Jimmy Smith

 Jimmy left school in the seventh grade to help his dad who was having knee problems. Although he liked school (remembering biology fondly), he never returned and at age fifteen joined the navy. Coming out in 1947, Jimmy used the GI bill to began formal musical training, studying harmony and theory at the Halsey Music School (Clifford Brown was a classmate), string bass at Hamilton School of Music, and piano at Ornstein through 1950. 

Jimmy didn't read music and remembers how he cleverly hid this fact from his teacher. "She would play a thing by Brahms, maybe a minuet or just a little waltz, and she would say, 'Now James, you think you can read this?' I'd say, 'Yes ma'am.' I hated for her to find out I was just doing it by ear. She'd say, 'James, are you sure you're reading music?'"

Jimmy's innate musical talent soon became obvious to everyone there. Years later, Jimmy would find jam sessions in Philadelphia where he would play bump piano. "If you repeat yourself, you get bumped. Just one note or one bass line, one anything--you bumped! It was exciting not to repeat. It would make you think, think hard, man!"  

Originally a pianist, Smith switched to organ in 1953 after hearing Wild Bill Davis. "Bill Doggett gave me another way of playing the pedals to relax your leg. Bill plays straight up and down, with his heel, not his toe, 'cause he told me the toe gets tender faster than the heel on the pedals."

Woodshedding took place in the warehouse where he and his father worked as plasterers. Jimmy recalls: "I got my organ from a loan shark had it shipped to the warehouse. I stayed in that warehouse, I would say, six months to a year. I would do just like the guys do--take my lunch, then I'd go and set down at this beast. Nobody showed me anything, man, so I had to fiddle around with my stops." Jimmy developed  an exciting new sound which completely revolutionize the way in which the Hammond B-3 could be played. On hearing him playing in a Philadelphia club, Blue Note's Alfred Lion immediately signed him to the label and with his second album, also known as The Champ, quickly established Smith as a new star on the jazz scene. He was a prolific recording artist and as a leader, recorded around 40 sessions for Blue Note in just 8 years beginning in 1956. His most notable albums from this period include The 
Sermon!, House Party, Home Cookin' , Midnight Special, Back at the Chicken Shack and Prayer Meetin' .

 Smith then signed to Verve Records label in 1962. His first album Bashin', sold well and for the first time, set Smith with a big band led by Oliver Nelson. Further Big band collaborations followed, most successfully with 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 notable albums from this period include Blue Bash and Organ Grinder's Swing with Kenny Burrell, The Boss with George Benson, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Got My Mojo Workin, and the funky Root Down.

During the 50s and 60s, Smith recorded with some of the great jazz musicians of the day such as Kenny Burrell, George Benson, Grant Green, Stanley Turrentine, Lee Morgan, Lou Donaldson, Tina Brooks, Jackie McLean, Grady Tate and Donald Bailey. In the 1970s, Smith opened his own supperclub in L.A. and played there regularly.

Smith had a career revival in the 1980s and 90s, again recording for Blue Note and Verve, and for Milestone and Elektra. Smith also recorded with other artists including Quincy Jones/Frank Sinatra, Michael Jackson, Dee Dee Bridgewater and Joey DeFrancesco. His last major album Dot Com Blues (Blue Thumb, 2000), featured many special guests such as Dr. John, B.B.King and Etta James.

In 2005, Jimmy Smith was awarded the NEA Jazz Masters Award from the National Endowment for the Arts, the highest honors that the United States bestows upon jazz musicians.

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