Band

Between 1968 and 1975 the Band ranked among the planet’s foremost and most consequential rock ensembles, merging earlier eras with contemporary currents both thematically and sonically. Their recordings channeled the flavors of country, blues, folk, and additional strands of American roots music through an approach that felt spontaneous, natural, and forward-looking, revealing a level of artistic sophistication that stood out sharply during the psychedelic years. Despite their gravity they retained an instinct for propulsion, and their buoyant drive earned admiration from Bob Dylan; the partnership that followed brought the ensemble to listeners worldwide. The group first built its standing via the opening pair of LPs—Music from Big Pink in 1968 and The Band in 1969—captured its concert power on Rock of Ages in 1972, concluded its initial run with the expansive The Last Waltz in 1978, and resumed activity via Jericho in 1993.

The ensemble’s story reaches back to 1958. Arkansas-born rock & roller Ronnie Hawkins, intent on sustaining a professional trajectory, formed a support unit that featured fellow Arkansan Levon Helm on drums and capable guitar; Helm had previously directed his own outfit, the Jungle Bush Beaters. Ronnie Hawkins & the Hawks commenced taping in spring 1958 and performed across the American South while also appearing in Ontario, Canada, where compensation proved higher. After pianist Willard Jones exited one year later, Hawkins scouted Toronto talent in late 1959. He offered keyboard duties to Scott Cushnie, already performing alongside Robbie Robertson; Cushnie agreed only if Robertson could join as well.

Following initial reluctance from Hawkins, Robertson entered on bass, supplanting departing Jimmy Evans. Further personnel shifts occurred over ensuing years, Robertson moving to rhythm guitar behind Fred Carter’s lead work and, briefly, Roy Buchanan’s. Rick Danko joined on bass in 1961, succeeded by Richard Manuel on piano and harmony vocals. Around the same period classically trained organist Garth Hudson, able to read notation, completed the original configuration. From 1959 through 1963 Ronnie Hawkins & the Hawks ranked among the circuit’s most dynamic rock & roll units, notable during an interval when the style was widely declared extinct. Internal chemistry among the members cohered effectively, though relations with Hawkins grew strained; unbeknownst to him he soon found himself peripheral within his own band. As the newer arrivals Danko, Manuel, and Hudson—Canadians supplanting Hawkins’s fellow Southerners—integrated more tightly, control slipped from Hawkins.

The Hawks separated from Ronnie Hawkins in summer 1963. They elected to continue under the leadership of their senior member Levon Helm, appearing variously as Levon & the Hawks and the Canadian Squires while issuing recordings under both designations. A connection with John Hammond, Jr. for New York sessions introduced the musicians to Bob Dylan, then preparing to expand his concert sound. Robertson and Helm supported Dylan at the 1965 Forest Hills concert in New York, a performance preserved on surviving bootleg tape; eventually the full group signed on.

Association with Dylan altered the Hawks, though the partnership proved uneven. The musicians had mastered precise, compact playing and were accustomed to audiences seeking entertainment and movement. Dylan, however, confronted listeners inclined to dismiss him for shifting from acoustic folk to forceful electric rock & roll. The Hawks were unaccustomed to the intensity animating the folk crowd and initially unequipped for Dylan’s spontaneous rearrangements, which demanded rapid adaptation; the experience nevertheless rendered the ensemble more adaptable onstage.

The musicians served as Dylan’s touring unit in 1966, though Levon Helm, unsettled by hostile audience responses, departed early in the run. The remaining members entered the sphere of Dylan’s manager Albert Grossman, who arranged for them to join Dylan in Woodstock, New York, for sessions that yielded The Basement Tapes in their assorted forms, none issued officially for nearly a decade. Grossman then obtained a Capitol Records contract for the ensemble, newly named the Band. Levon Helm rejoined, producing Music from Big Pink, an oblique extension of the Basement Tapes. Released in July 1968, the enigmatically titled and packaged album bore no resemblance to prevailing work; it suggested psychedelia and the British Invasion had never occurred. Five distinct personalities converged toward a shared aim of fusing folk, blues, gospel, R&B, classical, and rock & roll. The music drew deeply from Americana and mythic national imagery even though every member except Helm hailed from Canada. Robertson, Manuel, and Danko contributed songs while all except Robertson and Hudson sang; their voices combined informally rather than in polished harmony. Classical organ passages intertwined with a substantial yet economical rock & roll attack, distancing the Band so completely from surrounding self-indulgent display and cultural posturing that they appeared to inhabit an alternate sphere governed by separate principles.

During 1969 the first widely circulated bootleg LP, The Great White Wonder, containing then-unreleased Basement Tapes material, began circulating on campuses and among collectors. Sound quality was limited and labels blank, yet the disc reached hundreds of thousands of listeners and intensified the Band’s aura. A second album, titled simply The Band, matched the debut in quality. Dominated by Robertson’s compositions and issued in September 1969, it propelled the group’s profile beyond Dylan’s shadow through original material comparable to his contemporaneous output. “Up on Cripple Creek” and “The Night They Drove Ol’ Dixie Down” seized public attention, the former securing an Ed Sullivan Show appearance.

After the second album internal dynamics shifted, partly due to touring pressures, expectations of sustained brilliance, and mounting press emphasis on Robbie Robertson over his colleagues. The Band remained a formidable performing unit, documented on the third album Stage Fright, yet fatigue and private strains accumulated. Members had long engaged in occasional marijuana use, but access to stronger substances increased. Resentments surfaced regarding Robertson’s songwriting dominance, later questioned publicly in Levon Helm’s autobiography, while constant visibility added friction. By Cahoots, released in 1971, some experimental spark and camaraderie had diminished, though the record remained among their strongest of that year. Fulfilling touring and recording obligations grew burdensome. By late 1971 the musicians opted for a hiatus, taping the live Rock of Ages; their subsequent effort, 1973’s Moondog Matinee, assembled studio renditions of oldies performed in their Hawks era and signaled internal difficulties. They skipped touring behind the album yet played one major date that year at Watkins Glen, New York, alongside the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers Band before the largest rock audience assembled to that point.

Also in 1973 they resumed collaboration with Bob Dylan, supporting Planet Waves and preparing a major 1974 tour. That outing, viewed retrospectively, appeared more an exercise in capitalizing on prior association than an occasion for significant new music. Many critics judged the Band sharper than Dylan onstage, a perception confirmed by the live Before the Flood drawn from February 1974 shows. Northern Lights-Southern Cross, issued late 1975, marked a substantial return and reaffirmed the group’s innovative standing. Around the same time Levon Helm and Garth Hudson contributed belatedly to Chess Records history by recording an entire album with Muddy Waters at Helm’s Woodstock studio. Initially overlooked, The Muddy Waters Woodstock Album proved Waters’s final strong Chess release and his finest in at least five years.

By 1976 the Band was dissolving as a working unit, members absorbed in separate pursuits with minimal live activity. A compilation appeared, and they embarked on a farewell tour; Robertson concluded their road days were ending and arranged a grand closing concert at San Francisco’s Winterland on Thanksgiving 1976. Guest performers included Ronnie Hawkins, Muddy Waters, Eric Clapton, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison, and Bob Dylan, with Martin Scorsese engaged to film the event. Widely covered in 1976, the concert achieved landmark status upon the 1978 release of Scorsese’s documentary The Last Waltz and its accompanying three-LP soundtrack. The film was celebrated as among the finest concert documentaries, yet by its theatrical arrival the Band’s final studio album Islands (1977) had received little notice, while Danko and Helm issued solo records and Robertson explored acting and film scoring.

Robertson envisioned continued studio work after the farewell, yet as other projects claimed his attention the ensemble ceased to rank among his priorities. The remaining members preferred continued touring, a preference Helm later articulated plainly in his autobiography; in 1983 they reunited for concerts with Cate Brothers Band personnel substituting for absent Robertson, who endorsed the effort. The Band maintained intermittent touring for several years until Richard Manuel, long troubled by drug and alcohol dependence, died by suicide on March 4, 1986, following a Winter Park, Florida performance. Helm, Danko, and Hudson persisted with rotating personnel and released Jericho in 1993, incorporating new studio tracks alongside a previously unreleased live recording of Manuel singing “Country Boys.” Robertson memorialized Manuel with “Fallen Angel” on his 1987 solo debut Robbie Robertson.

The Band entered the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1994; Robertson, Danko, and Hudson performed together at the ceremony while Helm, at odds with Robertson over songwriting credits and royalty allocation, declined to attend. With Helm the group continued touring and issued further studio albums: High on the Hog in 1996 and Jubilation in 1998. In 1999 they recorded a version of Bob Dylan’s “One Too Many Mornings” for the tribute Tangled Up in Blues: Songs of Bob Dylan; it proved their final release, as Rick Danko died December 10, 1999, aged 55. Following Danko’s death the Band ceased activity.

Levon Helm, who interspersed music with occasional acting, received a throat-cancer diagnosis in the late 1990s. While undergoing treatment he initiated regular performances at his Woodstock studio; the Midnight Ramble shows revitalized his solo work. Dirt Farmer, issued in 2007, earned a Grammy for Best Traditional Folk Album, followed by the more energetic Electric Dirt in 2009. Although his cancer recurred, Helm continued performing until weeks before his death on April 19, 2012. Garth Hudson maintained a modest solo profile, performing occasionally and releasing The Sea to the North in 2001; in 2011 he issued Garth Hudson Presents a Canadian Celebration of the Band, joining assorted artists reinterpreting songs from the group’s catalog. Robbie Robertson recorded sporadically, served as an A&R executive at Dreamworks Records, and collaborated repeatedly with Martin Scorsese, providing music for Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, The Color of Money, The Departed, and additional films. The Band’s catalog endured through archival projects, notably the 2005 box set A Musical History and expanded 50th-anniversary editions of Music from Big Pink, The Band, and Stage Fright. A Deluxe Edition of Cahoots appeared in 2021, featuring a new Bob Clearmountain mix and a previously unreleased May 1971 Paris concert. Robbie Robertson died August 9, 2023, aged 80. Less than eighteen months later Garth Hudson, the final surviving original member, died in Woodstock, New York, aged 87.