| Alexis Korner |
| Background information |
| Birth name |
Alexis Andrew Nicholas Koerner |
| Born |
April 19, 1928(1928-04-19) |
| Died |
January 1, 1984 (aged 55) |
| Genre(s) |
Blues |
| Occupation(s) |
Musician, Songwriter, Historian, Broadcaster |
| Instrument(s) |
Guitar, Piano, Vocals |
Associated
acts |
Blues Incorporated
C. C. S. |
Alexis Korner (born Alexis Andrew Nicholas
Koerner, 19
April 1928
in Paris, France - died 1 January 1984 in Westminster,
Central
London), was an English
blues musician, born
to an Austrian
father and Greek
mother.
Korner is probably best remembered as a networker and blues
historian, although he was a proficient guitarist
and a distinctive (if not accomplished) vocalist. Often referred to as
"the Father of British Blues", Korner was instrumental in bringing
together various English blues musicians.
|
Contents
- 1 Early
career
- 2 The
1960s
- 3 The
1970s and 1980s
- 4 References
- 5 Audio
- 6 Selected
discography
- 7 External
links
|
Early career
Alexis Korner spent his childhood in France, Switzerland, and
North Africa, and arrived in London in 1940. One memory of his youth
was listening to a record by Jimmy Yancey during a German air raid.
He said, "From then on all I wanted to do was play the blues."
After the war, he played piano and guitar, and in 1949 joined Chris
Barber's Jazz Band where he met blues harmonica player Cyril
Davies. They started playing together as a duo, formed the
influential London Blues and Barrelhouse Club in 1955, and made their
first record together in 1957. Korner brought many American
blues artists, previously unknown in England, to perform.
The 1960s
In 1961, Korner and Davies formed Blues Incorporated,
initially a loose-knit group of musicians with a shared love of
electric blues and R&B
music. The group included, at various times, such influential musicians
as Charlie Watts, Jack
Bruce, Ginger Baker, Long
John Baldry, Graham Bond, Danny
Thompson and Dick Heckstall-Smith. It also
attracted a wider crowd of mostly younger fans, some of whom
occasionally performed with the group, including Mick
Jagger, Keith Richards, Brian
Jones, Rod Stewart, John
Mayall and Jimmy Page. One story is that
the Rolling Stones went to stay at Korner's house late one night, in
the early 1960s, after a performance. They entered in the accepted way,
by climbing in through the kitchen window, to find Muddy
Waters' band sleeping on the kitchen floor.
- See main article : Blues Incorporated
Although Cyril Davies left the group in 1963, Blues
Incorporated continued to record, with Korner at the helm, until 1966.
However, by that time its originally stellar line-up and crowd of
followers had mostly left to start their own bands. "While
his one-time acolytes the Rolling Stones and Cream
made the front pages of music magazines all over the world, Korner was
relegated to the role of "elder statesman.""
Although he himself was a blues purist - Korner criticised
better-known British blues musicians, during the blues boom of the late
'60s, for their blind adherence to Chicago blues, as if the music came in
no other form - he liked to surround himself with jazz musicians and
often performed with a horn section drawn from a pool which
included, among others, saxophone players Art
Themen, Mel Collins, Dick Heckstall-Smith, Dick
Morrissey, John Surman and trombonist
Mike Zwerin.
In the 1960s Korner began a media career, initially as a show
business interviewer and then on the ITV's Five O'Clock Club, a
children's TV show. He also wrote about blues for the music papers, and
continued his performing career especially in Europe. While touring
Scandinavia he first joined forces with singer Peter Thorup, together forming the band
New Church, who
were one of the support bands at the Rolling Stones Free Concert at
Hyde Park on 5
July 1969.
It is said that Jimmy Page found out about a new singer, Robert
Plant, who had been jamming with Korner, who wondered why
Plant had not yet been discovered. Plant, Korner, and Steve
Miller were in the process of recording a full album with Plant on
vocals until Page had asked him to join "the New Yardbirds", aka Led
Zeppelin. Only two songs are in circulation of these
recordings: "Steal Away" and "Operator".
The 1970s and 1980s
In 1970 Korner and Thorup formed a big band ensemble, C.C.S.
- short for The Collective Consciousness Society -
which had several hit singles produced by Mickie
Most, including a version of Led Zeppelin's "Whole
Lotta Love" which was used as the theme for BBC's Top
Of The Pops for several years. This was the
period of Korner's greatest commercial success in the UK.
- See main article : C.C.S.
In 1973, he formed another group, Snape, with Boz
Burrell, Mel Collins, and Ian
Wallace, previously together in King Crimson. Korner also
played on B.B.
King's Supersession album, and cut his own, similar
album, Get Off My Cloud, with Keith Richards, Peter
Frampton, Nicky Hopkins, and members
of Joe
Cocker's Grease Band.
In the mid 1970s, while touring Germany, he established an intensive working
relationship with bassist Colin Hodgkinson who played for the
support act Back Door. They would continue
to collaborate until the end.
In the 1970s Korner's main career was in broadcasting. In 1973
he presented a six part documentary for the BBC, The Rolling
Stones Story, and in 1977 he established a weekly blues and
soul show on Radio
1, which ran until 1981. He also used his gravelly voice to great
effect as an advertising voice over artist.
In 1978, for Korner's 50th birthday, an all-star concert was
held featuring Eric Clapton, Paul
Jones, Chris Farlowe, and Zoot
Money, which was later released as a video.
In 1981, he formed another "supergroup", Rocket 88, featuring
Jack Bruce. Ian Stewart and Charlie
Watts, backed by a horn section and keyboard players. They toured
Europe and released an album on Atlantic Records which mixed blues
with boogie-woogie jazz.
Alexis Korner, a lifelong smoker, died of lung
cancer on January 1st 1984, aged 55.
Alexis Korner: The Biography, written by
Harry Shapiro, was published in 1997.
References
Audio
Selected discography
- Ken Colyer's Skiffle Group: Back to the Delta
(1954)
- Alexis Korner's Breakdown Group Featuring Cyril
Davies (1957)
- Alexis Korner Skiffle Group: Blues from the Round
House 1 and 2 (1958)
- R&B From the Marquee (1962)
- Alexis Korner's Blues Incorporated (1963)
- A New Generation of Blues (1968)
- Accidentally Born in New Orleans (1972)
- Live On Tour in Germany (1973)
- Get Off Of My Cloud (1975)
- Juvenile Delinquent (1984)
External links
