Satch a tribute from the Doc
How New Orleans voodoo legend honoured his childhood hero
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Working with Mac was one of the craziest experiences of my life
The death of singer-songwriter Dr John last June at 77 brought to an end one of most colourful careers in modern American music.
The New Orleans legend, aka Malcolm ‘Mac’ John Rebbenack, had been a sixtimes Grammy winner.
The piano playing whizz’s ‘doctorate’ was earned from studying Louisiana grooves in his native city’s notorious nightclubs.
As well as collaborating with such luminaries as Van Morrison, The Rolling Stones, Rickie Lee Jones and Brit space rockers Spiritualized, the good
Doc amassed his own enviable recorded legacy. This week Ske Dat De Dat: The Spirit of Satch – his 2014 tribute to fellow Crescent City musical revolutionary Louis ‘Satchmo’ Armstrong – is given a commemorative reissue.
Trombonist Sarah Morrow, Mac’s creative partner, said: “When he was a child, every day his dad would drive by the house where Satchmo was born and point it out to little Mac.
“They were from the same neighborhood.
Louis Armstrong was an inspiration to his father and to everyone in the community – the possibility of achieving great things.” Sarah was musical arranger when Ske Dat De Dat was recorded.
Having worked with Ray Charles, she gave Mac a copy of her album Elektric Air at a recording date in 2008. “Around midnight that same day he called and said, ‘You’re a bad mutha ***** and I wanna work with yo ass!’
“Getting to know him, and working as closely as we did, was one of the craziest, most beautiful and honourable, yet bizarre experiences of my life.”
Though Sarah says Mac was a voodoo priest who practised rituals, prayers and candle burning at recording sessions, he resisted adding elements that characterised his early incarnation as the Voodooamuletdispensin‘ Nitetripper’ at his live shows.
Sarah said: “It was too connected to his days of heroin abuse.
“He had been clean for 20something years at that point, but confided it was a demon he faced every day, no matter how long he had been clean.”
Dr John told Sarah that Satchmo had come to him in a dream and told him to do his music, in his own way.
“Mac was a big dream voyager – he would frequently visit me in my dreams and still does,” she said. “He also saw spirits in this world pretty much wherever we went.” ■■Ske Dat De Dat is out today