Good morning folks! Sensing that the list is made up of people that enjoy ALL quality music, I thought you'd enjoy this piece on Johnny Adams. Tmrw there will be a memorial concert in NOLA. ALSO ==> TUNE (click) IN!!!! - *Piano Night* The 11th Annual WWOZ Piano Night Concert will be offered Monday, April 26th at Tipitina's from 6 PM til 2 AM. Kermit Ruffins will provide barbeque to all attendees, and a buffet will be served upstairs to Brass Pass members. Featured performers this year include Jon Cleary, Tommy Ridgley, Eddie Bo, Willie Metcalf, Scott Kirby, Joe Krown, Willie Tee, Reggie Hall, Ann Rabson, Mitch Woods, Joel Simpson, John Gros, Nelson Lunding and Will Sargaisson. ** WWOZ will broadcast the event live on 90.7 FM. It will also be streamed throughout the world on the Internet at: www.wwoz.org ** enjoy, Kate ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ *Songbird Remembered* On the Eve of a Jazzfest Concert in his Memory, Aaron Neville and other Friends and Fans Sing the Praises of the Late Johnny Adams, the "Tan Canary," one of the Great Voices of New Orleans Rhythm & Blues By KEITH SPERA Music Writer April 25, 1999 Dew Drop Inn Revisited: A Tribute to Johnny Adams WHAT: A Jazzfest evening concert dedicated to the late R&B singer FEATURING: Aaron Neville, Irma Thomas, Marva Wright, Big Al Carson and the Wardell Quezergue Orchestra WHEN: Tuesday, 8 p.m. WHERE: Praline Connection Gospel & Blues Hall, 907 S. Peters Street TICKETS: Sold out. A living history of New Orleans music turned out at the D.W. Rhodes Funeral Home for Johnny Adams' funeral last fall: Ernie K-Doe. Cyril and Aaron Neville. Dave Bartholomew. George Porter Jr. Wild Magnolias Big Chief Bo Dollis. Tommy Ridgley. Harold Battiste. Willie "Tee" Turbinton. After they raised the roof of the chapel with a musical tribute, the mourners solemnly filed past Adams' open casket. Aaron Neville, a red carnation accenting his white shirt, paused for a moment in front of the casket, then reached out and placed a single rosary bead on the lapel of Adams' lavender suit. Neville's gesture, played out as a battery of cameras clicked away and the Treme Brass Band kicked off an indoor second-line, communicated the intimacy that existed between the two men, one of deep mutual respect and admiration. Neville learned to sing in part by mimicking the swooping falsetto on Adams' earliest recordings; this was his final farewell to a fellow world-class vocalist and first-class gentleman. When cancer silenced Adams at age 66 on Sept. 14, 1998, New Orleans and the world lost one of its great, largely unsung musical heroes. During a 40-year career, "the Tan Canary," as he was lovingly dubbed by an admiring disc jockey, never scored a national hit on par with K-Doe's "Mother In Law," never enjoyed a modern-day career resurgence of the sort that has blessed Aaron Neville. But to his devoted fans - which, tellingly, include everyone from rhythm & blues belter Ruth Brown to contemporary blues-rocker Bonnie Raitt, from old-school singer Neville to youthful Darius Rucker, lead singer of Hootie & the Blowfish - his voice shone as one of the brightest in American music, the New Orleans equivalent of Frank Sinatra. Knowing, refined, versatile, a technical marvel, his nimble voice could articulate subtle shades of emotion in everything from the earthiest rhythm & blues to the most elegant jazz. The New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival has lost several members of its extended family since last year's event. Longtime contemporary jazz and evening concert producer Charlie Bering died after a long illness. Gospel singer Raymond Myles was murdered a month after he stirred the congregation at Adams' funeral. Both Myles and Bering are being honored at the '99 Jazzfest, but Adams warranted a special tribute. On Tuesday, Aaron Neville, Irma Thomas, Marva Wright, Big Al Carson and storied local arranger Wardell Quezergue and his orchestra will join together to salute Adams and his music during a sold-out Jazzfest evening concert at the Praline Connection, performing the Tan Canary's songs as well as their own. Ironically, it will be a bigger crowd than Adams ever performed for in his hometown, save his sets at Jazzfest. Jazzfest producer/director Quint Davis' eulogy at Adams' funeral sketched out the singer's place in the musical cosmos. "As it was with the passing of Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Mahalia Jackson, Louis Armstrong, Fess (Professor Longhair) and James Booker," Davis said, "there is no replacing the true masters." Like many great singers, Johnny Adams started off in gospel, and only reluctantly agreed to try his hand at secular R&B. But once he relented, he discovered that he had a natural flair for the music. Songwriter Dorothy Labostrie, the person that initially persuaded Adams to try R&B, also gave him his first single, "I Won't Cry," which he recorded for the local Ric Records label. It became a modest regional hit in 1959, thanks in part to a young, pre-Dr. John Mac Rebennack's production work (Adams re-recorded the song in 1970, and it made a brief appearance on the national charts). Adams cut several more classic sides, including the ballad "Teach Me To Forget," a cover of Chris Kenner's "Life Is a Struggle" and the modest national hit "Losing Battle." Fourteen of his Ric singles were later reissued on the 1991 Rounder CD "I Won't Cry." But the records failed to register sizable sales around the country. After a potential record deal with Motown Records, the sort of deal that could have made him a star, fell through, Adams went back to the local labels that had been his home. A session with Nashville session musicians yielded the 1969 country-soul hit "Reconsider Me," but mostly his records had little impact outside of New Orleans. By the mid '70s, Adams was living with his mother in the Iberville housing development and working at Dorothy's Medallion Lounge and other neighborhood clubs; his band included guitarist Walter "Wolfman" Washington, now a celebrated bandleader in his own right. He continued to record haphazardly for various labels with limited commercial success, though he took pride in the fact that his singles, local jukebox favorites, were enough to get him gigs. (A new CD issued by the Australian label Aim, "The Immortal Soul of," collects 15 of the hard-to-find songs he cut during this period, from 1976 to '83.) His career finally got back on track in the mid-1980s when Rounder Records, the Massachusetts label that is home to many Louisiana artists, signed him. More than the contract itself, the chief benefit of joining the Rounder family was meeting Scott Billington, the label's house producer. In Billington, Adams found a sympathetic ear, someone who understood and appreciated the nuances of his voice. On eight albums of new recordings for Rounder, Billington teamed Adams with the best local musicians and assisted him in selecting material that showcased his remarkable voice. "It was one of the most beautiful and expressive voices I ever heard," says Billington. "Add to that his musicianship and a certain spirituality, it's an unbeatable combination. "What Johnny was really about was not just the beauty of his voice and not just his musicianship, but his ability to deliver an absolutely transcendent performance. When Johnny connected with a song, you could feel it." Their collaboration yielded stellar results: "Johnny Adams Sings Doc Pomus: The Real Me," a tribute to the famed songwriter; "Good Morning Heartache," Adams' first formal foray into the world of jazz; "The Verdict," his second jazz project, for which fan Harry Connick Jr. joined him on a voice and piano duet, "A Lot of Living to Do"; "One Foot In the Blues," which set Adams' voice against an organ combo led by Dr. Lonnie Smith. The singer, now living in Baton Rouge with his wife and young daughter, began to tour, working the festival circuit in Europe. He made a decent, if not spectacular, living, enough to stock his closet with a rainbow assortment of brightly colored suits and matching shoes. The keyboardist David Torkanowsky, who often led Adams' band during jazz gigs at Snug Harbor, often teased him about his purple suit, comparing the color to the jackets worn by K&B drugstore clerks. Adams took the ribbing in stride. His career was steady, his smoky voice as strong as ever, and additional accolades rolled in with each new release. Then he was diagnosed with cancer in the fall of 1997. He and Billington had intended to record what became his final album, "Man Of My Word," in Nashville the following spring, but by then his illness had left him too weak to travel. So the record, a stirring collection of old and new soul music, was made in New Orleans. The sessions were a struggle, a test of the singer's will. "It wasn't easy for him to make the record," Billington recalled. "It's a miracle it was finished. I'm still moved to tears when I listen to his vocal performances on that record." Many others have been similarly moved. Years ago, before the fall of the Berlin Wall, Adams toured Eastern Europe with the Neville Brothers and Irma Thomas. "We'd end the show with 'Amazing Grace,'" Aaron Neville said. "Johnny would give me chill bumps when he'd come in; we'd have those people with tears in their eyes." Neville was similarly moved during a benefit concert at Tipitina's in December 1997, one of several staged by musicians to help defray Adams' mounting medical expenses. "I was going to call him up (onstage for 'Amazing Grace'), but I didn't want him to come up there feeling bad," Neville said. "The next thing I knew, I felt his presence. I turned around, and that was a moment that I wanted to cry. I heard his voice, and it went through me like gold and silver." Neville had hoped Adams could contribute to a planned album of spiritual music. That dream was never realized, but Neville did join Adams for the gospel standard "Never Alone" on "Man Of My Word." "It was a labor of love," Neville said. "I'd get choked up when I was singing with him, especially 'Never Alone.' It was special for everybody involved. "From Aaron Neville to Johnny Adams, he was the baddest dude in the world. I told him that to his face. He'd say, 'Oh, go 'head on, Aaron.' And I'd say, 'You know I'm telling the truth.' Johnny would be hitting notes that there was no way in the world I would try; I think he reached up to the sky to get them, I don't know. He had that gospel background, a powerful, natural voice, a powerful falsetto. I could hear him singing anything: Opera, classical, any kind of music there was, Johnny Adams could sing it. He had the voice of an angel." Ruth Brown, the powerhouse singer whose recordings of "So Long" and "Teardrops From My Eyes" built a commercial base for Atlantic Records in the late 1940s and early 1950s, was thrilled that Adams agreed to reprise the role of Billy Eckstine on a duet of "I Didn't Know" for Brown's acclaimed 1998 Rounder release "R+B=Ruth Brown." "When I had the opportunity to work with Johnny Adams, I was so overwhelmed," said Brown prior to the 1998 Jazzfest. "He is one of my favorite singers in the world." Darius Rucker, whose own voice is featured on 14 million copies of the 1994 Hootie & the Blowfish album "Cracked Rear View" - a sales plateau that would take Adams a century to reach - is a devoted Neville Brothers fan, but Johnny Adams made the deepest impression on him. "Johnny Adams was a huge influence on me," Rucker said recently. "I've got a 200-disc changer at home, and I bet I've got seven Johnny Adams CDs that rotate around in there. I probably still listen to them every week. I was just playing a Mini-disc that I made for myself: 'Treat me wrong, treat me right my mind ...' from a Johnny Adams record. "The Tan Canary was almost like Sinatra: Every time you heard a Johnny Adams song, you knew it was a Johnny Adams song. My mom would play Al Green's 'For the Good Times' and 'Neither One of Us Wants to Be the First to Say Good-bye' by Gladys Knight & the Pips. When I heard the Johnny Adams version of it, it became a Johnny Adams song for me. I love to hear him sing. One of the greatest regrets of my life is that I never got to see him play live." Perhaps sensing that the 1998 Jazzfest would be Adams' last, several artists paid tribute to him. Bonnie Raitt made a point of saluting Adams during her performance at the Ray-Ban Stage. Neville invited Adams to join him and the Zion Harmonizers for a brief set in the Gospel Tent; Adams supplied a counterpoint to Neville's angelic flutter on "Never Alone," "Down By the Riverside" and "Amazing Grace. All along, Adams had maintained that he would know when he should quit the stage. "I keep telling myself that when the time comes when I can't enjoy what I'm doing, I'll stop," he told writer John Sinclair in the liner notes to the 1995 album "The Verdict." "Because I don't want to be out there, 75 or 80 years old, still trying to get somebody to feel something that you don't feel anymore. I would rather have people remember me from when I sang with a lot of inner soul and feeling and spirit." The Tan Canary got his wish. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Originally published April 25, 1999 © 1999, The Times-Picayune.
