Rolling Stones keyboardist, Alabama native Chuck Leavell’s lovely tribute to Charlie Watts
Chuck Leavell’s piano playing is as expressive and lyrical as rock & roll keyboards get.
Anyone who’s heard him perform at Rolling Stones concerts, on ‘70s Allman Brothers instrumental track “Jessica,” the “Unplugged” version of Eric Clapton’s “Old Love” or latter day Stones studio gems like “Out of Tears” knows that.
Leavell’s tribute to Charlie Watts is just as stirring as any of that. Watts – whose jazz-cool drumming was essential to The Stones’ sound, as heard on tracks like “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” “Gimme Shelter,” “Miss You” and “Start Me Up” – died Tuesday. He was 80.
Leavell, a Tuscaloosa native, has been touring and recording with The Stones since 1982. On Wednesday, Leavell posted the following statement on his Facebook page:
“We are all shocked and devastated to lose Charlie. I feel broken. There has been no man finer, more elegant and more beautiful to walk the Earth than Charlie Watts. All class. As a musician, his timing and beat were impeccable, his touch delicate yet so powerful. His sense of what and what not to play was unsurpassed. It has been the honor of my life to have played with him over the last 40 years, and to have called him a friend. My heart goes out to his beautiful family. My sincere thanks to all that have sent condolences to me. Far too many for me to answer individually, but you know who you are.”
In early August, Watts announced he was bowing out of The Stones upcoming stadium tour to rest and recuperate after a recent medical procedure. In years past, the drummer had battled cancer.
Steve Jordan, a longtime collaborator on Stones guitarist Keith Richards’ solo projects, will be playing drums on The Stones tour, set to kickoff Sept. 26 in St. Louis. The tour winds through the Southeast with shows in Nashville Oct. 9, New Orleans Oct. 13, Tampa Oct. 29 and Atlanta Nov. 11.
Watts was the first Stone Leavell ever met. That was in 1973 at a London party, when Leavell played a Knebworth Park concert with the Allman Brothers, the legendary Southern rockers.
As a teenager, Leavell attended The Rolling Stones’ 1965 concert at Legion Field in Birmingham. Leavell had been playing “Satisfaction” and other British Invasion hits with his high-school band, The Misfitz.
“I was stoked to hear the Stones play live,” Leavell told me in 2016, regarding that ‘65 Legion Field concert. “I remember them doing ‘Little Red Rooster,’ which blew me away. Brian Jones (founding Stones guitarist) was still in the band, and I thought they were all so very cool – their look, the moves and of course the music. I don’t recall actually thinking I would someday get to play with them, though. But looking back, it was a fortuitous experience for me.”
By the early ‘80s, Leavell was touring with The Stones as the band’s keyboardist, a role that grew into him being the band’s musical director. When The Stones returned to Legion Field in 1989 as part of the “Steel Wheels Tour,” Leavell was rocking onstage with the band. “A dream come true,” Leavell said in our 2016 interview, “is about the only way I can put it.” The Stones and Leavell hit Legion Field again for an epic concert as part of the band’s “Voodoo Lounge Tour.”
Leavell’s saloon-sashay piano solo on “Honky Tonk Women” has been a musical highlight of Stones concerts for decades. In addition to Rolling Stones, Allmans and Clapton, Leavell has worked with artists like George Harrison, David Gilmour and The Black Crowes. Leavell was inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame in 2016. These days, he and longtime wife Rose Lane Leavell reside on their tree farm in Georgia.