Allen Toussaint Interview

One day I caught myself singing, I was singing loud and clear.
And I said, Spirit, where have you been??
Gee, but I?m glad you?re here!

If these lyrics -- coming as they do in the lead-off cut of Allen Toussaint's fine new CD Connected are any indication, the New Orleans music master may be moving into a new phase of artistic productivity and (we certainly hope!) public visibility. So far, throughout a nearly 40-year recording career that is one of the most distinguished in American popular music, Toussaint has remained a "musician's musician," revered by his professional peers but largely unknown to the general public. Saying repeatedly that he prefers to work behind the scenes, he has used his amazing talents as songwriter, producer, pianist, and arranger to craft and enhance hit records for other artists -- from fellow New Orleans R&B singers like Lee Dorsey, Irma Thomas, Ernie K-Doe, Dr. John, and Aaron and Art Neville, to a wide roster of more mainstream pop stars including Bonnie Raitt, the Pointer Sisters, Glen Campbell, Boz Scaggs, the Band, and many more.

To those who study his work closely, one of the ironies of Toussaint's retiring stance and low public profile is the fact that he himself is an amazing performer of his own songs. In fact, his own sparse catalog of albums, which have appeared very sporadically over the years with little promotional support or public attention, include many of his greatest artistic highlights. He is an absolutely superb singer, whose rich, subtle, intriguing (high-baritone? low-tenor?) voice can be by turns light-hearted and whimsical, driving and rhythmic, or filled with inexpressible ache and longing. And his performances of his own songs have an intimate, natural, personal quality that's unsurpassed by any singer I know; they're lovely, totally involving, and yet seemingly effortless -- Allen's singing always seems as natural as breathing, or as his gentle, poetic, almost courtly Southern speech.

Add to this Tousssaint's marvelous piano playing -- he stands with Mac Rebennack (Dr. John) as one of the two great living apostles of Professor Longhair's rolling, polyrhythmic, Caribbean-accented New Orleans piano tradition, and like Mac he has of course added many distinctive elements and flavors of his own to Longhair's original recipes. Add his superb arranging skills, by which I mean not only his incredible horn-section writing but also the supreme, relaxed funkiness of his grooves and rhythm section arranging, with its distinctively New Orleans blend of rhythmic complexity and laid-back ease of feeling. And of course, add the many great songs -- including much of his most adventurous and personal writing -- which he's chosen for his own albums. Great as his achievements have been with the many fine singers he's written for and produced, it's tempting to revive Columbia's old slogan about Bob Dylan: truth is, friends, nobody sings Toussaint like Toussaint!

Possibly the release of Connected, the premiere outing for a new label which Toussaint himself co-owns, will mark the beginning of wider public recognition for the man's wonderful vocal and performing talent. But whether or not that happens, the album is available as a rich, 15-course, musical feast for those who know enough to seek it out. Allen displays here a very wide range of styles in which he can write and perform -- from the rolling, rollicking, blues piano of "Do the Do," to the driving funk instrumental "Funky Bars" (reminiscent of his late-period Lee Dorsey classic, "Night People"), to intimate gentle love ballads, to upbeat Caribbean-flavored modern-spiritual numbers. He revisits two of his 1960s masterpieces with a cooking instrumental take on his much-covered Lee Dorsey hit "Get Out My Life, Woman" and a gorgeous, amazingly sensitive reading of "Wrong Number," a relatively obscure early song originally written for Aaron Neville. But deep as his catalog, and his traditional R&B and gospel roots, run, one of the remarkable things about the album is the degree to which it shows Toussaint looking forward into the present and the future -- sometimes with a sly wink at the new versions of our old human foibles ("Computer Lady" teases at the idea of on-line romance with delightful good humor), more often with an uplifting evocation of hope and communication among the world's peoples, cast in the lilting "worldbeat" flavors of "Ahya" and "Aign Gnee" or the classic New Orleans groove of the easy-rockin' title track.

With the new album in hand, it's appropriate to take a look back at a few of Allen's earlier musical achievements. Here are a handful that deserve your attention -- put together in roughly (not rigorously) chronological order for There's on-line radio series, as a sampler or introductory visit from Toussaint's rich body of work over the years.

1. Pure Uncut Love, Allen Toussaint, 1996. Two bars of the piano intro, and anyone who knows Toussaint's work will be sure it's him! At once relaxed and rocking, at once whimsical and spiritual, this song can be heard as Allen invoking his muse as he sets forth on a new phase of his artistic journey... or simply as a catchy musical reminder of what's really most important in all of our lives.

2. Whirlaway, Allen Toussaint ("Tousan"), 1958.

3. Java, Allen Toussaint ("Tousan"), 1958.

These two cooking piano instrumentals, recorded for RCA in the late '50s, showcase different sides of Allen's playing. "Whirlaway," one of the hardest-driving R&B instrumentals of all time, reveals what Allen calls the "flairs of Fess" one can hear in his playing throughout his career -- that is, the unmistakable, distinctive signature piano licks of the great Professor Longhair, which Allen adapts and reworks in his own compositions. (We'll see more examples later in the program.) "Java," which helped establish Allen in the business on a national level through Al Hirt's hugely popular cover version, shows off his gift for a lilting, catchy melodic line -- but you can see how much funkier and more exciting his original version is than Hirt's smoothed-out pop-Dixie reading. Notice how much is added to the tune by the surprising, hot, Latin-inflected drumming of the great Charles "Hungry" Williams. RCA talent scout Danny Kessler produced these all-instrumental recordings to showcase Allen after hearing him as a sideman on a local session, and Allen says Kessler named many of the tunes, including "Java," after the racehorses he'd been betting on! 12 tunes were released as an LP, The Wild Sound of New Orleans by "Tousan", a superb 27-tune reissue CD of all this material is now available as Allen Toussaint, The Complete "Tousan" Sessions.

4. Mother-in-Law, Ernie K-Doe, 1961.

5. Fortune Teller, Benny Spellman, 1962.

In the early 1960s Toussaint enjoyed a highly successful period with the local New Orleans label Minit, which issued an amazing body of regional and national hits he wrote and produced for many of the city's best R&B singers. The irresistibly catchy "Mother-in-Law" was a national Top 10 hit for the irrepressible gospel shouter (and certified local character) Ernest Kador, better known by the funky-phonic spelling K-Doe; Allen wrote many other fine tunes for him as well, including the classics "A Certain Girl" and "Hello My Lover," but none matched the chart success of this charming family complaint. The bass voice on this tune was sung by another local talent, Benny Spellman, and after "Mother-In-Law" became a smash Spellman pressured Allen to write him a hit of his own. Toussaint obliged with the lovely "Lipstick Traces," and also recorded Spellman on the original version of the classic story song "Fortune Teller," which was later covered by many others including the Rolling Stones and the Who (check out a superb recent rendition by the local New Orleans band the Iguanas on their first album a couple of years back). The Caribbean rhythms and subtly interweaving group vocals may have kept this gem from being a big pop hit in the early '60s, but they make great listening for our ears today.

6. It's Raining, Irma Thomas, 1962.

7. I Did My Part, Irma Thomas, live version, 1976.

New Orleans' golden-voiced Irma Thomas still enjoys an active career today with a solid series of recent CDs on the Rounder label. But many of the recordings which stand as her all-time classics were the series of great songs Toussaint wrote for her Minit recordings of the early 1960s. The haunting "It's Raining" is one of Allen's loveliest ballads; its uptempo flip side, "I Did My Part," is even more exciting than ever in this jumping live performance from the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in the mid-'70s. Among the other great tunes Allen wrote for Irma in the Minit period was the moody "Ruler of My Heart," which Otis Redding later covered as "Pain In My Heart." Incidentally, most of Allen's material from the Minit period was copyrighted under pen names (such as his mother's maiden name, Naomi Neville -- no connection to Art & Aaron's family) due to publishing-contract problems.

8. Working In A Coal Mine, Allen Toussaint, 1970.

9. Get Out My Life, Woman, Lee Dorsey, 1965.

10. Hello Mama, Lee Dorsey, 1965.

Of course it is the great 1966 hit version of "Working In A Coal Mine," produced by Allen for Lee Dorsey, which everyone remembers, but I couldn't resist breaking up the sequence a little bit here to showcase the fabulous remake Allen did himself a few years later for Scepter. Allen's on piano of course, but dig the superbly tasty twin lead guitars which add so much funky crackle and melodic charm to this version -- one of them played by none other than Dr. John! (The other is Florida session hand Terry Kellman.) Allen's writing reached new levels of distinctiveness and personality in the many fine tunes he penned for the late Lee Dorsey from ca. 1965-70 (plus another batch in the late '70s). Allen has said many times that it was Lee's unique and charming "down-home" personality that inspired him and made the songs possible to write.

That wry charm of Lee's is in full evidence in the spoken lines he delivers at the breaks of "Hello Mama." I like putting this tune together with the better-known, more-covered "Get Out My Life, Woman," because you can hear Allen's different uses of the same Prof. Longhair-style piano figure in the two tunes: it's the spiraling fill in verse 4 and the rideout of "Get Out..." and the intro theme to "Hello Mama," and it adds a tremendous amount in both contexts. (Listen to Longhair himself play the lick on, for example, "Hey Now Baby" on his great Rock and Roll Gumbo CD, Dancing Cat DD-3006. And you'll even hear Allen use it again in the ride-out of "Pure Uncut Love.") Other exciting features of these recordings include Allen's distinctive background singing, and the great funky rhythms -- perhaps not pure funk as both James Brown and New Orleans' own Meters would define the idiom a few years later, but getting mighty close to that feel.

11. Yes We Can, Lee Dorsey, 1970.

12. Southern Nights, Allen Toussaint, 1975.

These are Allen's original versions of two fine songs which the general public knows much better in "covers" by other artists. In 1970 Allen's songwriting was making another giant advance. Along with a handful of other important black musicians, he was an important figure in the movement (originally pioneered in the '60s by Curtis Mayfield's writing for the Impressions) to expand the limits of R&B songwriting beyond its usual love-song and party-song themes, into songs dealing forthrightly with social conditions and moral or spiritual issues. The title track from his masterful 1970 album with Lee Dorsey, "Yes We Can" is a superb example of the kind of "secular gospel" classic that resulted from this adventurous step forward -- an upbeat, uplifting, positive statement of community, presented with gritty, natural, down-home singing and an irresistibly funky groove, laid down here by the incomparable Meters, who served as the house rhythm section on many of Toussaint's greatest productions in this period. And much of the finest writing he (and other New Orleans songwriter-performers like Earl King and Dr. John) would do from this point forward would come as he continued to apply his immense talent and finely honed rhythm & blues chops to more challenging and mature lyric themes. (Other examples follow.)

The Pointer Sisters' cover version a few years later made "Yes We Can" an international hit in an arrangement closely modeled on the Toussaint-Dorsey original. However, Glen Campbell's giant 1976 hit of Toussaint's "Southern Nights" (On Toussaint Collection) departed much further from the author's version, recasting that song as a lively, bouncy Dixieland-country hybrid. For those who are only familiar with Campbell's record, Allen's original version (presented here) will come as a revelation -- slow, dreamy, intimate, personal, filled with a lifetime of deep emotion poured into the spare, haunting lyric lines and his lovely, high, flowing vocal performance.

13. Allen Toussaint, What Is Success, 1970.

14. Allen Toussaint, Freedom for the Stallion, 1976.

15. Allen Toussaint, Shoorah Shoorah, 1976.

These are three more of Allen's 1970s masterpieces probing complex moral, spiritual, and social themes with lovely and infectous melodies, set in irresistibly rocking rhythm & blues arrangements (Success, Shoorah) or deep, rolling gospel piano chords (Freedom). All of these songs have been recorded repeatedly by other artists (Bonnie Raitt, Boz Scaggs, Betty Wright, etc.) but Allen's own deeply soulful performances remain the definitive versions.

16. Toussaint, Dr. John, and "Crescent City Gold": Hang Tough, 1994.

17. Allen Toussaint, Sweet Dreams, 1996.

18. Allen Toussaint, We're All Connected, 1996.

In the 1980s Toussaint served as composer and musical director for several stage and film productions (Stagger Lee; High Rollers Social and Pleasure Club; etc.). Unfortunately no "soundtrack" albums of this work were released, and Toussaint released little new music on record during this period. (One amazing release which did appear during the '80s was Stevenson Palfi's brilliant video documentary Piano Players Rarely Ever Play Together, exploring the relationship of Allen, his mentor/inspiration Professor Longhair, and one of Longhair's teachers, Tuts Washington. The film is rendered even more poignant by the fact that Longhair died during filming in 1980, and Palfi captures an amazing sequence of Toussaint singing a loving tribute song to "Fess" during the funeral itself. Allen still performs this piece on his relatively infrequent live shows.)

In the '90s, however, Allen has begun to emerge with newly recorded material, participating in several joint recording projects with other artists, which have now of course been followed by the release of his own new album. "Hang Tough," one of his finest and most charming songs, appears on 1994's Crescent City Gold (High Street CD 72902 10324-2), a fascinating album project which reunited many of the veterans of New Orleans' legendary "Cosimo's" studio scene of the 1950s and '60s, including sax legends Red Tyler and Lee Allen, the great drummer Earl Palmer, and also Mac "Dr. John" Rebennack returning to guitar (his original instrument) for this date. Allen of course had served as producer, arranger, and background singer on what is arguably Mac's greatest album, 1972's Right Place Wrong Time, and the two of them again share the vocal honors on this great rollicking number, whose unique mixture of uplifting lyric message and infectious "second-line" rhythm could only have emerged from the wonderful musical traditions of New Orleans.

We conclude the program with two more fine new tunes from We're All Connected -- "Sweet Dreams" which is one of Allen's most affecting and tender ballads ever, and the title track, a groovin' and high-spirited anthem of fellowship for our ever-more-closely interlinked world. It's cause for encouragement and celebration, not only to hear such strong and affirmative new songs, but also to re-encounter an artist like Toussaint, and to find him still exploring, still at the height of his powers, still bringing forth magical new music to share with us all.

Allen Toussaint: Behind The Sound

Pure Uncut Love
Whirlaway
Java
Mother-in-Law
Fortune Teller
It's Raining
I Did My Part
Working in a Coal Mine
Get Out My Life, Woman
Hello, Mama
Yes We Can
Southern Nights
What Is Success
Freedom for the Stallion
Shoorah Shoorah
Hang Tough
Sweet Dreams
We're All Connected

• Connected (NYNO)

• Tousan (Wild Sounds of New Orleans) (Edsel)
• From a Whisper to a Scream (KNT)
• Life, Love & Faith (Charly)
• Allen Toussaint Collection (Warner-Reprise)