Wild Bill Davis

With his swirling Hammond B-3 lines, Wild Bill Davis forged a link between the big-band swing era of the 1930s and ’40s and the organ-centered R&B that dominated the 1950s and early ’60s. Alongside guitarist Floyd Smith and drummer Chris Columbus, he established the core format of the jazz-organ trio. Although he began his career on guitar, Davis first appeared on record with Milt Larkin’s orchestra in 1939, a group noted for the twin-saxophone front line of Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson and Arnett Cobb. Influenced by Freddie Green’s rhythm work, he stayed with Larkin until 1942. Switching to piano, Davis entered Louis Jordan & His Tympany 5 in 1945, already recognized for his skills as a composer and arranger. He later supplied original pieces and charts to both Duke Ellington and Count Basie. Davis had been booked to record his own arrangement of “April in Paris” with the Count Basie Orchestra in 1955, yet he was unable to attend the sessions; the track, cut without him, reached the pop Top 30. Drawn to the organ styles of Fats Waller and Count Basie, Davis explored the Hammond B-3 and soon shaped a personal method. “I thought of (the organ) as a replacement in clubs for a big band,” he remarked in a late-’80s interview. After five years with Jordan he formed his own trio, though he continued to rejoin Jordan for occasional dates. Despite being overshadowed by later organists such as Jimmy Smith and Bill Doggett in the late ’50s and Booker T. Jones in the ’60s, Davis performed regularly until suffering a fatal heart attack in August 1995. For nearly thirty years his summertime engagements in Atlantic City, New Jersey, drew loyal audiences. Born in Moorestown, New Jersey, he pursued musical studies at Tuskegee University and Wiley College in Texas.