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Jackson blows his own horn

By Bill Ellis
ellis@commercialappeal.com

Memphis Horns legend to appear at Soulsville U.S.A. concert series


Playing host to many a music great, "Last Mondays in Studio A" should be the first choice for all Soulsville U.S.A. fans.

The live concert series -- held, as the title implies, on the last Monday of every month -- is an intimate, living history reminder of our town’s tuneful legacy and yet another reason to pay a regular visit to the Stax Museum of American Soul Music.


Memphis Horns trumpet legend Wayne Jackson stops by this Monday for a 7 p.m. show with Stax Music Academy students at the museum’s 926 E. McLemore address. Others on board include Linda ’What a Man’ Lyndell in an Otis Redding tribute on May 30; Hi Records diva Ann Peebles on June 27; Motown/Stax/Raeletts songbird Mable John in a tribute to Etta James on July 25; Beale Street belter Barbara Blue in a tribute to Janis Joplin on Aug. 29; and blues giant Little Milton on Sept. 26.

Jackson only has about 300 chart-topping songs to pull from for his show. Count on such Stax classics as "Green Onions" and "Last Night," the first hit he had as a member of the Mar-Keys.

From there it’ll be a toss-up, "whatever is on their list that I know," says Jackson, 63, who also will sign copies of his new autobiography, "In My Wildest Dreams: A Collection of Rock and Roll Tales, Volume I."

Available through his Web site, sweetmedicinemusic.com, the book largely covers his ’60s tenure at Stax, where he -- alongside brass cohorts such as Floyd Newman and longtime Memphis Horns partner Andrew Love -- played on hundreds of timeless recordings from "Walking the Dog" and "Knock on Wood" to "In the Midnight Hour" and "(Sittin’ on) The Dock of the Bay."

In colorful prose, Jackson gets away with a highly assertive account of the times and tunes as only someone who lived it could. For example: "I thought everything we did with (Sam & Dave) was a hit except ’Soul Man.’ I thought that was the dumbest song I ever heard!"

Coming in at 205 highly readable pages, the book is the first of four planned volumes, with subsequent entries to cover the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s. For Jackson, that means such milestones as recording with Peter Gabriel, U2, Rod Stewart and Sting and touring with Jimmy Buffett, Robert Cray and the Doobie Brothers.

"The first one came out so well, I just sat down and flew at it -- but I sleep with my editor!" he said, laughing, referring to his wife of 14 years, Amy Jackson, who handled the book’s redacting chores.

Yet Jackson may want to start mapping out Vol. 5, since he recently spent quality studio time with Stax fan Neil Young (Young employed Booker T. & the MGs as his backing band on tour in 1993 and has since used members on several albums, notably 2002’s Are You Passionate?).

Recording in Nashville, where Memphis-born Jackson has lived for almost a decade, Young also is using frequent keyboard collaborator Spooner Oldham of Muscle Shoals/American Studios fame on the Ben Keith-produced album.

Jackson describes the project as "more upbeat than what Neil usually does" and likens the opportunity with the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer to the time he landed that "Sledgehammer" gig with Peter Gabriel in the mid ’80s.

"I was dead as a doornail when ’Sledgehammer’ came along," recalls Jackson. "I sit around here sometimes for a month and nothing. Nobody calls and I think I made somebody mad. My whole life has been like this -- it rains really hard and then the sun shines."

Wayne Jackson performs at the Stax Museum of American Soul Music from 7-9 p.m. $20 general admission, free to museum members; complimentary wine, beer and hors d’oeuvres. Visit soulsvilleusa.com or call 942-7685.