The Derek Trucks Band
Encyclopedia
The Derek Trucks Band has been called a "group of musicians that share a passion for improvisation
Improvisation
Improvisation is the practice of acting, singing, talking and reacting, of making and creating, in the moment and in response to the stimulus of one's immediate environment and inner feelings. This can result in the invention of new thought patterns, new practices, new structures or symbols, and/or...

 and musical exploration" by a reviewer at Allmusic.
The band was founded in 1994 by young slide guitar
Slide guitar
Slide guitar or bottleneck guitar is a particular method or technique for playing the guitar. The term slide refers to the motion of the slide against the strings, while bottleneck refers to the original material of choice for such slides: the necks of glass bottles...

 prodigy, Derek Trucks
Derek Trucks
Derek Trucks is a Grammy Award-winning, American guitarist, songwriter, and record producer. He founded The Derek Trucks Band and worked as a session musician when he was still in his early teens. Throughout those teenage years, he toured with The Allman Brothers Band primarily as a slide...

, who began playing guitar and touring with some of blues and rock music's elite when he was just nine years old. After experimenting as an adolescent with musicians he met between tours and recording sessions, Trucks founded The Derek Trucks Band in 1994. With family ties to The Allman Brothers Band
The Allman Brothers Band
The Allman Brothers Band is an American rock/blues band once based in Macon, Georgia. The band was formed in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1969 by brothers Duane Allman and Gregg Allman , who were supported by Dickey Betts , Berry Oakley , Butch Trucks , and Jai Johanny "Jaimoe"...

, Trucks continued to experiment and play with others, carefully assembling his own band over a period of several years. Loosely based in his family home in Jacksonville, Florida
Jacksonville, Florida
Jacksonville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Florida in terms of both population and land area, and the largest city by area in the contiguous United States. It is the county seat of Duval County, with which the city government consolidated in 1968...

, with Trucks as unquestionable bandleader
Bandleader
A bandleader is the leader of a band of musicians. The term is most commonly, though not exclusively, used with a group that plays popular music as a small combo or a big band, such as one which plays jazz, blues, rhythm and blues or rock and roll music....

, the band is made up of six individuals.

The band has drawn upon the wide variety of the influences and musical preferences of its band members. Together, they have gained increasing public notice and critical acclaim for developing a unique sound of their own. Melding together blues, southern rock
Southern rock
Southern rock is a subgenre of rock music, and genre of Americana. It developed in the Southern United States from rock and roll, country music, and blues, and is focused generally on electric guitar and vocals...

, jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

, rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...

, and Hindustani classical music
Hindustani classical music
Hindustani classical music is the Hindustani or North Indian style of Indian classical music found throughout the northern Indian subcontinent. The style is sometimes called North Indian Classical Music or Shāstriya Sangeet...

 with afro-beat and a fusion of world music
World music
World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...

, the band has released nine albums as of 2009. Increasingly, the bandmates have combined their talents to perform pieces from some of the most highly regarded musicians before them, while at the same time collaborating on writing the songs they have recorded.
Their sound has become, with maturity, a way for Trucks to explore his own creativity. Rather than focus all his energy into his increasing role as a guest (and eventually, a permanent membership in The Allman Brothers Band) Trucks has nurtured a different eclectic
Eclecticism in music
Eclecticism is used to describe a composer's conscious use of styles alien to his nature, or from one or more historical styles. The term is also used pejoratively to describe music whose composer, thought to be lacking originality, appears to have freely drawn on other models .-Sources:* Kennedy,...

 sound as bandleader
Bandleader
A bandleader is the leader of a band of musicians. The term is most commonly, though not exclusively, used with a group that plays popular music as a small combo or a big band, such as one which plays jazz, blues, rhythm and blues or rock and roll music....

 of what is now The Derek Trucks Band.

History

The Derek Trucks Band was founded by Trucks in 1994, with the introduction of Todd Smallie, an Atlanta jazz and blues-based musician playing bass guitar
Bass guitar
The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

. As the first to join him, Trucks has said he feels that he's "kind of grown up with him."
The next year, in 1995, Smallie was followed by drummer
Drum kit
A drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....

 Yonrico Scott
Yonrico Scott
Yonrico Scott is an American Grammy Award-winning drummer and percussionist. He was a longtime member of The Derek Trucks Band and is bandleader of his own ensemble; the Yonrico Scott Band. Having developed his craft not only from years of session work, roadwork, and study, the Cape Cod Times...

, who initially filled the role of percussionist, as well as drummer, completing the band's first cohesive rhythm section
Rhythm section
A rhythm section is a collection of musicians who make up a section of instruments which provides the accompaniment section of the music, giving the music its rhythmic texture and pulse, also serving as a rhythmic reference for the rest of the band...

. Scott began learning to play the drums when still a very young child. Originating in Michigan, with a Motown influence, he graduated from the University of Kentucky
University of Kentucky
The University of Kentucky, also known as UK, is a public co-educational university and is one of the state's two land-grant universities, located in Lexington, Kentucky...

 with a B.A. Degree
Bachelor's degree
A bachelor's degree is usually an academic degree awarded for an undergraduate course or major that generally lasts for three or four years, but can range anywhere from two to six years depending on the region of the world...

 in percussion performance. His songwriting collaborations with other band members appear from their first eponymous debut album in 1997, followed with Out of the Madness
Out of the Madness
-Personnel:The Derek Trucks Band*Derek Trucks - guitar*Todd Smallie - bass*Bill McKay - organ, keyboards*Yonrico Scott - drums, percussionOther personnel*Warren Haynes - vocals, guitar*Larry McCray - vocals, guitar*Jimmy Herring - guitar...

in 1999, and have continued to date. Scott has been playing with Trucks for over 17 years as of 2009. According to Trucks: "We've developed a kind of 'musical ESP'.. it's nice to have somebody that you don't have to look at...he's just right there with you."
Trucks continued to gather a steady group of talented musicians together, although two early members did not last. The band's initial keyboardist/vocalist, Bill McKay, left his mark in songwriting credits on the band's earliest albums.

Upon finding an opening for a keyboardist
Keyboardist
A keyboardist is a musician who plays keyboard instruments. Until the early 1960s musicians who played keyboards were generally classified as either pianists or organists. Since the mid-1960s, a plethora of new musical instruments with keyboards have come into common usage, requiring a more...

, the bandmates felt fortunate to find Kofi Burbridge, (brother of bass guitairist Oteil Burbridge
Oteil Burbridge
Oteil Burbridge, in Washington, D.C.), is a Grammy Award-nominated American multi-instrumentalist, specializing on the bass guitar, trained in playing jazz and classical music from an early age. He has achieved fame primarily on bass guitar during the current resurgence of the Allman Brothers Band...

, with whom Trucks plays in the Allman Brothers Band) to fill the role. Kofi Burbridge is a classically trained
Classical music
Classical music is the art music produced in, or rooted in, the traditions of Western liturgical and secular music, encompassing a broad period from roughly the 11th century to present times...

 multi-instrumentalist
Multi-instrumentalist
A multi-instrumentalist is a musician who plays a number of different instruments.The Bachelor of Music degree usually requires a second instrument to be learned , but people who double on another instrument are not usually seen as multi-instrumentalists.-Classical music:Music written for Symphony...

, and contributes to the band his versatility with keyboards
Keyboard instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument which is played using a musical keyboard. The most common of these is the piano. Other widely used keyboard instruments include organs of various types as well as other mechanical, electromechanical and electronic instruments...

, organ
Organ (music)
The organ , is a keyboard instrument of one or more divisions, each played with its own keyboard operated either with the hands or with the feet. The organ is a relatively old musical instrument in the Western musical tradition, dating from the time of Ctesibius of Alexandria who is credited with...

, flute
Flute
The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...

, and backing vocals, in addition to his talents in songwriting. Burbridge joined the band in 1999. In an interview upon the release of their 2002 album, Joyful Noise
Joyful Noise (album)
-Personnel:The Derek Trucks Band*Derek Trucks - guitar*Yonrico Scott - drums, vocals, percussion*Kofi Burbridge, flute, vocals, keyboards*Todd Smallie - bass, vocalsAdditional personnel*Susan Tedeschi - vocals...

, Trucks commented in 2006, "Kofi Burbridge has been with us maybe 2-3 years, and he's one of the few musical geniuses that I've had the chance to work with..." continuing, "I'm really anxious to see in the next few years to see where he takes this, because he's definitely a huge part of what's going on right now."
In 2002 the band's producers, Craig Street
Craig Street
Craig Street, born in Oakland, California, is a noted record producer.Craig moved with his family to Los Angeles at the age of 11, but returned to the Bay Area for his high school years. He began playing guitar at age 14, playing in a number of Berkeley bands...

 and John Snyder recommended singer Mike Mattison
Mike Mattison
Mike Mattison is an American musician and the lead vocalist of the Grammy Award-winning blues rock sextet, The Derek Trucks Band. Mattison's vocal sound has been described as "strong," with an "expressive blues voice"...

 to the band.

Mattison performed several shows with the band, and Trucks decided Mattison's soulful voice and calm stage presence completed the band's identity. Trucks said of Mattison, "He's got a huge range, so that helps us out a lot when we stretch into some of the different material we cover. It's like having three different vocalists onstage at times. It's a tough piece of the puzzle to find, you know -- a good singer who fits with what you're doing -- so we were very fortunate to hook up with Mike."

Mattison has collaborated with Trucks writing songs, on each album since joining the band, including the title track to the band's 2008 album, Already Free
Already Free
Already Free is the sixth studio album by The Derek Trucks Band. It was released in the US on January 13, 2009 by Legacy Recordings. A European release followed on February 20, 2009. The album has received very positive reviews, and debuted at #19 on the Billboard Top 200 reached #1 on the blues...

.
Mattison had a previous band as well—a vocal duo, called Scrapomatic
Scrapomatic
Scrapomatic is an American blues duo, consisting of two performers, Paul Olsen, and Mike Mattison. Backed by other musicians, they have performed together since the mid 1990s, and the duo often open for The Derek Trucks Band, of which Mattison is also a member, performing as their lead vocalist...

, with guitarist/vocalist Paul Olsen, with whom he still performs at occasional gigs, including some opening sets for The Derek Trucks Band.

The band's final member, Count M'Butu is the only band member that does not appear on every tour. M'Butu, the group's eldest member, plays a variety of drums and percussion. Trucks and Scott both have known him for decades, before he joined the Derek Trucks Band, as M'Butu was a regular musical fixture in Atlanta; one of the bastions of the Allman Brothers fan bases. Thus, as of early 2009, M'Butu is the eldest member of the band, which has members whose ages are in their 20's, 30's 40's 50's and 60's. M'Butu has a great deal of African influence in his work, but lived in Sandersville, Georgia
Sandersville, Georgia
Sandersville is a city in Washington County, Georgia, United States. The population was 6,097 at the 2010 census. The city is the county seat of Washington County...

 most of his life, "so he's got that Southern thing, too", Derek finishes. His differing influences are compatible with the band's world music
World music
World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...

 sound.

Since the last members joined in 2002, the bandmates have adjusted to near-constant travelling on the road, and have become comfortable with one another. Each member's experiences, tastes, and differing approaches to each piece are a bonus, says Mattison. Since the band embraces improvisation and musical exploration, he has said, "You're just part of the ensemble -- you do your bit and step back and let everybody else do theirs. It's fun to not have to carry the weight of the entertainer."

The band's album, 'Already Free
Already Free
Already Free is the sixth studio album by The Derek Trucks Band. It was released in the US on January 13, 2009 by Legacy Recordings. A European release followed on February 20, 2009. The album has received very positive reviews, and debuted at #19 on the Billboard Top 200 reached #1 on the blues...

', won the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album
Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album
The Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album was awarded from 1988 to 2011. From 2001 to 2003 the award recipients included the producers and engineers as well as the artists...

 at the 52nd Grammy Awards
52nd Grammy Awards
The 52nd Annual Grammy Awards took place on January 31, 2010, at Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. Neil Young was honored as the 2010 MusiCares Person of the Year on January 29, two days prior to the Grammy telecast. Only ten of the 109 awards were received during the broadcast...

. Shortly after winning the Grammy, the band has been on a hiatus since 2010. That summer they released their live album, Roadsongs
Roadsongs (album)
-Disc 2:...

. 2011 the band got the Blues Music Award as Band of the Year.

The Derek Trucks Band would occasionally play together with the band of Trucks' wife, Susan Tedeschi
Susan Tedeschi
Susan Tedeschi is an American blues and soul musician, who has received multiple Grammy Award nominations, and is well-known for her singing voice, guitar playing, stage presence, and marriage to blues guitarist Derek Trucks...

, in a collective known as "Soul Stew Revival". This allowed the couple to spend more time with each other when they would otherwise both be out on the road separately. From that project, Trucks and Tedeschi formed a new group called the Tedeschi Trucks Band
Tedeschi Trucks Band
The Tedeschi Trucks Band, formerly known as the Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi Band is a blues rock group based in Jacksonville, Florida. Formed in 2010, the band is led by husband-and-wife musicians Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi, and primarily features members from their respective solo groups.-...

 which includes Mike Mattison
Mike Mattison
Mike Mattison is an American musician and the lead vocalist of the Grammy Award-winning blues rock sextet, The Derek Trucks Band. Mattison's vocal sound has been described as "strong," with an "expressive blues voice"...

 and Kofi Burbridge from the Derek Trucks Band.

Personnel

The current members of the band are:
  • Derek Trucks
    Derek Trucks
    Derek Trucks is a Grammy Award-winning, American guitarist, songwriter, and record producer. He founded The Derek Trucks Band and worked as a session musician when he was still in his early teens. Throughout those teenage years, he toured with The Allman Brothers Band primarily as a slide...

     – Guitar
    Guitar
    The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

    , Slide guitar
    Slide guitar
    Slide guitar or bottleneck guitar is a particular method or technique for playing the guitar. The term slide refers to the motion of the slide against the strings, while bottleneck refers to the original material of choice for such slides: the necks of glass bottles...

    , Sarod
    Sarod
    The sarod is a stringed musical instrument, used mainly in Indian classical music. Along with the sitar, it is the most popular and prominent instrument in the classical music of Hindustan...

    , Dobro
    Dobro
    Dobro is a registered trademark, now owned by Gibson Guitar Corporation and used for a particular design of resonator guitar.The name has a long and involved history, interwoven with that of the resonator guitar...

  • Kofi Burbridge – keyboards, flute
    Flute
    The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...

    , vocals
    Singing
    Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. One who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music known as songs that can be sung either with or without accompaniment by musical instruments...

     (1999–present)
  • Todd Smallie –bass
    Bass guitar
    The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

     backing vocals (1994–present)
  • Yonrico Scott
    Yonrico Scott
    Yonrico Scott is an American Grammy Award-winning drummer and percussionist. He was a longtime member of The Derek Trucks Band and is bandleader of his own ensemble; the Yonrico Scott Band. Having developed his craft not only from years of session work, roadwork, and study, the Cape Cod Times...

     – drums
    Drum kit
    A drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....

    , percussion
    Percussion instrument
    A percussion instrument is any object which produces a sound when hit with an implement or when it is shaken, rubbed, scraped, or otherwise acted upon in a way that sets the object into vibration...

    , vocals
    Singing
    Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. One who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music known as songs that can be sung either with or without accompaniment by musical instruments...

     (1995–present)
  • Mike Mattison
    Mike Mattison
    Mike Mattison is an American musician and the lead vocalist of the Grammy Award-winning blues rock sextet, The Derek Trucks Band. Mattison's vocal sound has been described as "strong," with an "expressive blues voice"...

     – lead vocals (2002–present)
  • Count M'Butu – percussion, including a variety of drums(2004–present)

Discography

  • The Derek Trucks Band
    The Derek Trucks Band (album)
    -Personnel:Band Members*Derek Trucks - guitar, sarod*Todd Smallie - bass guitar*Bill McKay - organ, keyboards, synthesizer, clavinet, piano, vocals *Yonrico Scott - drums, tympani, conga drums, shakers, tambourine, maracas, sabasa, chimes...

    (1997)
  • Out of the Madness
    Out of the Madness
    -Personnel:The Derek Trucks Band*Derek Trucks - guitar*Todd Smallie - bass*Bill McKay - organ, keyboards*Yonrico Scott - drums, percussionOther personnel*Warren Haynes - vocals, guitar*Larry McCray - vocals, guitar*Jimmy Herring - guitar...

    (1998)
  • Joyful Noise
    Joyful Noise (album)
    -Personnel:The Derek Trucks Band*Derek Trucks - guitar*Yonrico Scott - drums, vocals, percussion*Kofi Burbridge, flute, vocals, keyboards*Todd Smallie - bass, vocalsAdditional personnel*Susan Tedeschi - vocals...

    (2002)
  • Soul Serenade
    Soul Serenade
    -Personnel:*Derek Trucks - guitar, sarod*Todd Smallie - Bass guitar*Yonrico Scott - drums, percussion*Bill McKay - Hammond B-3 organ, Wurlitzer Piano, keyboards*Kofi Burbridge - flute, clavinet, Fender Rhodes Piano, keyboardsAdditional personnel...

    (2003)
  • Live at Georgia Theatre
    Live at Georgia Theatre
    Live at Georgia Theatre is the fifth album and first live album by American artist Derek Trucks and The Derek Trucks Band released in 2004 ....

    (2004)
  • Songlines
    Songlines (album)
    Songlines is the sixth album by American slide guitarist Derek Trucks and his group the Derek Trucks Band. This is the group's first studio album to feature an expanded sextet.-Track listing:# Volunteered Slavery – 2:05...

    (2006)
  • Songlines Live
    Songlines Live
    Songlines Live is the second commercially released live recording and first DVD by American artist Derek Trucks, released in 2006...

    (2006, DVD)
  • Already Free
    Already Free
    Already Free is the sixth studio album by The Derek Trucks Band. It was released in the US on January 13, 2009 by Legacy Recordings. A European release followed on February 20, 2009. The album has received very positive reviews, and debuted at #19 on the Billboard Top 200 reached #1 on the blues...

    (2009)
  • Roadsongs
    Roadsongs (album)
    -Disc 2:...

    (2010)

External links

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