John Simon (musician)

John Simon (* 11. August 1941 in Norwalk , Connecticut ) is a rock - producer , - Pianist and - keyboardist .

Simon took piano and violin lessons as a small child , and wrote his first songs before he was ten. As a teenager he was the band leader and composer of various bands in his school and wrote two musicals. In the early 1960s he got a job as a producer at Columbia Records and initially only produced relatively unknown performers, such as Joseph McCarthy, the Charles Lloyd Quartet, the Sunset Serenaders and Frankie Yankovic. He was commercially successful for the first time in 1966 as the producer of the single Red Rubber Ball by The Cyrkle (a composition by Paul Simon and Bruce Woodley ).

Simon's career as a top producer began. In 1967 he was at the Monterey Pop Festival , where he met Peter Yarrow . Together with him he produced the soundtrack for the film You Are What You Eat in 1968 . At the same time, Simon made the acquaintance of Howard Alk , who in turn introduced him to the band , which was not yet famous at the time. Simon liked the band's sound and decided to help them out. He first made them the backing band of Tiny Tim , which he was producing at the time. Later he also recorded the demo take with the band, which should make them famous.

In 1968, Simon also produced Simon and Garfunkels Bookends , Cheap Thrills by Big Brother and the Holding Company , Child Is Father to the Man by Blood, Sweat & Tears, and Leonard Cohen's Songs of Leonard Cohen , all on Columbia Records. There were also Cass Elliot's Dream a Little Dream of Me and Gordon Lightfoot Did She Mention My Name on other labels and he played on Late Again by Peter, Paul & Mary . As the grand finale of the year, Simon produced their debut album, Music from Big Pink by The Band.

1969 began for Simon with the productions of The Bands The Band and The Electric Flags The Electric Flag . On the advice of Paul Simon and Dylan producer Alan Grossman , Simon finally signed as a solo artist with Warner Brothers and released his debut John Simon's album in 1970 , on which musicians such as Garth Hudson , Richard Manuel , Cyrus Faryar , Rick Danko , Leon Russell , Jim Gordon , Delaney Bramlett , Jim Price , Carl Radle , Rita Coolidge , Bobby Whitlock and Jean Millington play. Otherwise he only produced Down Home by Seals & Crofts that year .

In 1972 Simon released a second solo album called Journey . During the 1970s, Simon also worked frequently as a studio musician, for example for Eric Clapton , Howlin 'Wolf , Taj Mahal , Dave Mason and Jesse Ed Davis . He has also worked with John Martyn , Al Kooper , David Sanborn , Steve Forbert , Cyrus Faryar , Gil Evans , John Hartford , Michael Franks , Martin Mull and continues to do so with The Band. Together with Robbie Robertson he wrote the piece Davy's on the Road Again , which was recorded in 1978 by Manfred Mann's Earth Band and published on the album Watch .

In the 1980s and 1990s, Simon u. a. Albums by Emmylou Harris , John Sebastian , Winter Hours , Biréli Lagrène , the Kips Bay Ceili Band , Pierce Turner and Christine Lavin . To this day, Simon is still active in the music scene.