Today is the birthday of Hammond B-3 jazz artist Richard “Groove” Holmes—born in Camden, New Jersey, May 2, 1931; died in St. Louis, Missouri, June 29, 1991. I love the sound of the Hammond organ in jazz; in fact, I would have no problem playing soul-jazz organ sounds all night long on my jazz show. But I think the very first time I heard an organ of any kind was on the Grateful Dead’s first Warner Bros. album Grateful Dead, released in mid-March, 1967. The first track is “The Golden Road (To Unlimited Devotion)” and opens with Pigpen’s signature organ sound (probably a Vox Continental; he switched to the Hammond B-3 in 1968) and every time I hear those opening sustained notes, I get brief flashes of where I was when I first heard it: Pacific Grove, CA, 1967.
It’s probably not by accident that the Hammond organ inevitably made its way from the mechanical pipe organs played in churches of the
Hammond B-3 with Leslie speaker
Middle-Ages to the electric Hammond B-3 organs used in Baptist churches in the south. African-American Baptist church gospel music had that amalgam of African rhythms, blues, and Christian hymns that influenced countless jazz and blues organ players. Jazz borrowings from gospel music and blues spawned Soul Jazz and the jazz organ trios—primarily organ, guitar, and drums.
My first taste of organ jazz was from Jimmy Smith, Hammond B-3 soul-jazz pioneer. Check out the funky soul jazz album Back at the Chicken Shack, 1960, one of Smith’s classic Blue Note sessions with Stanley Turrentine on tenor Kenny Burrell on guitar, Donald Bailey on drums. No bass. The first time I heard this was probably from my father’s record collection.
But it was Richard “Groove” Holmes who got me on the fast track to swinging soul jazz sounds; he was the master of the “Groove.” On my playlist would be “Groovin’ with the Jug,” title cut from the 1961 Pacific Jazz album featuring Holmes on organ, Gene Ammons on tenor, guitarist Gene Edwards and drummer Leroy Henderson. The 1965 Soul Message on Prestige is a brilliant mix of boogaloo rhythms and funky grooves. A good example of this is “Groove’s Groove;” pure organ soul rhythm. Here’s to “Grooves” 84th birthday!
Call and Response 