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Donny Hathaway (Wurlie) Appreciation Thread


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Underrated as a piano player also.  It may be because there isn't a lot of footage of him strangely enough?  He never comes up when people talk about keyboard players.   He went to Howard University where my daughter went and met his wife there.  He also went to Julliard apparently.

"Danny, ci manchi a tutti. La E-Street Band non e' la stessa senza di te. Riposa in pace, fratello"

 

 

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Donny Hathaway's EP playing is a masterclass in soul. Willie Weeks absolutely kills. 

 

The Hathaway/Weeks combo is my point of reference for how keys and bass should coexist and sound great. 😎

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PD

 

"The greatest thing you'll ever learn, is just to love and be loved in return."--E. Ahbez "Nature Boy"

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I must have been around 19 and I was doing a session at an 8 track place. The next session was Van McCoy and I hung around after my session with the guys in Van’s band. I was talking to the bass player and drummer and they told me that they were in town with Donny and told me to come check it out. I went and was blown away. It was a lot for a 19 year old to witness in the early 70's. Mavis opened. Anywho…I remained friends them both all these years. I talked to Basie on the phone the first of March in ’20; right when covid was starting to get bad. By the end of March he was gone. Bad ass bass player.

 

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+1 on what everybody has to say here about the live album.  I recently stumbled across this footage, which was new to me.  Awesome to see footage of this band.  

 

 

Also, he was a BRILLIANT orchestrator.  The way the timbres of Donny's Hammond and his orchestral arrangement coexist on this cut in particular... wow.  Not a note out of place from the whole band either.

 

 

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On 4/30/2022 at 9:29 AM, Morrissey said:

Resurrecting this thread to post this video, which is a pretty accurate cover of Donny's playing on What's Going On.  I've always loved this tune but never got around to transcribing it.  Watching this video gave me another avenue to appreciate the sophistication of Donny's keyboard skills.  So tasty and, imho, way underrated. 

 

 

 

Outstanding performance and great example. Unfortunately I have a difficult time with the Wurly sound, I find it so distracting because the tremolo is so fast. 

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-Mike Martin

 

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Diggin all the love for Willie Weeks.  I assume most of you are familiar with his excellent 4 minute(!) bass solo starting at the 8 minute mark of this tune.  So tasty.  And delightfully playful at times:

 

 

 

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