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26-743: Morrissey–Mullen were a British jazz-funk /fusion group of the 1970s and 1980s. Considered one of the most popular jazz groups in London, the band was led by Dick Morrissey on tenor and soprano saxes and flute, and Jim Mullen on guitar, who joined forces in 1975, playing together for sixteen years, during which they came to be known as "Mr Sax and Captain Axe" because of their hallmark call and response style between guitar and saxophone. The band began in New York City where Dick Morrissey and Jim Mullen were recording and touring with their mutual friends in

52-737: A UK identity was Light of the World, formed by Kenny Wellington, Jean-Paul 'Bluey' Maunick and other musicians. Acid jazz is jazz genre, but its emphasis on groove just like funk, hip hop, and club dance music. Incognito , The Brand New Heavies , Jamiroquai , and the James Taylor Quartet helped the acid jazz movement surge in popularity. UK group US3 signed to Acid Jazz Records , founded by Peterson and Eddie Piller . US3 covered " Cantaloupe Island ", originally recorded by Herbie Hancock . Jimmy Smith (musician) James Oscar Smith (December 8, 1928 – February 8, 2005 )

78-530: A harmonic structure that allows musicians to improvise. Modern jazz funk music was influenced by Herbie Hancock . The Mizell Brothers were producers for many jazz and soul artists. Examples of early jazz funk albums include Miles Davis' On the Corner (1972) and Jimmy Smith's Root Down (1972). The Last Poets , Gil Scott-Heron , Lightnin' Rod , T.S. Monk , Pleasure , Boogaloo Joe Jones , Lenny White , Don Blackman , Monk Higgins , Wilbur Bascomb ,

104-753: A larger audience. By contrast, pop audiences found it "too jazzy" and, therefore, too complex. Some mainstream artists in jazz used specialist producers to commercial success. Larry and Fonce Mizell produced jazz-funk artists such as Johnny "Hammond" Smith , Gary Bartz , Roger Glenn, the Blackbyrds, and Donald Byrd . In the UK's nightclubs of the mid-late 1970s, DJs including Colin Curtis in Manchester , Birmingham 's Graham Warr and Shaun Williams , and Leeds -based Ian Dewhirst and Paul Schofield championed

130-539: A song-and-dance routine in clubs at the age of six. 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 period in the U.S. 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

156-478: A story where Smith grabbed Emerson's "meat and two veg" as a humorous greeting. Later, Smith influenced bands such as Medeski, Martin & Wood and the Beastie Boys , who sampled the bassline from "Root Down (and Get It)" from Root Down —and saluted Smith in the lyrics—for their own hit "Root Down". Often called the father of acid jazz , Smith lived to see that movement come to reflect his organ style. In

182-410: Is to pull out the first three drawbars on the "B" preset on the top manual of the organ, with added harmonic percussion on the 3rd harmonic. The tone has been emulated by many jazz organists since Smith. 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 played the bass line on

208-500: The Average White Band and Herbie Mann . Up (Atlantic, 1977) included Average White Band as a rhythm section, Luther Vandross and Cissy Houston on vocals, and New York session musicians . A six-week residency at Mikell's in New York City attracted Boz Scaggs , David Sanborn , Steve Gadd , Steve Ferrone , Richard Tee , George Benson , Ray Barretto , Michael Brecker , and Randy Brecker . On their return to

234-611: 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 play. 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

260-574: The 1950s and 1960s, Smith almost always performed live, in a trio, consisting of organ, guitar and drums. The Jimmy Smith Trio performed " When Johnny Comes Marching Home " and "The Sermon" in the film Get Yourself a College Girl (1964). In the 1970s, Smith opened his own supper club in the North Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles , California , at 12910 Victory Boulevard and played there regularly with Kenny Dixon on drums, Herman Riley and John F. Phillips on saxophone; also included in

286-514: 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, with the help of a webmaster he produced Dot Com Blues , his last Verve album. In 1999, Smith guested on two tracks of a live album, Incredible! (Smith's nickname during the 1960s) with his protégé, Joey DeFrancesco, a then 28-year-old organist. Smith and DeFrancesco's collaborative album Legacy

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312-539: The Blackbyrds, Donald Byrd and Les DeMerle and Michael Henderson released jazz funk albums. Jazz funk musicians used electric instruments, such as the Rhodes Piano or electric guitar, bass guitar , organ, particularly in jazz fusion . Herbie Hancock played ARP Odyssey synthesizer and clavinet on album Head Hunters (1973). Jennifer Lopez popularized "jazz funk dance" in the sketch comedy In Living Color . The controversy may have helped jazz find

338-786: 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 Smith worked with a big band, led by Oliver Nelson . Further big band collaborations followed with composer/arranger 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 albums from this period include Blue Bash! and Organ Grinder Swing with Kenny Burrell , The Boss with George Benson , Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? , Got My Mojo Working , and Hoochie Coochie Man . During

364-478: The United Kingdom, Morrissey–Mullen concentrated on the small-club/pub circuit, including a residency at The Half Moon , Putney for many years. In 1979, Morrissey–Mullen recorded an instrumental version " Love Don't Live Here Anymore ", originally a hit for Rose Royce , backed with a piece by Jim Mullen entitled "Don't You Worry" - released as a 12-inch single, EMI 12DIG 1001, this was significant in being

390-523: The album Jimmy Smith Plays for the People in 1978. Smith had a career revival in the 1980s and 1990s, again recording for Blue Note and Verve, and for Elektra and Milestone . He also recorded with Quincy Jones , Frank Sinatra , Michael Jackson (he can be heard on the title track of the Bad album), Dee Dee Bridgewater , and Joey DeFrancesco . His last album, Dot Com Blues (Blue Thumb/Verve, 2000),

416-579: The band had included two session musicians from New Zealand, Frank Gibson Jr. on drums and Bruce Lynch on bass, the band was also a springboard for a generation of young British musicians, including Chris Fletcher on percussion, Henry Thomas on bass, Gary Husband on drums, Rob Burns on bass, Claire Hamill and Carol Kenyon on vocals (both on whom appeared with Dick Morrissey on the 1981 Jon & Vangelis album The Friends of Mr Cairo ), Tessa Niles , Linda Taylor , and Noel McCalla . Morrissey's failing health required too many visits to hospital for

442-726: The band to be viable. When the band dissolved in 1988, Mullen and Morrissey continued meeting for jam sessions with what they called "Our Band", usually with the same musicians that had accompanied them in the past. They appeared at the 1991 Cork Jazz Festival in the Metropole Hotel in Cork, Ireland. Morrissey died on 8 November 2000, aged 60, after many years fighting various forms of cancer . Jazz-funk Jazz-funk exhibits several distinctive characteristics. A first characteristic of jazz funk has simple structure based around one or two riffs, and second characteristic of jazz funk has

468-400: The band was harmonica/flute player Stanley Behrens. The 1972 album Root Down , considered a seminal influence on later generations of funk and hip-hop musicians, was recorded live at the club, albeit with a different group of backing musicians. Holle Thee Maxwell , then known as Holly Maxwell, was Smith's vocalist for two years in the late 1970s. During a South African tour, they recorded

494-464: 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. The drawbar setting most commonly associated with Smith

520-573: The first non-classical 100% digitally recorded and mastered record released by EMI Morrissey–Mullen's backing band included British jazz musicians such as Martin Drew , David Sheen, Chris Ainsworth, Tony Beard, Neil Wilkinson, John Mole , Clive Chaman, John McKenzie, Joe Hubbard, Trevor Barry, and Pete Jacobsen , John Critchinson , Martin Blackwell, Geoff Castle, and John Burch (with whom Dick Morrissey would form an octet in 1984). Although members of

546-588: The genre, along with Chris Hill and Bob Jones in the South. London-based jazz funk pioneers drew a new audience to jazz: notably pirate radio stations Invicta 92.4 and JFM. In the late 1980s, rare groove crate diggers–DJs in England who were interested in looking back into the past and re-discovering old tunes– Norman Jay and Gilles Peterson achieved prominence. While the majority of jazz-funk bands are American, British jazz-funk artists and bands emerged in

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572-399: 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 forty sessions for Blue Note in just eight years beginning in 1956. Albums from this period include The Sermon! , House Party , Home Cooking' , Midnight Special , Back at

598-526: The late 1970s and early 1980s. They were encouraged by club DJs such as Chris Hill and Robbie Vincent , who was then on BBC Radio London , and Greg Edwards , who had a show on London's first commercial radio station, Capital Radio . They launched a jazz festival in 1980, where the jazz-funk band Light of the World performed. Jazz-funk was also played on Europe's first soul station, Radio Invicta , and pirate radio stations such as Solar Radio , Horizon, and Kiss FM . The first of these bands to establish

624-463: 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 , Don Patterson , Richard "Groove" Holmes , Joey DeFrancesco , Tony Monaco and Larry Goldings as well as rock keyboardists such as Jon Lord , Brian Auger and Keith Emerson . Emerson would later recount

650-719: Was an American jazz musician who helped popularize the Hammond B-3 organ, creating a link between jazz and 1960s soul music . In 2005, Smith was awarded the NEA Jazz Masters Award from the National Endowment for the Arts, the highest honor that America bestows upon jazz musicians. James Oscar Smith was born in Norristown, Pennsylvania northwest of Philadelphia . He joined his father doing

676-433: Was recorded with B. B. King , Dr. John , and Etta James . Smith and his wife moved to Scottsdale, Arizona in 2004. She died of cancer a few months later. Smith recorded Legacy with Joey DeFrancesco, and the two prepared to go on tour. However, before the tour began, Smith died on February 8, 2005, at his Scottsdale home, where he was found by his manager, Robert Clayton. He died in his sleep of natural causes. While

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