Stevie Wonder

[Jacoproud]

Does anyone know who the bass player is on Stevie Wonder's 'Songs in the Key of Life' album??

[Brad Johnson]

Nathan Watts.

[rickbass]

....also, Stevie's gifted left hand.

[Jacoproud]

that guy really knows how to groove.

[jazzbo]

On that tangent, (does that make sense?), can anybody share some other albums that feature some of Nathan Watts' best work?

[gruffpuppy]

Originally posted by jazzbo
can anybody share some other albums that feature some of Nathan Watts' best work?

Kind of a hard call JB, he tended to play on disks that had a couple of diferent bass players.

I.E.
The Jacksons
The Pointer Sisters
The Temptations
The Spinners
Diana Ross

[Bruce Lindfield]

Originally posted by Jacoproud
Does anyone know who the bass player is on Stevie Wonder's 'Songs in the Key of Life' album??

That album is one of my (and lots of people's) favorite "groove" albums of all time. I have an MD compilation of the dancier tracks from this and it always gets people dancing at parties!

At the Jazz Summerschool I have attended for the last few years, the end of week's highlight has been the Jazz pros getting together and doing "I Wish" "Sir Duke " etc. at the evening "Jazz club". It always brings the house down!


I just wish Stevie had done more like this - can't understand why not!

[Arnold]

How about Stevie's musicuarium. All the groove tunes are on it.

[Brad Johnson]

VH1 did a "Behind the Music" (I think) about that album and got all of the original players together. They still sound great but the main attraction is still Stevie, on keyboards, mixing, playing drums... he's special. It was cool to have him explain how he and his engineer layered sounds.

[Jacoproud]

Stevie played drums? wow he sure is a talented guy. Plus he has a left hand better than most bassists i know!!

[beermonkey]

Originally posted by Jacoproud
Stevie played drums? wow he sure is a talented guy. Plus he has a left hand better than most bassists i know!!

Stevie played everything on some of his songs, keys, bass, drums, etc.. I can't recall if he's ever played guitar on any of his recordings.

His left hand is a monster. I've always dug how well he can play bass lines like an actual bass player; as opposed to most keyboardists who have no clue at all. For a truely bad-ass Stevie keyboard bassline, dig on "Boogie on Reggae Woman".

Songs in the Key of Life was one of the albums I grew up listening to. It's completely and utterly brilliant. One of my bands plays "Sir Duke" into "I Wish" just like it appears on the album, which is always fun to play. Other personal favs from that album are "Ebony Eyes", "As", "All Day Sucker", and "Ordinary Pain".

[PolkaHero]

Originally posted by Jacoproud
Stevie played drums? wow he sure is a talented guy. Plus he has a left hand better than most bassists i know!!

Stevie was taught by Motown's Benny Benjamin in his formative years.