Allen Toussaint

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Allen Toussaint (2009)

Allen Toussaint (born January 14, 1938 in New Orleans , Louisiana , † November 9, 2015 in Madrid ) was an American musician and one of the most influential record producers of the 1960s in New Orleans. As a piano player with his own style, he arranged, produced and composed great hits for American performers.

Career

At the age of seven, influenced by Professor Longhair , he played the piano and founded the band Flamingos in 1952, which Snooks Eaglin later joined. Dave Bartholomew brought him in as piano accompaniment in particular for the Fats Domino recordings of I Want You to Know (B-side of The Big Beat , December 1957) and Young School Girl (August 1958). During this time, in January 1958, he also arranged Lee Allen's biggest hit, Walkin 'With Mr. Lee .

His first own single came about as part of a talent competition on January 29, 1958 as Al Tousan under the title Whirlaway / Happy Times (RCA # 47-7192), recorded in Cosimo Matassa's famous recording studios in New Orleans. Impressed by his piano work, Matassa encouraged him to record further instrumental titles, which were then summarized in February 1958 as the instrumental album The Wild Sounds of New Orleans . This also included his composition Java , later a great instrumental hit for Al Hirt (# 4 pop charts in January 1963). The entire album with the support of the house band Matassas ( Alvin "Red" Tyler  - baritone saxophone, Frank Fields  - bass, Justin Adams and Roy Mantrell - guitar, Charles "Hungry" Williams - drums) reflects the captivating, authentic sound from New Orleans of the time. Despite moderate sales, Toussaint gained national fame through the album.

Artistic director of a record label

Ernie K-Doe - Mother-In-Law

From 1960 he went to the recently founded record label Minit Records , for which he produced, arranged, composed and on whose recordings he can often be heard as an accompanying pianist. Together with Allen Orange he brought out some records under the Allen & Allen label . At Minit Records , his real creative breakthrough began when he worked on developing the "New Orleans sound" into a lighter, more melodic, sometimes wistful style. In particular, he produced Ooh Poo Pah Doo for Jessie Hill in May 1960 , wrote the million-seller Mother-In-Law for Ernie K-Doe (April 1961) and Benny Spellman's Fortune Teller / Lipstick Traces (On A Cigarette) (June 1962) under his second pen name Naomi Neville . For sister label Instant Records he produced Lee Dorsey's Ya Ya (August 1961) or Chris Kenner's often-covered dance song Land of 1000 Dances (July 1963). Toussaint's drafting into the army left a creative void at Minit Records that his replacement Eddie Bo could not fill . The record label almost completely lost its market position and was sold to Imperial Records.

New beginning

When he was drafted into the army in January 1963, his creativity suffered enormously. During some encounters with his background band Stokes , which also included drummer Billy Fayard , Whipped Cream was created under the pseudonym Naomi Neville , covered by Herb Alpert in February 1965 and made a mean hit. After his discharge from the army in 1965, he worked with Marshall Sehorn, with whom he founded a production company and the record label Sansu Enterprises . Here - in addition to Betty Harris, Earl King , Chris Kenner and Lou Johnson - Lee Dorsey was also signed. Compositions for Dorsey such as Ride Your Pony , the often covered Get Out of My Life Woman or the immortal Working in the Coal Mine were all penned by Toussaint. From 1966 Sansu hired the Meters as the house band , which from 1969 received the status of interpreters and were produced by Toussaint. In 1971 Toussaint recorded his first solo album after a long time, which was simply titled Toussaint . With Sehorn, the later famous Sea-Saint sound studio in New Orleans was established in New Orleans in 1972 .

  • Allen Toussaint - Whirlaway

  • Allen & Allen - Heavenly Baby

  • Lee Dorsey - Yes We Can

  • LaBelle - Lady Marmalade

  • Dr. John - Right Place Wrong Time

Toussaint produced the title Right Place Wrong Time for Dr. John (album In The Right Place , March 1973) and the number one funk hit Lady Marmalade for LaBelle (December 1974). The Pointer Sisters adopted Yes We Can Can as their first single in August 1973 (original by Lee Dorsey from August 1970). Glen Campbell reinterpreted the title track from Toussaint's solo album Southern Nights (May 1975) and made it into the million-selling country hit Southern Nights in February 1977 ; Robert Palmer titled his album, which was accompanied by the Meters, Sneakin 'Sally Through the Alley in June 1975 after the song composed by Toussaint in 1970 (again originally from Lee Dorsey's album Yes We Can , 1970).

The discographer Tom Lord lists Toussaint in the field of jazz and rhythm and blues from 1957 to 2012 with a total of 50 recording sessions, including a. with Alvin Tyler , Ramsey Lewis , Kip Hanrahan (Conjure: Music for the Texts Of Ishmael Reed) , Madeleine Peyroux and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band . In 2009 Nonesuch released the jazz album The Bright Mississippi , u. a. with Nicholas Payton , Don Byron , Joshua Redman , Brad Mehldau and Marc Ribot . Rolling Stone magazine voted the album 82nd in its 2013 list of The 100 Best Jazz Albums .

Allen Toussaint died on November 9th, 2015 at the age of 77 during a European tour, a few hours after a concert at the Teatro Lara in Madrid . His grave is in Mount Olivet Cemetery in New Orleans.

statistics

For Allen Toussaint, a total of 818 titles are registered as composers at BMI , seven of which received a BMI Award. In 2009, his song Sweet Touch of Love was featured in the AX Dark Temptation commercial.

Awards

Allen Toussaint receives the National Medal of Arts (2012)

Albums

  • The Wild Sound of New Orleans (1958)
  • From a Whisper to a Scream (1970)
  • Toussaint (1971)
  • Life, Love and Faith (1972)
  • Southern Nights (1975)
  • Motion (1978)
  • The Allen Toussaint Collection (1991)
  • The Wild Sound of New Orleans: The Complete 'Tousan' Sessions (1994)
  • Connected (1996)
  • A New Orleans Christmas (1997)
  • A Taste of New Orleans (1999)
  • Finger Poppin '& Stompin' Feet (2002)
  • The Complete Warner Bros. Recordings (2005)
  • I Believe to My Soul (2005)
  • River in Reverse (with Elvis Costello ) (2006)
  • The Bright Mississippi (2009)
  • Songbook (2013)

Web links

Commons : Allen Toussaint  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ John Broven, Rhythm And Blues In New Orleans , 1995, p 149
  2. ↑ As a composer, besides Toussaint and Alvin Tyler (session saxophonist), a certain Freddy Friday is also registered. Friday - it turned out - had only contributed the title Java
  3. ↑ Fortune Teller was covered by the Rolling Stones , Lipstick Traces by the O'Jays
  4. ↑ Tom Lord: Jazz discography (online)
  5. ↑ Rolling Stone: The 100 Best Jazz Albums . Retrieved November 16, 2016.
  6. ↑ Dominic Massa: Influential songwriter, producer Allen Toussaint has died. ( Memento of 10 November 2015 Internet Archive () english )
  7. ^ Allen Toussaint in the Find a Grave database . Retrieved June 5, 2020.
  8. ↑ BMI entry for Allen Toussaint ( Memento from December 22, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
  9. ↑ The 100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time. Rolling Stone , August 2015, accessed August 7, 2017 .
  10. ↑ Southern Nights are long in FAZ from December 17, 2013, page 26
personal data
SURNAME Toussaint, Allen
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American musician
DATE OF BIRTH January 14, 1938
PLACE OF BIRTH New Orleans , Louisiana , United States
DATE OF DEATH November 9, 2015
Place of death Madrid , Spain