Who are the musician's musicians?

Bill Monroe, Roy Clark, Floyd Cramer, Boots Randolph, Keith Green (his piano playing was top notch), Michael W. Smith is a singer-songwriter but his piano playing is top notch as well.

 

Tom Scott

 

Let us not overlook the Funk Brothers. All of them. Outstanding.

 

Musicians who may not have had it all together sufficiently to be big commercial successes, but who had a special talent or uniqueness that other musicians can learn from. A classic example to me would be The Shaggs.

 

Jerry Reed

 

Spoon

 

That's a good one. I never saw them with Swope but did with Weston, and though subtle it was a cool addition to a rock band.

A couple more I can think of:

I've never seen them live but Geoff Barrow of Portishead apparently does mainly record scratching live, of acetates they've cut of their own tracks/instruments, etc. I think that would qualify.

And M. Frog, who was kind of a Brian Eno type (I think he used the same EMS synthesizers as well) for Todd Rundgren for awhile.

 

Guthrie Govan

 

You see these "sound manipulators" a lot in post rock and post metal bands like Isis and Minsk or even Mogwai (post rock). Even the touring version of Wovenhand has a guy like that. The Black Angels did, too (she quit or got the boot).

It provides cool atmosphere but you're right: they're aren't that many bands that have someone like that.

 

There was an issue of Guitar Player magazine back in the '90s that posed this very question. I seem to remember Jeff Beck and Richard Thompson getting mentioned (both deservedly so).

 

5 pages in and no word of Austin Texas guitarist who was influenced by so many listed here and plays all styles of music? A true virtuoso of the guitar and true musicians's musician..............
ERIC JOHNSON

 

I mentioned Roscoe Beck. Doesn't that count a little?

 

David Lindley
Bill Frisell

 

The great guitarist Louie Shelton. Originator of hundreds of classic licks and killer tone.



Jackson 5, Marvin Gaye, The Monkees, John Lennon, Simon and Garfunkel, The Mamas & the Papas, Stevie Wonder, Boz Scaggs, Gladys Knight & the Pips, The , Neil Diamond, Barbra Streisand, The Carpenters, Glen Campbell, Ella Fitzgerald, James Brown, Diana Ross, Whitney Houston, Joe Cocker, Kenny Rogers, Henry Mancini, Dave Grusin, Quincy Jones, Lalo Schifrin and many others...

 

Elliot Randall

 

Frank Blair & John Khaleefa
T.J. Tindall (Who just Passed)
David Lindley
Kenny Buttrey
Wayne Moss
Clarence White

 

He was in the Stones' Rock and Roll Circus, I realized the other day.

 

Today? Blake Mills.

 

What about any of the Ventures players?

All seemed very talented to me.

 

The very definition of "musician's musician".

 

This past Halloween, I played in a Queen tribute set. Everyone I played with in that set, I considered "musician's musicians." A blast to play with, a kick in the pants ("man, I want to play better now") and all pulled it together quickly. I won't say it was "effortless" because this is Queen we're talking about, but it was a heck of a group of people to do it with.

 

Great thread, of course the answer is:

John Martyn.

 

Matt Bissonette
Steve Gadd
Jeff Porcaro
Richard Bennett
Ian Thomas

 

Merle Travis

 

Tommy Emmanuel
Shawn Lane
Jaco pastorius
Allan Holdsworth
Adrian Legg