Ry Cooder — Get Rhythm
Born: March 15, 1947 in Los Angeles, CA
Birth name: Ryland Peter Cooder
Location:
Album release: November 1987
Record Label: Warner Bros. / Reprise
Duration: 40:54
Tracks:
01. Get Rhythm 3:18
02. Low–Commotion 3:10
03. Going Back To Okinawa 4:42
04. 13 Question Method 3:39
05. Women Will Rule The World 5:52
06. All Shook Up 3:31
07. I Can Tell By The Way You Smell 4:34
08. Across The Borderline 6:18
09. Let's Have A Ball 5:50
Written by:
• Johnny Cash 1
• Ry Cooder / Jim Keltner 2
• Ry Cooder 3
• Chuck Berry 4
• Raymond Quevedo 5
• Otis Blackwell / Elvis Presley 6
• Walter Davis 7
• Ry Cooder / Jim Dickinson / John Hiatt 8
• Alden Bunn 9
AWARDS
• Billboard Albums
• 1987 Get Rhythm The Billboard 200 #177
Personnel:
• Ry Cooder — Guitar, Vocals
• Van Dyke Parks — Keyboards
• Flaco Jiménez — Accordion
• Steve Douglas — Saxophone
• Jorge Calderón — Electric Bass
• Buell Niedlinger — Acoustic Bass on 2, 6, 8
• Jim Keltner — Drums
• Miguel Cruz — Percussion
• Bobby King, Terry Evans, Arnold McCuller, Willie Greene, Jr. — background vocals
• Larry Blackmon — vocals on "All Shook Up"
• Harry Dean Stanton — vocals on "Across the Borderline"
CREDITS:
• Chuck Berry Composer
• Larry Blackmon Guest Artist, Performer, Vocals
• Otis Blackwell Composer
• Jorge Calderón Bass (Electric), Guest Artist
• Johnny Cash Composer
• Ed Cherney Engineer, Mixing
• Ry Cooder Bass, Composer, Guitar, Mandolin, Producer, Vocals
• Miguel Cruz Percussion
• Walter Davis Composer
• Jim Dickinson Composer
• Steve Douglas Guest Artist, Saxophone
• Terry Evans Vocals, Vocals (Background)
• Lalo Garcia Lettering
• Clark German Engineer
• Willie Green, Jr. Vocals (Background)
• William "Bill" Greene Vocals
• John Hiatt Composer
• Flaco Jiménez Accordion, Guest Artist
• Jim Keltner Composer, Drums, Guest Artist
• Bobby King Bass, Vocals (Background)
• Stephen Marcussen Mastering
• Steven M. Martin Art Direction
• Arnold McCuller Vocals, Vocals (Background)
• Buell Neidlinger Bass, Bass (Acoustic)
• Van Dyke Parks Guest Artist, Keyboards
• Elvis Presley Composer
• Raymond Quevedo Composer
• Harry Dean Stanton Guest Artist, Performer, Vocals
Review by Bob Gottlieb; Score: ***
• "The Musician's Musician". "The Master of the Eclectic". There are probably a dozen more titles by which this "guitar player" is known. To even refer to him as a guitar player is probably a gross mislabeling of this musician. He defies any sort of categorization; this is his greatest strength and for some his weakness. The theme for these nine cuts is rhythm of all different ilk. I won't even give the parameters because he seems to have none. I wondered how many different instruments he played on this album (I thought I counted five different types of guitar); it only says guitar and vocal for his credits. Listen to his version of "All Shook Up," more bop and rhythm than Elvis could put into four of his songs. It seems musicians line up to play with him, and they feel he did them a favor by letting them play on his albums. He always gives them plenty of space to do what they do. This CD will make the dead start tapping their toes.
Artist Biography by Steve Huey
• Whether serving as a session musician, solo artist, or soundtrack composer, Ry Cooder's chameleon–like fretted instrument virtuosity, songwriting, and choices of material encompass an incredibly eclectic range of North American musical styles, including rock & roll, blues, reggae, Tex–Mex, Hawaiian, Dixieland jazz, country, folk, R&B, gospel, and vaudeville. The 16–year–old Cooder began his career in 1963 in a blues band with Jackie DeShannon and then formed the short–lived Rising Sons in 1965 with Taj Mahal and Spirit drummer Ed Cassidy. Cooder met producer Terry Melcher through the Rising Sons and was invited to perform at several sessions with Paul Revere & the Raiders. During his subsequent career as a session musician, Cooder's trademark slide guitar work graced the recordings of such artists as Captain Beefheart (Safe as Milk), Randy Newman, Little Feat, Van Dyke Parks, the Rolling Stones (Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers), Taj Mahal, and Gordon Lightfoot. He also appeared on the soundtracks of Candy and Performance.
• Cooder made his debut as a solo artist in 1970 with a self–titled album featuring songs by Leadbelly, Blind Willie Johnson, Sleepy John Estes, and Woody Guthrie. The follow–up, Into the Purple Valley, introduced longtime cohorts Jim Keltner on drums and Jim Dickinson on bass, and it and Boomer's Story largely repeated and refined the syncopated style and mood of the first. In 1974, Cooder produced what is generally regarded as his best album, Paradise and Lunch, and its follow–up, Chicken Skin Music, showcased a potent blend of Tex–Mex, Hawaiian, gospel, and soul, and featured contributions from Flaco Jimenez and Gabby Pahinui. In 1979, Bop Till You Drop was the first major–label album to be recorded digitally. In the early '80s, Cooder began to augment his solo output with soundtrack work on such films as Blue Collar, The Long Riders, and The Border; he has gone on to compose music for Southern Comfort, Goin' South, Paris, Texas, Streets of Fire, Alamo Bay, Blue City, Crossroads, Cocktail, Johnny Handsome, Steel Magnolias, and Geronimo. Music by Ry Cooder (1995) compiled two discs' worth of highlights from Cooder's film work.
• In 1992, Cooder joined Keltner, John Hiatt, and renowned British tunesmith Nick Lowe, all of whom had played on Hiatt's Bring the Family, to form Little Village, which toured and recorded one album. Cooder turned his attention to world music, recording the album A Meeting by the River with Indian musician V.M. Bhatt. Cooder's next project, a duet album with renowned African guitarist Ali Farka Touré titled Talking Timbuktu, won the 1994 Grammy for Best World Music Recording.
• His next world crossover would become one of the most popular musical rediscoveries of the 20th century. In 1997, Cooder traveled to Cuba to produce and play with a group of son musicians who had little exposure outside of their homeland. The resulting album, Buena Vista Social Club, was a platinum–selling international success that made stars of Compay Segundo, Ibrahim Ferrer, and Rubén González, and earned Cooder another Grammy. He continued to work on projects with his Buena Vista bandmates, including a collaboration with Manuel Galbán in 2003 titled Mambo Sinuendo. His other work in the 2000s included sessions with James Taylor, Aaron Neville, Warren Zevon, and Spanish diva Luz Casal.
• In 2005, Cooder released Chavez Ravine, his first solo album since 1987's Get Rhythm; the album was the first entry in a trilogy of recordings about the disappearance of Los Angeles' cultural history as a result of gentrification. Chavez Ravine was followed by My Name Is Buddy in 2007, and the final chapter in the saga, I, Flathead in 2009. In 2010, Cooder was approached by Paddy Moloney of the Chieftains to produce an album. Moloney had been obsessed with an historical account of the San Patricios, a band of immigrant Irish soldiers who deserted the American Army during the Mexican–American War in 1846 to fight for the other side, against the Manifest Destiny ideology of James Polk's America. Cooder agreed and the end result was San Patricio, which brings this fascinatingly complex tale to life. In early 2011, Cooder was taken by a headline about bankers and other moneyed citizens who'd actually profited from the bank bailouts and resulting mortgage and economic crisis, and wrote the song "No Banker Left Behind," which became the first song on 2011's Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down, an album that reached all the way back to his earliest recordings for musical inspiration while telling topical stories about corruption — political and social — the erasure and the rewriting of American history, and an emerging class war. A month after its release, Beat poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti's fabled City Lights publishing house issued Cooder's first collection of short fiction entitled Los Angeles Stories. He continued to follow his socio–political muse with Election Special, released in the summer of 2012, and in 2013 released Live in San Francisco, his first live album in 35 years, with Corridos Famosos (son Joachim on percussion, Flaco Jimenez on accordion, Robert Francis on bass, and vocalists Terry Evans, Arnold McCuller, and Juliette Commagere). The ten–piece Mexican brass band La Banda Juvenil also guested. In 2014, Rhino Records offered an epic–scale look at Cooder's work in film scoring with Soundtracks, a seven–disc box set compiled from his movie music of the '80s and '90s. http://www.allmusic.com/
Website: http://www.nonesuch.com/artists/ry-cooder
AWARDS:
•♦• 1988 Grammy Award (Best Recording for Children) — Pecos Bill, producer (Rabbit Ears Productions)
•♦• 1993 Grammy Award (Best World Music Album) — A Meeting by the River(With Pt. Vishwa Mohan Bhatt)
•♦• 1994 Grammy Award (Best World Music Album) — Talking Timbuktu with Ali Farka Toure
•♦• 1997 Grammy Award (Best Tropical Latin Performance) — Buena Vista Social Club
•♦• 2003 Grammy Award (Best Pop Instrumental Album) — Mambo Sinuendo with Manuel Galbán
•♦• 2003 Grammy Award (Best Traditional Tropical Latin Album) — Buenos Hermanos, producer (Ibrahim Ferrer, artist)
•♦• 2000 — Ry Cooder received an honorary doctorate from Queen's University, Canada
•♦• 2001 — Ry Cooder received an honorary doctorate from the California Institute of the Arts
_____________________________________________________________
Born: March 15, 1947 in Los Angeles, CA
Birth name: Ryland Peter Cooder
Location:
Album release: November 1987
Record Label: Warner Bros. / Reprise
Duration: 40:54
Tracks:
01. Get Rhythm 3:18
02. Low–Commotion 3:10
03. Going Back To Okinawa 4:42
04. 13 Question Method 3:39
05. Women Will Rule The World 5:52
06. All Shook Up 3:31
07. I Can Tell By The Way You Smell 4:34
08. Across The Borderline 6:18
09. Let's Have A Ball 5:50
Written by:
• Johnny Cash 1
• Ry Cooder / Jim Keltner 2
• Ry Cooder 3
• Chuck Berry 4
• Raymond Quevedo 5
• Otis Blackwell / Elvis Presley 6
• Walter Davis 7
• Ry Cooder / Jim Dickinson / John Hiatt 8
• Alden Bunn 9
AWARDS
• Billboard Albums
• 1987 Get Rhythm The Billboard 200 #177
Personnel:
• Ry Cooder — Guitar, Vocals
• Van Dyke Parks — Keyboards
• Flaco Jiménez — Accordion
• Steve Douglas — Saxophone
• Jorge Calderón — Electric Bass
• Buell Niedlinger — Acoustic Bass on 2, 6, 8
• Jim Keltner — Drums
• Miguel Cruz — Percussion
• Bobby King, Terry Evans, Arnold McCuller, Willie Greene, Jr. — background vocals
• Larry Blackmon — vocals on "All Shook Up"
• Harry Dean Stanton — vocals on "Across the Borderline"
CREDITS:
• Chuck Berry Composer
• Larry Blackmon Guest Artist, Performer, Vocals
• Otis Blackwell Composer
• Jorge Calderón Bass (Electric), Guest Artist
• Johnny Cash Composer
• Ed Cherney Engineer, Mixing
• Ry Cooder Bass, Composer, Guitar, Mandolin, Producer, Vocals
• Miguel Cruz Percussion
• Walter Davis Composer
• Jim Dickinson Composer
• Steve Douglas Guest Artist, Saxophone
• Terry Evans Vocals, Vocals (Background)
• Lalo Garcia Lettering
• Clark German Engineer
• Willie Green, Jr. Vocals (Background)
• William "Bill" Greene Vocals
• John Hiatt Composer
• Flaco Jiménez Accordion, Guest Artist
• Jim Keltner Composer, Drums, Guest Artist
• Bobby King Bass, Vocals (Background)
• Stephen Marcussen Mastering
• Steven M. Martin Art Direction
• Arnold McCuller Vocals, Vocals (Background)
• Buell Neidlinger Bass, Bass (Acoustic)
• Van Dyke Parks Guest Artist, Keyboards
• Elvis Presley Composer
• Raymond Quevedo Composer
• Harry Dean Stanton Guest Artist, Performer, Vocals
Review by Bob Gottlieb; Score: ***
• "The Musician's Musician". "The Master of the Eclectic". There are probably a dozen more titles by which this "guitar player" is known. To even refer to him as a guitar player is probably a gross mislabeling of this musician. He defies any sort of categorization; this is his greatest strength and for some his weakness. The theme for these nine cuts is rhythm of all different ilk. I won't even give the parameters because he seems to have none. I wondered how many different instruments he played on this album (I thought I counted five different types of guitar); it only says guitar and vocal for his credits. Listen to his version of "All Shook Up," more bop and rhythm than Elvis could put into four of his songs. It seems musicians line up to play with him, and they feel he did them a favor by letting them play on his albums. He always gives them plenty of space to do what they do. This CD will make the dead start tapping their toes.
Artist Biography by Steve Huey
• Whether serving as a session musician, solo artist, or soundtrack composer, Ry Cooder's chameleon–like fretted instrument virtuosity, songwriting, and choices of material encompass an incredibly eclectic range of North American musical styles, including rock & roll, blues, reggae, Tex–Mex, Hawaiian, Dixieland jazz, country, folk, R&B, gospel, and vaudeville. The 16–year–old Cooder began his career in 1963 in a blues band with Jackie DeShannon and then formed the short–lived Rising Sons in 1965 with Taj Mahal and Spirit drummer Ed Cassidy. Cooder met producer Terry Melcher through the Rising Sons and was invited to perform at several sessions with Paul Revere & the Raiders. During his subsequent career as a session musician, Cooder's trademark slide guitar work graced the recordings of such artists as Captain Beefheart (Safe as Milk), Randy Newman, Little Feat, Van Dyke Parks, the Rolling Stones (Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers), Taj Mahal, and Gordon Lightfoot. He also appeared on the soundtracks of Candy and Performance.
• Cooder made his debut as a solo artist in 1970 with a self–titled album featuring songs by Leadbelly, Blind Willie Johnson, Sleepy John Estes, and Woody Guthrie. The follow–up, Into the Purple Valley, introduced longtime cohorts Jim Keltner on drums and Jim Dickinson on bass, and it and Boomer's Story largely repeated and refined the syncopated style and mood of the first. In 1974, Cooder produced what is generally regarded as his best album, Paradise and Lunch, and its follow–up, Chicken Skin Music, showcased a potent blend of Tex–Mex, Hawaiian, gospel, and soul, and featured contributions from Flaco Jimenez and Gabby Pahinui. In 1979, Bop Till You Drop was the first major–label album to be recorded digitally. In the early '80s, Cooder began to augment his solo output with soundtrack work on such films as Blue Collar, The Long Riders, and The Border; he has gone on to compose music for Southern Comfort, Goin' South, Paris, Texas, Streets of Fire, Alamo Bay, Blue City, Crossroads, Cocktail, Johnny Handsome, Steel Magnolias, and Geronimo. Music by Ry Cooder (1995) compiled two discs' worth of highlights from Cooder's film work.
• In 1992, Cooder joined Keltner, John Hiatt, and renowned British tunesmith Nick Lowe, all of whom had played on Hiatt's Bring the Family, to form Little Village, which toured and recorded one album. Cooder turned his attention to world music, recording the album A Meeting by the River with Indian musician V.M. Bhatt. Cooder's next project, a duet album with renowned African guitarist Ali Farka Touré titled Talking Timbuktu, won the 1994 Grammy for Best World Music Recording.
• His next world crossover would become one of the most popular musical rediscoveries of the 20th century. In 1997, Cooder traveled to Cuba to produce and play with a group of son musicians who had little exposure outside of their homeland. The resulting album, Buena Vista Social Club, was a platinum–selling international success that made stars of Compay Segundo, Ibrahim Ferrer, and Rubén González, and earned Cooder another Grammy. He continued to work on projects with his Buena Vista bandmates, including a collaboration with Manuel Galbán in 2003 titled Mambo Sinuendo. His other work in the 2000s included sessions with James Taylor, Aaron Neville, Warren Zevon, and Spanish diva Luz Casal.
• In 2005, Cooder released Chavez Ravine, his first solo album since 1987's Get Rhythm; the album was the first entry in a trilogy of recordings about the disappearance of Los Angeles' cultural history as a result of gentrification. Chavez Ravine was followed by My Name Is Buddy in 2007, and the final chapter in the saga, I, Flathead in 2009. In 2010, Cooder was approached by Paddy Moloney of the Chieftains to produce an album. Moloney had been obsessed with an historical account of the San Patricios, a band of immigrant Irish soldiers who deserted the American Army during the Mexican–American War in 1846 to fight for the other side, against the Manifest Destiny ideology of James Polk's America. Cooder agreed and the end result was San Patricio, which brings this fascinatingly complex tale to life. In early 2011, Cooder was taken by a headline about bankers and other moneyed citizens who'd actually profited from the bank bailouts and resulting mortgage and economic crisis, and wrote the song "No Banker Left Behind," which became the first song on 2011's Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down, an album that reached all the way back to his earliest recordings for musical inspiration while telling topical stories about corruption — political and social — the erasure and the rewriting of American history, and an emerging class war. A month after its release, Beat poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti's fabled City Lights publishing house issued Cooder's first collection of short fiction entitled Los Angeles Stories. He continued to follow his socio–political muse with Election Special, released in the summer of 2012, and in 2013 released Live in San Francisco, his first live album in 35 years, with Corridos Famosos (son Joachim on percussion, Flaco Jimenez on accordion, Robert Francis on bass, and vocalists Terry Evans, Arnold McCuller, and Juliette Commagere). The ten–piece Mexican brass band La Banda Juvenil also guested. In 2014, Rhino Records offered an epic–scale look at Cooder's work in film scoring with Soundtracks, a seven–disc box set compiled from his movie music of the '80s and '90s. http://www.allmusic.com/
Website: http://www.nonesuch.com/artists/ry-cooder
AWARDS:
•♦• 1988 Grammy Award (Best Recording for Children) — Pecos Bill, producer (Rabbit Ears Productions)
•♦• 1993 Grammy Award (Best World Music Album) — A Meeting by the River(With Pt. Vishwa Mohan Bhatt)
•♦• 1994 Grammy Award (Best World Music Album) — Talking Timbuktu with Ali Farka Toure
•♦• 1997 Grammy Award (Best Tropical Latin Performance) — Buena Vista Social Club
•♦• 2003 Grammy Award (Best Pop Instrumental Album) — Mambo Sinuendo with Manuel Galbán
•♦• 2003 Grammy Award (Best Traditional Tropical Latin Album) — Buenos Hermanos, producer (Ibrahim Ferrer, artist)
•♦• 2000 — Ry Cooder received an honorary doctorate from Queen's University, Canada
•♦• 2001 — Ry Cooder received an honorary doctorate from the California Institute of the Arts
_____________________________________________________________