It should be no surprise that singer/guitarist John Paul
Hammond is a musician. It’s in his
blood.
Hammond, who on Friday, June 7 will play the State Theatre
in Falls Church, Virginia as part of the 2013 Tinner Hill Blues Festival, is
the son of famous record producer and talent scout John Henry Hammond. By his son's account, the elder Hammond discovered artists ranging from Billie Holiday to
Lester Young to Bob Dylan to Bruce Springsteen.
Sometimes referred to as John Hammond, Jr., Hammond the son
has had several brushes of his own with musical history during his forty year
career.
He is the only musician known to play in a band featuring
both Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton. He
also advised Hendrix to travel to England—a move that essentially launched the
guitarist to fame.
Hammond befriended Willie Dixon and Duane Allman, got to
know Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf and shared a show with Jimmy Reed. He enlisted members of the Band as his back-up band for an album—then saw
Bob Dylan steal them away. He attended parties hosted in New York City by blues
shouter and songwriter Victory Spivey.
Spivey once recorded him playing with Otis Spann and Bob Dylan in the
same session.
Performing live on guitar and harp-on-a-rack in a
barrelhouse style, Hammond plays classic blues songs from the 30’s, 40’s, and
50’s. He has recorded more than 30 albums since debuting on Vanguard Records in
1962. In 1985 he won a Grammy for the
compilation album Blues Explosion,
which also featured Sugar Blue, J.B. Hutto, Luther “Guitar Junior” Johnson,
Koko Taylor and Stevie Ray Vaughan. He
has received four other Grammy nominations, including one in 2010 for his album
Rough and Tough.
In 2011, Hammond was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame by
the Blues Foundation.
He spoke to Beldon’s Blues Point about his long career in
the following interview:
BBP: I did see
you at the Hamilton (in November, 2012). I guess you were opening for Coco
Montoya?
Hammond: This was
in D.C., right?
BBP: Yeah. Yeah. I
really enjoyed your show, I must say.
Hammond: Thank
you.
BBP: Well, I was
reading about your background, and you’re part of the Vanderbilt family, right?
Hammond: Um,
indirectly. My father’s mother was Emily Sloane, who—her mother was a
Vanderbilt. And I never got to know that whole scene at all. My dad was a
rebellious guy who broke away from his family and all of that stuff and I mean
was practically disowned by his family. And so I grew up not knowing much about that
side at all. I grew up mostly with my mother, who was Irish, born in Toronto,
just off the ship from Ireland. So that was my reality as a kid. You know, as I
got older I heard all of these things about my father’s mother and her
Vanderbilt connections. My grandfather, John Henry Hammond, was the son of a
very strange dynamic guy from the Civil War era, a general in the army who
became a scout for the railroad and all of this stuff. A real character. So
that’s my background.
BBP: Wow. I was
curious also—just as a thought—are you related to Anderson Cooper from CNN?
Hammond:
Indirectly, indirectly, yes. Anyone that
had a Vanderbilt connection, all of these trainspotter types are quick to say
(affecting a pompous type voice) “Oh, you’re related to (whomever). He’s your
third cousin twice removed.” I don’t pay attention to that stuff.
BBP: Well, I
don’t know why I thought of that. It just sort of popped into my head. But anyway you were talking about your dad,
and I understand your dad was pretty important in the music business in his own
right. That he actually discovered Billie Holiday?
Hammond: Billie
Holiday, Count Basie, Lester Young, Charlie Christian, Meade Lux Lewis, Albert
Ammons—he put the band together for Benny Goodman, then went on to discover artists like Aretha
Franklin, Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, um, Bruce Springsteen…
BBP: Really!
Hammond: It goes
on and on. He was quite a guy.
BBP: But I
understand you really didn’t have a lot of contact with him as you were growing
up.
Hammond: Well I didn’t grow up with my dad. My folks
were divorced when I was five. I saw my father on occasion. My brother and I grew up with our mother,
basically.
BBP: But did his
line of work influence you at all?
Hammond: Maybe
indirectly, but I wasn’t part of his household, so I got into this on my own.
It’s my own passion.
BBP: Well, why
the blues, of the different styles of music you could have gotten into? What
about them attracted you?
Hammond: When I
was seven, my father took me to hear Big Bill Broonzy, who was one of the great
country blues players. I was very
impressed. I don’t know how the seeds
were sewn, but as I got older, I just sort of gravitated towards blues music and
all of that passion and feeling, to me, it was where it all came from. I just
got deeper and deeper into it. And when I was 18, I got a guitar, and when I
was 19 I started playing professionally. It’s all I wanted to do.
BBP: Hmm. And I
understand that you were a big fan of Jimmy Reed, that he had a lot of
influence…
Hammond: Oh,
yeah. I got to be on a show with him.
BBP: Really?
Hammond: 1964. In
Oakland, California.
BBP: You were
playing with him?
Hammond: Yeah, I
was opening the show. It was a show put
on by a record producer named Chris Strachwitz who had a label called Arhoolie
Records. And I got to know Chris: he’s a
big blues fanatic, and he put on shows, recorded artists and so forth. He
was—is—a terrific, dynamic guy.
BBP: And what was
it like meeting Jimmy Reed for the first time? He was somebody you admired all
of those years.
Hammond: It was
awesome. I was so humbled I don’t think I said more than four words, like, “so
nice to meet you.” And I watched his show intently. He was just amazing.
BBP: Wow. And I also understand that you were a big fan
of Robert Johnson.
Hammond: I was,
but I never met Robert Johnson (laughs). He died before I was born.
BBP: Yeah. He
died before a lot of us were born.
Hammond: But I
got to know a lot of great blues players, including Howlin’ Wolf and Muddy
Waters. Willie Dixon. I could just name hundreds of other artists that I’ve
toured with and played with—got to know and—I’ve had an amazing career.
BBP: Yeah, I’ve
been reading all about you. You certainly have. Tell me about Willie Dixon
though. I know that you were a friend of his.
Hammond: Well, he
was happening on many levels. He was a songwriter of course, and wrote songs
for Muddy and Howlin’ Wolf and Little Walter and just about everybody. He was also a great bass player—bandleader—he
put artists on the map, you know from obscurity to having recording deals and
so forth. He worked hand and glove with Chess Records and he took care of
himself. I mean he got his songs published, he made money that way. He was a
very happening guy. He was from
Vicksburg, Mississippi. I’d driven through Vicksburg on my way to New Orleans
once and I said “Oh, I was in your hometown, Vicksburg” and he said (imitating
a very deliberate tone of voice) “don’t talk to me about Vicksburg.” Ooooh. So
I guess he didn’t have wonderful experiences there. He had been a professional boxer for a
while. He was a big, tough guy, but a really
nice person.
BBP: A lot of
musicians in the past I know were boxers.
Jackie Wilson, the great R&B performer. A lot of folks. But you were described to me as the only
person in the history of music who ever had Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton
together in the same band.
Hammond: (laughs)
For about a week, yeah.
BBP: How’d that
happen?
Hammond: Well, I
met Eric in 1965 when I was on tour in England. I hooked up on some shows with
John Mayall and his Bluesbreakers and Eric was his guitar player. So we hung
out a bunch in England and played a bunch of shows together. They actually
backed me on a TV show called Ready
Steady Goes Live and we became friends at that point. And in 1966 I was
playing at a club in New York and was introduced to Jimi Hendrix who was a
fantastic guitar player and a great guy. I got to know him as a friend and I
put a little band together with him as my lead guitar player and he was
discovered and went over to England and became a huge star in Europe. In 1967 I
put my own little band together, just drums and bass and Cream came over for
their first tour in the U.S. and Hendrix came back to the U.S. from England,
where he was a huge star. And they both had some time off, and they both came
down to this club where I was playing with my little band. And they both said
“Hey, suppose we sit in with you?” Every
night that week they came in and sat in. It was just phenomenal.
BBP: How did they
sound together? How was the mixture of…
Hammond: Oh, they
were just incredible. They fed off each other;
they were both great players, very passionate about blues music and—no problem.
BBP: That’s
incredible. I also know that you actually played with Levon Helm and some
members of the Band?
Hammond: Yeah. I
met them in Toronto in1963. They had just left Ronnie Hawkins and they were on
their own and playing gigs in Toronto. I went down to hear them one night and became
good friends. I would go to their shows, they’d come to my shows, and they were
in New York in 1964 trying to get a demo tape together. And it wasn’t going so well, and I was
already signed to Vanguard Records. So I approached Vanguard and I said, “I’ve
got a little band together. Can we have a recording session?” And reluctantly
they said okay, and so we had three hours to do whatever we wanted to do, and we
made a whole album called So Many Roads.
Levon (Helms) and Robbie (Robertson),
Rick Danko and Richard Manuel and Garth Hudson and the whole Band was my band for a while. My friend Bob Dylan
came to the recording date and I introduced them to Bob and the next thing I
know, they were playing with Bob!
BBP: (laughing)
He stole them from you, huh?
Hammond: Well,
yes. Well, I mean not that they were ever my
band; they were always their own band. But they recorded behind me on that So Many Roads record.
BBP: Did you ever
record with Dylan himself?
Hammond: I did. I went to a recording date, he asked me
to play some guitar. Highway 61 Revisited,
but it was obscure. I think I may have been on one track in the background
maybe. Or perhaps it didn’t make it, I don’t know. It wasn’t a big deal to me.
BBP: But getting
back to Jimi Hendrix, you actually advised him to—when Chas Chandler approached
him—I think it was at the Café Go-Go in New York?
Hammond: The Café
Au Go Go.
BBP: Right. You
actually advised him to take Chas Chandler up on his offer.
Hammond: Oh,
definitely. Oh yeah. He was so good. He was so dynamic, that how could you not
suggest that he go over and make his own career happen? I mean he’d been a sideman for –for three or four
years. He’d been with a band called Curtis Knight and was fired in New York, I
think, for probably upstaging him (laughs).
And I mean he was so dynamic,
it was just incredible and he was a really, really nice guy.
BBP: Do you
remember the conversation? Do you remember his reaction?
Hammond: He said
“Man, this guy has offered me a ticket to go to England and record.” And I said:
“You just have to do it. You’re not going to have a whole lot of chances like
that just off the bat.” And he came back and looked me up when he’d already
become a huge star.
BBP: Hmm. Well,
I’ve heard you are a great electric player. Over the years, your trend seems to
be to do acoustic shows, one man acoustic shows.
Hammond: Yes, that’s
what I enjoy doing most. I can play some
electric guitar but that isn’t my real focus. I prefer the solo style that I’ve developed over
all of these years and I feel that’s my strongest point. I do enjoy playing the electric guitar, but
having a band together and all of that, that’s not been my focus.
BBP: But you have
done some albums where you’ve played electric…
Hammond: Yes. Yes.
BBP: The one you
recorded with David Hidalgo from Los Lobos….
Hammond: Yes.
BBP: How do you
know when something calls for a band and when something calls for you to play
solo?
Hammond: Usually
it’s the record label that says “well, we don’t want a solo record.” So it’s
kind of on my shoulders to put a band together. What I like to do and have done
in the past is to do some cuts on the album being solo and some with just a
piano or a smaller combo, and then some with a full band; you know drums, bass,
piano, whatever. And I’ve made albums in the past with big bands and horn
sections and all of that stuff, and I’ve had a chance to do a whole lot of
stuff over the years.
BBP: Yeah, I kind
of picked that up. One thing though. Do you—you don’t really do a lot of
original material, do you?
Hammond: I’ve got
some songs of my own, yeah. I think I played some that night. I don’t think of myself as a songwriter. I’m
a blues singer and I know hundreds and hundreds of songs so I have a lot to
fall back on, be inspired by.
BBP: But it seems
like your aim seems to be to kind of pay tribute and homage to the genre.
Hammond: I do
songs that I like. I’m definitely in the genre. This is my life. I think that
blues music is always relevant and dynamic—very honest—and I’ve been inspired
to do this for my whole career. A great song deserves to be sung, and I don’t
think you have to be a songwriter to be a good singer or player.
BBP: But when you
do write songs, what artist do you think of?
Hammond: Well,
they’re so many that I’ve been inspired by. I just go with the feeling that
comes, you know?
BBP: So it’s just
a collection of people who are calling to you in the background as you’re
writing your songs, right?
Hammond: I get inspiration; I don’t know where it
comes from. But it does come.
BBP: You know
something else I was curious about? I’ve seen a lot of people do this—Bruce
Springsteen—you did it at your show at the Hamilton. Playing the harmonica and
playing the guitar at the same time. That must be very hard. How do you..
Hammond: Well, it
isn’t anymore. It used to be like a huge challenge right at the beginning, but
I began playing harmonica and guitar almost at the same time. So in order to put them together, I guess
it’s like a piano player that has a left hand independent from the right hand.
And after a while, you don’t even think about it: it just flows. It’s hard to put in the words.
BBP: It’s just
something that happens more or less.
Hammond: Yes, that’s what I’ve started out to do and
got to a point where I could do it and was encouraged to do it and felt like I
was getting better.
BBP: And I guess
at the same time you’re throwing in the singing as well, so that kind of
complicates things…
Hammond: That one man band aspect.
BBP: Right. I
mean, are you kind of following a blues tradition when you do that?
Hammond: Well,
there’s only a handful of players that play on the rack like I do. Jimmy Reed
was one. I don’t know if you ever saw Doc Watson play…
BBP: That might
have been before my time…
Hammond: Great
harmonica player on the rack. It’s uh…you have to be a little nuts to do it, I
think (laughs).
BBP: When you say
“the rack” you mean…
Hammond: the
harmonica on a rack while you’re playing guitar.
BBP: Got you. Now
I also hear that you actually look for obscure blues songs that are actually in
danger of disappearing.
Hammond: I don’t
go out of my way to look for stuff like that. I mean, if I hear it by chance or
whatever, and I feel “oh, that’s a good one,” that’s the kind of way I go about
it. I don’t go looking for them.
BBP: It’s just
something you hear and you try to incorporate it.
Hammond: Yeah.
BBP: When you
hear something, is there something particular that appeals to you?
Hammond: it’s got
to appeal to me; otherwise I don’t want to be involved with it. There are so many great songs out there, it’s
what I feel that I can do that I like that I can make it mine. I think that’s
where all singers are. Find something you can latch onto and make it your own.
BBP: I mean can
you put into words what about a song grabs you?
If somebody were to ask you what you would look for, or what would
strike your ear?
Hammond: Well it
would have to do with the words and how they go together, what the image is
that it creates in your mind. I’m a guy
who’s been on the road 51 years, I’ve seen a whole lot of stuff and I can
relate to traveling. I can relate to every statement you can make in the book:
passion, adventure—when a song grabs me it has to be something I can relate to.
BBP: Something in
your personal experience, in other words.
Hammond: Yes, I
guess. I’ve had a lot—a lot –of that.
BBP: That’s
interesting. Now I know you’ve played with a lot of musicians over the years,
we kind of talked about that earlier. And there were others too that we didn’t
mention: Dr. John, Duane Allman, Roosevelt Sykes. Which of these musicians
actually taught you the most? I mean, did any of them actually take you aside
and say “John, you need to do more of this…”
Hammond: No,
nobody ever did that. I traveled with a
fellow named Charles Otis from New Orleans, who, when I put my first band
together, he was the drummer, and he’s been on the road with Professor Longhair
and Little Richard and Alvin Robinson and Frogman Henry, all of these great New
Orleans players. I mean he’d been on the
road and knew about how to comport yourself, you know, how to be professional
and not go crazy. Charles taught me a lot about, just how to be yourself in
your own shoes and be professional; respect your audience, you know, that kind
of thing. Charles is my friend to this day. We made many records together,
travelled all over the place and…you’ll meet folks like that in your life that
will hip you to things. One of those guys.
BBP: Wow. How did
you hook up with Roosevelt Sykes? The reason I ask is because I actually saw
him back in the seventies.
Hammond: You did?
Wow, I was on some films with him. And
we became friends, and I was going to make a record, and I wanted that sound of
just piano and guitar. And I asked him if he’d do it, and he said he would. So
I flew him up to New York; he wanted $700. And so the record label was going to
write him a check and he said “no, no, no, I want cash on the piano.” (laughs).
So he got the cash on the piano and we had a great time. I was on a lot of gigs with him; just a
phenomenal guy.
BBP: That’s
incredible. What year was this?
Hammond: Probably
’75.
BBP: Hmm. That’s
about the time I saw him.
Hammond: It was
called Footwork.
BBP: Hmm. That’s
the name of the album?
Hammond: Yeah. An
album I made with him. I also had recorded with him back in the ‘60’s for
Victoria Spivey. When Sykes came to New York he played at Gerdes Folk City and
this was a hangout for Victoria Spivey who was an old time blues shouter from
the 20’s and 30’s. And she knew Roosevelt and anytime he came to New York,
she’d be there, and the idea was to invite everybody in the band up to her
place in Brooklyn and she’d record you there on a tape recorder. And so I went up there many times and I got
to record with some phenomenal players, including Otis Spann and Bob Dylan. It
was back in the wild 60’s, ’65 or ’66, or around there.
BBP: Otis Spann
and Bob Dylan in the same session?
Hammond: Yeah.
BBP: Really?
Hammond: Oh
yeah. And they’re still available. I
don’t know if they’re on CD yet, but I imagine they are somewhere…
BBP: Wow. What a
combination. I mean…
Hammond: …on the
Queen Bee label.
BBP: Queen Bee
label? And these are based on recordings
that Victoria Spivey made on a tape recorder?
Hammond: Yeah, on
her tape recorder with her friend Lenny.
She’d feed you a huge fried chicken dinner and then you’d have to play
(laughs). It was a wild scene.
BBP: It sounds
like an awful lot of fun.
Hammond: It was.
BBP: Who else
would show up for those things?
Hammond: Well, a
harmonica player named Bill Dicey. Babe Stovall. Anybody who was coming through
and playing;if she liked you, you’d be invited up to her place.
BBP: Well it
sounds like you’ve known a lot of interesting people. Duane Allman, how did you
meet him?
Hammond: Well, I
was recording for Atlantic in 1969, and Duane came to the recording session, he
wanted to meet me. He had heard some of my earlier recordings. So one of the
players on the recording date, Eddie Hinton, knew Duane and introduced him to
me. And Eddie said to me “you’ve got to
hear this guy play, he’s phenomenal.” So
Duane played a little bit, and I said “Oooo. Would you like to be on this next
tune we’re going to record?” And it was
just mind-boggling. Everybody in Mussel Shoals knew of Duane, he had played
behind Aretha Franklin; he had played behind other artists that were recording
for Atlantic…so anyway we became really good friends. At one point the Allman
Brothers band actually opened for me in St. Paul—probably ’69 or ’70—and then I
opened a lot of shows for them later (laughs).
BBP: You returned
the favor in other words.
Hammond: Oh, man,
we were good friends.
BBP: Wow. That’s
something. You’ve had some pretty amazing experiences there with musicians. I
was wondering, how do you think the blues has changed? I know you like the more traditional styles,
but the things that the modern artists are putting out, what’s your take on
them?
Hammond: Well,
you do too much, it isn’t blues anymore. You do too little, it becomes a
ballad. It’s hard to put into words. I mean blues; you’ll know it when you hear
it… (Hammond had to stop our conversation briefly at this point to take another
call. Our interview resumed upon his return.)
BBP: Just a couple more I want to throw at you. You
know it was funny, I was watching TV the other night, and they showed that
movie Little Big Man.
Hammond: Oh yeah…
BBP: And I
understand that you were involved in putting together the soundtrack for that?
Hammond: I did
the soundtrack for it. I mean I didn’t do the cavalry stuff, but I did the
entire guitar playing. 1970.
BBP: Mmm-hmm.
Yeah. That was the year that movie came out.
Hammond: Yeah, they
flew me out to Hollywood. I said to Arthur Penn, “I don’t think the music that
I play existed back then.” He said “it doesn’t matter, it will work.” So they
sat me in front of a five-hour movie, and where they wanted to have music, I
would play; there’d be a little strip that would come on the film and then I
would start, and they recorded it as I played to the movie. It was an amazing, amazing experience for me.
BBP: Was that the
only movie you ever did? Were there others?
Hammond: I was
involved in two other films vaguely. One was called Matewam, a John Sayles film and one called The Indian Runner; it was
a Sean Penn film.
The Tinner Hill Blues Festival is held annually in Falls
Church, Virginia to honor blues guitarist John Jackson, who lived in Virginia
and died in 2002. Scheduled for June 7-9, 2013, this year’s festival will also
feature singer/guitarist Big Bill Morganfield, Sheryl Warner and the Southside
Housewreckers, The Acoustic Blues Women, Guitarist Roy Bookbinder, Beverly
Guitar Watkins, pianist Daryl Davis, singer Mary Ann Redmond and singer Sista
Monica, among others. For specific performance times and other details, check
out the Tinner Hill Website at:
