An
elementary quiz among pop music enthusiasts is, "who is the only musician to be credited on a Beatles
recording other than the group's four members?" Not only that, he also played
keyboards for the Rolling Stones on many of the group's albums and tours during
the 1970s. Not only that, but he had been a boy wonder who had worked with many
legendary artists in black music before he was even of age. All that, before
his very successful solo career mainly in the 70s, a career that produced #1
hits. One of the world's best keyboard players - and a man with a tortured
life: Ladies and gentlemen, here's Billy Preston.
William Everett Preston (September 2, 1946 –
June 6, 2006) was born in Houston, Texas and when he was three, the family
moved to Los Angeles, where Preston began playing
piano while sitting on his mother Robbie's lap. Noted as a child prodigy,
Preston was entirely self-taught and never had a music lesson. By the age of
ten, he was playing organ onstage backing several gospel singers such as
Mahalia Jackson, James Cleveland and Andraé Crouch. At age eleven, Preston
appeared on Nat King Cole's national TV show singing the Fats Domino hit
Blueberry Hill with Cole. Also at eleven, he appeared in St. Louis Blues
(1958), the W.C. Handy biopic starring Nat King Cole; Preston played Handy at a
younger age. Here's that exciting version of Blueberry Hill:
As
his career was taking off, a traumatic event occured that marred Billy's
passage to adolescence; at about the age of nine, after he and his mother moved
to Los Angeles from Houston to perform in a touring production of Amos 'n'
Andy, he was repeatedly abused by the touring company's pianist. When Preston
told his mother about the abuse, she did not believe him, and failed to protect
him. The abuse subsequently went on for the entire summer, and Preston stated
that he was also later abused by a local pastor.
As
Preston's manager Joyce Moore revealed after Billy's death, his mother’s
refusal to accept the news categorically (and ironically) weighed heavier than
the molestation itself by destroying Billy’s self worth well into the realm of
his adulthood and massive success. He hid a great amount of pain and self
hatred behind a huge gapped-tooth smile by being completely disconnected from
himself, his success and the world for his entire 50 year career.
In
1962, Preston joined Little Richard's band as an organist. Horst Fascher, body
guard for musicians in Hamburg, wrote a book saying Little Richard made it
clear to everyone that he was with Billy Preston at
the time. Here they are much later, in 1985, live at the Apollo Theatre,
NYC, performing Didn't It Rain:
Here
is a tribute to gospel legend Marion Williams, where three legends appear
together: Aretha Franklin, Little Richard and Billy Preston:
Billy
Preston first met The Beatles while touring with Little Richard's band in 1962.
At the time The Beatles were the opening act, and were yet to find fame beyond
their home city. Of this meeting, John Lennon said (in The Beatles Anthology):
“It’s hard for people to imagine just how thrilled we, the four of us, were to
even see any great rock’n’roller in the flesh and we were almost paralysed with
adoration for both of them, and the side show was that Little Richard’s
organist was Billy Preston. He looked about 10 then.”
In
1963, Preston played the organ on Sam Cooke's Night Beat album. The Guardian included it on
their 2007 list of "1000 Albums to Hear Before You Die". In You Gotta
Move, Billy's organ is prominent:
Also
in 1963, Preston
released his own debut album, 16 Yr Old Soul, for Cooke's SAR label. Greazee
Parts 1 & 2 opened the album:
In
1965, he released the album The Most Exciting Organ Ever and performed Short
Fat Fannie on the rock and roll show Shindig!
From
The Most Exciting Organ Ever, here's Don't Let Sun Catch You Crying:
At
the end of 1965 he released Early Hits of '65. From that album, I chose to play
Goldfinger:
In
1966 he released Wildest Organ in Town! It was arranged by Sly Stone. Here's In
The Midnight Hour:
From
the same album, here's Satisfaction:
In
1967, he joined Ray Charles' band. Following this exposure, several musicians
began asking Preston to contribute to their sessions. His first meeting on
stage with Ray Charles happened a couple of years earlier, on Shindig!, with
the song Double O Soul:
Among
the people with whom he worked during this time and formed lasting friendships
was Aretha Franklin. Here they are much later, reminiscing and singing O Holy
Night:
Also
in 1967, he released Club Meeting. It included his own composition Let the Music
Play:
Billy
met again with the Beatles in 1969, during the fraught sessions for the Let It
Be album and film. George Harrison, unwilling to further endure the animosity
within the group, had walked out of the studio and gone to a Ray Charles
concert in London, where he saw Preston playing the organ. Harrison brought
Preston back into the studio, where his enthusiasm and easy-going personality
helped ease the tensions.
John
Lennon was in favour of making Preston a full member of the band; Paul
McCartney disagreed, saying there was little point as the band was close to
splitting. Nevertheless, he worked with The Beatles from 22-31 January 1969,
playing Fender Rhodes electric piano and a Lowrey DSO Heritage organ.
Preston
performed with The Beatles during their 42-minute performance on the rooftop of
Apple, on 30 January 1969, which was the band's final public performance. In
April 1969 the Get Back single was credited to "The Beatles with Billy
Preston", as was its b-side, Don't Let Me Down. Billy Preston also played
on The Beatles' Abbey Road album. He performed on the songs I Want You (She's
So Heavy) and Something, though was not credited. Here is Preston telling us
all about it:
Here
he is with the Beatles, performing Don't Let Me Down:
Here's
Get Back: Preston's organ-playing takes the song to another level.
Preston
was signed to Apple in 1969, and released the album That's The Way God Planned
It. Aside from Harrison, other contributors to the album include Keith
Richards, Eric Clapton, Ginger Baker and Doris Troy. Most of the songs were
written by Preston himself, as was the title track, produced by George
Harrison; it was released as a single and peaked at #11 in the UK.
Preston
and Harrison had a strong relationship after The Beatles split. Preston was the
first to record My Sweet Lord, for his 1970 album Encouraging Words, and
he appeared on several subsequent albums by Harrison. He also appeared at the
Concert for Bangladesh. Here's My Sweet Lord:
Here's
Preston with the live version of That's The Way God Planned It from the Concert
for Bangladesh:
Here's
Preston doing his organ magic for the Rolling Stones in Can't You Hear Me
Knockin':
He
also plays the piano in John Lennon's wonderful meditation on God:
I'm
The Greatest is also a John Lennon composition, offered to Ringo Starr for his
album Ringo. Preston is on keyboards:
In
1971, Preston left Apple and signed with Herb Alpert's A&M Records. The
previous year, he contributed to another hit single when Stephen Stills asked
to use Preston's phrase "if you can't be with the one you love, love the
one you're with", a song on Stills' self-titled debut solo album.
It
seems that in the TV documentary Unsung,
which dedicated a show to Billy Preston in 2011, had one of Billy's backing
musicians from the late 60s/early 70s (no name mentioned in the story) saying that
when he first met Billy, Billy had asked him if he could give him some head. Preston
admitted he would never openly come out because the black church and the music
industry (and black people) would have turned against him. I'm sure he was
right.
His
first album with A&M was I Wrote a Simple Song. The title track was a minor
US hit (#77):
It
was his next single, Outa-Space that finally established Billy as a true superstar
in his own country. It peaked at #2 in Billboard's Hot 100 and at #1 in the
R&B chart. It also won a Grammy Award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance.
His
follow-up album, Music Is My Life (1972) further advanced his chart fortunes: The album contains Preston's first #1 single, Will
It Go Round in Circles, which would become one of
his best known songs:
It
also contains his version of the Beatles' Blackbird:
There
was another album in 1973, called Everybody
Likes Some Kind of Music. An instrumental was chosen as lead single - and like Outa-Space, of which Space
Race was a sort of sequel, it became a big hit (#4 Hot 100, #1 R&B):
Follow-up
single You're So Unique stalled at #48 in the Hot 100, but made #11 in the
R&B chart:
His
first live album was Live European Tour, released in 1974. It was recorded during his
opening act stint for The Rolling Stones 1973 European Tour, featuring Mick
Taylor on lead guitar & Preston's own band "The God Squad". From
it, here's The Bus:
His
next album, The Kids & Me (1974), included his second US #1, Nothing from
Nothing:
...
As well as Billy's composition, You Are So Beautiful, which was later a big hit for
Joe Cocker. Here's Preston's original version:
Here's
Cocker's hit version:
It's My Pleasure (1975)
featured his friend George Harrison on guitar, on the track That's Life:
He released two more albums with A&M, then he
appeared in that cute catastrophe of a film, the all-star version of the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts
Club Band movie (1978):
He then signed a contract with Motown and his first album
there, Late At Night (1979), contained his hit duet with Syreeta, With You I'm Born Again (#4
US, #2 UK):
From
his album The
Way I Am (1981), here's Sam Cooke's classic A Change Is Gonna Come:
From
his last album with Motown, Pressin' On (1982), here's I'm Never Gonna Say Goodbye:
While
his popularity waned, his drug dependancy, originally to cocaine and later to
the cheaper but more lethal crack, increased. By the late-1980s, Billy’s life
was in free-fall: he was arrested for insurance fraud after attempting to burn
down his own house in 1991. And he was treated for alcohol and cocaine
addictions. In the same year, he was also arrested for sexually assaulting
a 16-year-old Mexican boy, after picking him up at a gathering point for day
laborers. After submitting to a drug test, he tested positive for cocaine. A
few months later, Preston was charged with sexual battery, assault with a
deadly weapon – a knife – and false imprisonment of a 38-year-old man he hired
to do work at his Malibu, Ca. home. That year, he entered no-contest pleas to
the cocaine and sexual assault charges. He was sentenced to nine months at a
drug rehabilitation center and three months of house arrest.
Preston
overcame his problems in the early 1990s, toured with Eric Clapton, recorded
with Gary Walker, one of the vocalists in his Los Angeles-based band, and
worked with a wide range of other artists. In 2002 he performed at the tribute
concert for Harrison at the Royal Albert Hall, where he played My Sweet Lord
and Isn't It A Pity. Here's the latter:
His
final public appearance was at a 2005 press junket in Los Angeles, for the
re-release of the Concert for Bangladesh film. Afterwards he performed Give Me
Love (Give Me Peace On Earth), My Sweet Lord and Isn't It A Pity with Ringo
Starr and George's son Dhani.
Billy
Preston had been battling kidney disease for some years, brought on by his
drink and drug abuse. On Nov. 21, 2005, the man known as "The Fifth Beatle"
lay on a hospital bed, dressed in street clothes, thrashing and gasping for
air. Billy Preston had just arrived at the Intensive Care Unit at Daniel
Freeman Marina Hospital in Marina del Rey, Calif., rushed there from the
Canyon, a nearby drug-rehab center. A large, frustrated nurse wrestled with the
legendary, 59-year-old organ player, struggling to fit a black oxygen mask over
his face. Eyes wide with fear, Preston dodged his head back and forth, unable
to breathe.
Holding
his hand at his bedside was Preston's manager, Joyce Moore. She tried in vain
to calm him down. "I gripped him tight and said, 'Boo, you gotta
relax,'" Moore says. "I thought he was having a panic attack. I kept
saying, 'Breathe with me... breathe with me.'"
But
it wasn't a panic attack or the pangs of crack withdrawal. Years of drug abuse
had culminated in malignant hypertension and pericarditis, the internal
drowning of the area around Preston's heart. He mustered the strength to push
the mask away, look up at Moore and painfully utter his last words: "I... can't!"
Suddenly
Preston's eyes rolled back, and his grip loosened. The monitors flatlined. Even
after doctors drained the fluid around his heart, he didn't wake up. He lay in
a coma for nearly six months before dying on June 6, 2006.
As
of 2015, his estate was still legally tangled in a messy bankruptcy case. Such
a talented man and may I say such a good man, otherwise he would not have been
so popular among superstar musicians, didn't manage to live up to his full
potential, neither as an artist nor as a man. Such a waste... such a pity...
Any time I get full of myself and think I know a lot about music I turn to this site and get surprised once again. My image of Billy Preston was that of an accomplished musician so well liked that the Beatles wanted to recruit him. The Beatles! Never heard word one about a possible gay connection. I remember first hearing him on That's The Way God Planned It and of course, Get Back. After the 70s hits, not so much. Somehow I also didn't know about the drug and criminal charges nor the sad end to his life. Good job on educating moi once again!
ReplyDeleteHello my friend! I too have recently learned of the gay connection and was as surprised as you. In hindsight, it makes sense, my gaydar was sort of pinging before, but not too hard. Thank you for your kind and inspiring words!
DeleteEvery time I see that afro and that Gap tooth smile I just fall I'm him love withall over again it's unfortunate what he went through but he was one of the best♥️😍😉
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment, Trishalla. He was, indeed, unique!
Deletethe best organist I ever heard. he set the standard.
ReplyDeleteSo true!
DeleteI pray this estate settles so people who have great ideas can move forward with his music. Thanks for this story.
ReplyDelete