shack and Prayer Meetin.

Smith signed to the Verve label in 1962. His first album, Bashin', sold well and for the first time set Smith with a big band, led by Oliver Nelson. Further big band collaborations followed, most successfully with Lalo Schifrin for The Cat and guitarist Wes Montgomery, with whom he recorded two albums: The Dynamic Duo and Further Adventures Of Jimmy and Wes. Other notable albums from this period include Blue Bash and Organ Grinder's Swing with Kenny Burrell, The Boss with George Benson, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Got My Mojo Working, and Root Down.

During the 1950s and 1960s, Smith recorded with some of the great jazz musicians of the day such as Kenny Burrell, George Benson, Grant Green, Stanley Turrentine, Lee Morgan, Lou Donaldson, Tina Brooks, Jackie McLean, Grady Tate and Donald Bailey.

The Jimmy Smith Trio performed "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" and "The Sermon" in the 1964 film Get Yourself a College Girl.

In the 1970s, Smith opened his own supper club in Los Angeles, California, and played there regularly with guitarist Paul C Saenz, Kenny Dixon on drums, Herman Riley and John F. Phillips on saxophone; also included in the band was harmonica/flute player Stanley Behrens.

Later career
Smith had a career revival in the 1980s and 1990s, again recording for Blue Note and Verve, and for Milestone and Elektra. Smith also recorded with other artists including Quincy Jones/Frank Sinatra, Michael Jackson (he plays on the title track of the Bad album), Dee Dee Bridgewater and Joey DeFrancesco.

His last major album, Dot Com Blues (Blue Thumb, 2000), featured many special guests such as Dr. John, B. B. King and Etta James.

Smith and his wife Lola moved to Scottsdale, Arizona, in 2004, but Lola died of cancer a few months later. Smith later recorded an album, Legacy, with Joey DeFrancesco, and the two began preparation to go on tour. However, before this could happen, Smith was found dead on February 8, 2005, at his Scottsdale home by his manager, Robert Clayton. He was deemed to have died in his sleep of natural causes. Smith is survived by two sisters, Janet Taylor and Anita Jones; and three children, Jia, Connie and Jimmy, Jr. & step son Michael Ward.

Musical style
While the electric organ had been used in jazz by Fats Waller, Count Basie, Wild Bill Davis and others, Smith's virtuoso improvisation technique on the Hammond helped to popularize the electric organ as a jazz and blues instrument. The B3 and companion Leslie speaker produce a distinctive sound, including percussive "clicks" with each key stroke. Smith's style on fast tempo pieces combined bluesy "licks" with bebop-based single note runs. For ballads, he played walking bass lines on the bass pedals. For uptempo tunes, he would play the bass line on the lower manual and use the pedals for emphasis on the attack of certain notes, which helped to emulate the attack and sound of a string bass.

Smith influenced a constellation of jazz organists, including Jimmy McGriff, Brother Jack McDuff, Richard "Groove" Holmes, Joey DeFrancesco and Larry Goldings, as well as rock keyboardists such as Jon Lord, Brian Auger and Keith Emerson. More recently, Smith influenced bands such as the Beastie Boys, who sampled the bassline from "Root Down (and Get It)" from Root Down&mdash;and saluted Smith in the lyrics&mdash;for their own hit "Root Down," Medeski, Martin & Wood, and the Hayden-Eckert Ensemble. Often called the father of acid jazz, Smith lived to see that movement come to reflect Smith's organ style. In the 1990s, Smith went to Nashville, taking a break from his ongoing gigs at his Sacramento restaurant which he owned and, in Music City, Nashville, he produced, with the help of a webmaster, Dot Com Blues, his last Verve album. In 1999, Smith guested on two tracks of a live album, Incredible!, the hit from the 1960s, with his protégé, Joey DeFrancesco, a then 28-year-old organist. Smith and DeFrancesco's collaborative album Legacy was released in 2005 shortly after Smith's death.

As leader

 * Blue Note
 * 1956: A New Sound... A New Star... Jimmy Smith at the Organ, Volume 1
 * 1956: A New Sound A New Star: Jimmy Smith at the Organ Volume 2
 * 1956: The Incredible Jimmy Smith at the Organ
 * 1956: At Club Baby Grand, Volume One
 * 1956: At Club Baby Grand, Volume Two
 * 1957: A Date with Jimmy Smith Volume One
 * 1957: A Date with Jimmy Smith Volume Two
 * 1957: Jimmy Smith at the Organ, Vol. 1
 * 1957: Jimmy Smith at the Organ, Vol. 2
 * 1957: The Sounds of Jimmy Smith
 * 1957: Plays Pretty Just for You
 * 1957: Jimmy Smith Trio + LD
 * 1957: Groovin' at Small's Paradise
 * 1958: House Party
 * 1958: The Sermon!
 * 1958: Confirmation
 * 1958: Softly as a Summer Breeze
 * 1958: Cool Blues
 * 1958: Six Views of the Blues
 * 1959: Home Cookin'
 * 1960: Crazy! Baby
 * 1960: Open House
 * 1960: Plain Talk
 * 1960: Midnight Special
 * 1960: Back at the Chicken Shack
 * 1961: Straight Life
 * 1962: Plays Fats Waller
 * 1963: I'm Movin' On
 * 1963: Bucket!
 * 1963: Rockin' the Boat
 * 1963: Prayer Meetin'
 * 1981: On the Sunny Side
 * 1985: One Night with Blue Note, Preserved - Vol. 3
 * 1986: Go for Watcha Know
 * 1993: The Master
 * 1993: The Master II


 * Verve
 * 1962: Bashin'
 * 1963: Any Number Can Win
 * 1963: Blue Bash! (with Kenny Burrell)
 * 1963: Hobo Flats
 * 1963: Live at the Village Gate (Metro)
 * 1964: The Cat
 * 1964: Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
 * 1964: Christmas Cookin'
 * 1965: Monster
 * 1965: Organ Grinder Swing
 * 1965: Got My Mojo Workin'
 * 1965: In Hamburg Live (Metro)
 * 1965: Live in Concert / Paris / Salle Pleyel Live (Metro)
 * 1965: La métamorphose des cloportes (Soundtrack)
 * 1966: Hoochie Coochie Man
 * 1966: Peter & the Wolf
 * 1966: Jimmy & Wes: The Dynamic Duo (with Wes Montgomery)
 * 1966: Further Adventures of Jimmy and Wes (with Wes Montgomery)
 * 1967: Respect
 * 1967: Plays the Standards (Sunset SUS-5175/SUM-1175)
 * 1967: Best of Jimmy Smith
 * 1968: The Boss
 * 1968: Livin' It Up
 * 1968: Stay Loose
 * 1968: Live Salle Pleyel (Trema)
 * 1970: Groove Drops
 * 1971: The Other Side of Jimmy Smith
 * 1971: I'm Gonna Git Myself Together
 * 1971: In a Plain Brown Wrapper
 * 1972: History of Jimmy Smith
 * 1972: Bluesmith
 * 1972: Root Down - Live
 * 1973: Portuguese Soul
 * 1995: Damn!
 * 1996: Angel Eyes
 * 2000: Dot Com Blues (Blue Thumb)


 * Milestone
 * 1981: All the Way Live (with Eddie Harris)
 * 1989: Prime Time
 * 1990: Fourmost Live
 * 1990: Fourmost Return
 * 1993: ''Sum Serious Blues'


 * Other labels
 * 1955: The Fantastic Jimmy Smith with Don Gardner Trio
 * 1965: The Amazing Jimmy Smith Trio – Live at the Village Gate (Metro)
 * 1965: Live in Concert - The Incredible Jimmy Smith (Metro)
 * 1972: Newport in New York '72 / The Jimmy Smith Jam, Vol. 5 (Atlantic)
 * 1974: Black Smith (Pride)
 * 1974: Paid in Full (Mojo)
 * 1975: '75 (Mojo)
 * 1976: Sit on It! (Mercury)
 * 1977: It's Necessary (Mercury)
 * 1978: Unfinished Business (Mercury)
 * 1980: The Cat Strikes Again (LaserLight)
 * 1980: Second Coming (Mojo)
 * 1982: Off the Top (Elektra)
 * 1983: Keep on Comin' (Elektra)
 * 2001: Black Cat / Daybreak (Castle)

As sideman

 * Quincy Jones & Bill Cosby - The Original Jam Sessions 1969 (Concord) 2004
 * Kenny Burrell - Ellington Is Forever, Ellington Is Forever Volume Two (Fantasy, 1975)
 * Lenny White - Venusian Summer (L. White/J. Smith/Larry Young/Larry Coryell/Al DiMeola/Weldon Irvine/Hubert Laws) (Nemperor) 1975
 * James Ingram - It's Your Night (QWest) 1983
 * Stanley Turrentine - Straight Ahead (S. Turrentine/J.Smith/G.Benson/L.McCann) (Blue Note) 1984
 * Frank Sinatra - L.A. Is My Lady (Warners) 1984
 * Michael Jackson - Bad (Hammond B3 Midi organ solo in "Bad") (Epic/Sony) 1987
 * Dee Dee Bridgewater - Love and Peace: A Tribute to Horace Silver (Verve) 1994
 * Joey DeFrancesco - Incredible! (Concord) 1999
 * Joey DeFrancesco - Legacy (Concord) 2005