Alexis Korner

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Alexis Korner
Background information
Birth name	Alexis Andrew Nicholas Koerner
Born	April 19, 1928
Died	January 1, 1984
Genre(s)	Blues
Occupation(s)	Musician, Songwriter, Historian, Broadcaster
Instrument(s)	Guitar, Piano, Vocals
Associated acts	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.[1]

[edit] Career

Korner is probably best remembered as a networker and blues historian, alhough 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, such as Mick Rutherford, who went on to success in Ice, Heavy Metal Thunder and his own Mick Rutherford Band, John Mayall as well as Brian Jones, Mick Jagger, and Keith Richards, who went on to form the Rolling Stones. This facet is especially evident in his live recordings which read as a veritable who's who of the British music scene of the 1960s and 1970s.

Alexis Korner's New Church were one of the support bands at the Rolling Stones Free Concert at Hyde Park on 5th july 1969.

He also brought previously unknown American blues artists to England to perform. There is an apocryphal story that the Rolling Stones went to stay at Korner's house late one night, in the early '60s, 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.

Although he himself was always 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.

Ironically, he would have his greatest commercial success in the early 1970s with a jazz-rock band called C. C. S. - short for The Collective Consciousness Society, formed with musical director John Cameron, singer Peter Thorup, flautist Harold McNair and record producer Mickie Most. They had hits with "Walkin'", "Tap Turns on the Water", "Brother" which later became the theme tune to the Top 20 (later Top 40) on BBC Radio 1, "The Band Played the Boogie", and the best remembered, an instrumental version of Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love". This version was used for many years as the theme music for the BBC Television show Top Of The Pops.

It is said that Jimmy Page found out about this new singer, Robert Plant, that had been jamming with the well respected 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".

After C.C.S. disbanded in 1974 Korner formed another group, Snape. In the mid '70s, 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 late '70s he often reunited with several musicians from the "old days" for jam sessions, including the informal fun band Rocket 88. In his last years, he turned more to broadcasting, and presented a weekly blues and soul show for BBC Radio 1 until a few weeks before his admission to hospital and eventual death from cancer.

[edit] 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)

• At the Cavern (1964)

• Red Hot From Alex (1964)

• Sky High (1966)

• I Wonder Who (1967)

• A New Generation of Blues (1968)

• Both Sides (1970)

• Alexis Korner (1971)

• Bootleg Him (1972)

• Accidentally Born in New Orleans (1972)

• Live On Tour in Germany (1973)

• Alexis Korner (1974)

• Get Off Of My Cloud (1975)

• Live in Paris (1976)

• Just Easy (1978)

• The Party Album (1979)

• Me (1980)

• Juvenile Delinquent (1984)

• Testament (1985)

[edit] External link

• Alexis Korner page at Radio Rewind