Dr. John, a chief musical architect of New Orleans sound, dies at 77
Mac “Dr. John” Rebennack, the nine-fingered New Orleans-based pianist, singer, songwriter and session musician best known for his 1973 top 10 hit “Right Place, Wrong Time,” has died. He was 77. Across six decades as a creator, Rebennack served as the unofficial voodoo ambassador of the Crescent City, and starting in the 1960s helped update the region’s distinctive boogie-woogie sound for a new generation.
Rebennack suffered a fatal heart attack on Thursday morning, according to a statement released to The Associated Press.
Rebennack was born in New Orleans in 1941. His persona both on and off stage was a wonder built on myths, lies, speculation and deceit. He willfully obscured his biography in service of his art. Starting with his 1968 debut, “Gris-Gris,” and extending through at least 30 studio albums, the artist created singular works that used as a template classic American songcraft _ but with a handmade New Orleans roux mixed in.
As a session musician, Rebennack played on seminal 1960s and ‘70s sessions by artists including Aretha Franklin, Harry Nilsson, Canned Heat, Carly Simon, Buddy Guy and Joe Cocker, and was a memorable presence in “The Last Waltz,” Martin Scorsese’s documentary on the Band’s final performance.
As he evolved, he moved from a deliberately uncommercial purveyor of trippedout voodoo music and toward a desire to succeed in the market. As he famously told Rolling Stone in 1973, “The only thing that makes a record commercial is if people buy it.”
His 1974 song and album, “Desitively Bonnaroo,” birthed the name of the popular music festival held annually in Manchester, Tenn.
Across his life on the stage, the self-described “Night Tripper” wondered on the nature of death and even used his record-storeowning father’s ghost as a muse.
“There’s times I’ve been sat on his grave and heard him hummin’ stuff without seeing him,” he told the Independent in a 2001 interview of one such session, “but on this occasion he was sitting close as you are now. He looked like when he was young, and he was singing that exact melody.”