James Booker

James Carroll Booker III stood among the most colorful New Orleans pianists of his era and exerted considerable sway over the city’s rhythm-and-blues world throughout the 1950s and 1960s. Classical lessons shaped his early education until he reached twelve, yet he had already attracted notice as a blues and gospel organist performing weekly on radio station WMRY. Before finishing high school he had stepped into recording studios on multiple occasions, releasing his own debut single, “Doing the Hambone,” in 1953. National attention arrived in 1960 when the organ instrumental “Gonzo” placed him on the charts. Over the following twenty years he collaborated in performance and on record with an eclectic roster that included Lloyd Price, Aretha Franklin, Ringo Starr, the Doobie Brothers, and B.B. King.

A 1967 conviction for heroin possession led to a one-year term at Angola Penitentiary, known locally as the “Ponderosa,” an interruption that stalled his rising trajectory. When college audiences renewed interest in traditional New Orleans sounds during the 1970s—centered largely on Professor Longhair’s “Fess”—Booker mounted a return by 1974, securing steady work at clubs such as Tipitina’s, The Maple Leaf, and Snug Harbor. His appearances at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival quickly assumed legendary status; he routinely used festival earnings to make a grand entrance, arriving at the stage in a rented Rolls Royce while dressed in full regalia as the “Piano Prince of New Orleans,” cape included.

Those sets could shift without warning. Chopin might surface inside a blues number, or an impassioned monologue on the CIA could erupt in the style of a “Reverend Ike-meets-Moms Mabley” tag-team match. Booker’s left hand proved extraordinary, frequently forcing bassists to scramble for space, and through it he fused the city’s jazz and rhythm-and-blues traditions with a pronounced gospel accent. His approach remained intensely improvisational, transforming a single progression—usually one of his own—into an evolving medley. Vocally he delivered a plaintive, searing style equally at home with gospel, jazz standards, blues, or pop material.

New Orleans’ finest musicians held him in high regard despite his personal quirks, and traces of his approach continue to surface in the work of pianists such as Henry Butler and Harry Connick, Jr.