Maurice Jacox, singer/saxophonist best known with Willie & the Bees and as a solo performerĪn outgrowth of the Macalester College Black Voices, the choral and instrumental group took their name in 1971 when Gary Hines became director. And he was as wonderful a man as he was a singer.” He didn’t have a ‘falsetto’ voice he could just naturally sing that high. He was the last of his generation and was at the top of his game in his 70s. “At the time of his death, he was the greatest living soul singer, period. After retiring from a medical clinic, he toured with the Anthony Paule Soul Orchestra and hit blues events around the world, including Chile a week before he died in 2019 at age 77. He hated the nickname “Wee” Willie Walker - given by Memphis label Goldwax in reference to his 5-foot-5 stature - but the honey-voiced soul singer enjoyed the fact that European music companies were still calling him up under that name four decades after his chart-scratching 1967 single “There Goes My Used to Be.” Around the Twin Cities, where he relocated in 1959 as a gospel singer, Walker sang with the Exciters, the Val-Dons and Willie & the Bees in the 1960s-70s, then later the Butanes and Paul Metsa. Derrick Stevens, producer for Minnesota Public Radio/The Current and former MC Skat Kat Sonny Knight & the Lakers created some soulful classics before his death, contributions to the Minnesota music scene that alone should reserve his place. Too bad we all didn’t figure that out until almost 50 years later. “He sealed his place in Minnesota music history as a recording artist back in the 1960s. Sonny Knight & the Lakers, which grew out of the acclaimed 2012 compilation “Twin Cities Funk & Soul (1964-1975),” released three albums, packed First Avenue and toured Europe. Paul teen singer with the Blue Jays and the Cymbals before he was drafted in 1965, Knight bounced back and spent much of the ’70s singing with the psychedelic R&B band Haze, but it was his second comeback in his 60s that really caught fire. Mojo and the late Sonny Rodgers set the stage for the Minnesota bands that created a sound so similar to the Chess Records classic blues that those same Minnesota musicians became requested players overseas.”Īfter his band steamrollered the trendsetting South by Southwest music festival in 2014, Knight had only one complaint: The crowds and chaos reminded him of the Vietnam War.
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He taught them how to dress, how to conduct business and how to present yourself on stage. His last gig was with fellow harpman James Cotton just a month before dying of cancer in 2017 at age 81. He had a handful of albums, including last year’s “Mojo Workin’,” from 1969 sessions. He came to Minneapolis with Waters in 1962 and stayed to start his own band, becoming popular among blue-collar crowds at Mattie’s Ribs and hippie kids at the Labor Temple. Minnesota’s strongest connection to the blues from the other end of the big river, Mississippi native George Buford blew harmonica in Muddy Waters’ band off and on from the late ’50s until 1983, when he served as pallbearer at his boss’ funeral. Jacquie Maddix, DJ for KFAI, 90.3 and 106.7 FM, and singer with Lady J Griot & Her Root Doctors But none of that folksy sugarcoating can obscure the high caliber or the hard-won quality that his musicianship displays, year after year.” He can be sophisticated high-society-wise, or he can get down home with the nitty-gritty, depending on the crowd. “He is a crowd-pleaser who knows what an audience wants. At 93, he’s still eager for his next gig. In 1955, he played piano on Minnesota’s first rock ’n’ roll hit, Augie Garcia’s “Hi Yo Silver.” Last summer, he delivered one of the first pandemic-era virtual concerts from the rubble of Lake Street, where he pleaded in a new song, “Put the world back together.” In between, the elder James Harris (Jimmy Jam is his son) has entertained generations of Minnesota music fans with his jazzy, Louis Armstrong-cool piano ballads and R&B boogie via countless supper-club shows and a handful of his own warm, soulful records.
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