Customer Reviews

Spiders on the Keys

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This is Booker near the end of his career, playing in a dinky New Orleans bar and usually half out of his head. But the fingers still knew what they were doing, even on a piano that sounds as if it's strung with rubber bands. For an introduction to Booker's playing I'd recommend "New Orleans Piano Wizard," Booker in front of a huge audience playing a superb grand piano. But Booker freaks can't get enough of his playing, and I'm one of them.

Listen to "Piano Salad" and tell me how this guy plays this with only two hands? Definitely one of the finest piano players from New Orleans!

This is a solo club recording of the great New Orleans Pianist James Booker. A word of warning, the recordings were originally never planned for release so the Piano sound (and the sound overall) isn't great. The reason for its release though is clear. Booker was erratic and in the studio might or might not be on form that day. Here with the benefit of hours and hours of tapes they have able to put out two volumes of superb solo Piano with Booker unleashed to do his own thing for as long as he liked!

Highlight on this disc for me is the brilliant version of "On the Sunny Side of Street". Booker wasn't really a Jazz Pianist but listen to this performance and you might want to question that statement. This is a better version (except for the sound quality) than on the excellent studio album album Junco partner (Hannibal HNCD 1359). Checkout the great solo, he may not be Jazz Pianist, but he has all the attributes of a Jazz Pianist.

Elsewhere there are stunning versions of some of Bookers own tunes and great covers of many well known tunes like 'Eleanor Rigby', Tico Tico and 'Over the Rainbow'.

You should have this essential New Orleans Piano recording in your collection together with its sister volume 'Ressurection of the Bayou Maharajah'.

I have all of his albums. Yes, he was troubled and yes, he had a substance abuse problem, but God could he play. And really, that's all that matters. He's right up there with Tatum and Waller.... I personally believe he may have been somewhere on the autistic scale. As one of the reviewers commented, it's hard to believe only two hands are playing the piano....

The late James Carroll Booker III was a troubled man who lived a chaotic, painful life, and who played some of the most beautiful music ever. This all-instrumental cd of live recordings from the Maple Leaf Bar in New Orleans showcases Booker's solo piano playing in a wide variety of styles. He plays blues, ballads, funk, jazz, classical and pop tunes - as well as a few styles of his own - and it all fits into a concentrated whole. The music on this cd is really among the all-time best stuff ever to come out of New Orleans, which is saying a lot. Some songs are likely to have you up and jumping, while others may bring tears to your eyes. The passion and the spirit of this music can never be broken. It is
really the eternal blues. If just a smattering of this spirit survived Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans will sooner or later re-emerge as a center of musical life-force.

Goosebumps. Incredable artistry. I only wish I could fly from Oklahoma City to his next gig.