Dr. Lonnie Smith wasn’t an actual doctor, and didn’t play one on TV. But when he manipulated the keys, pedals and drawbars of his Hammond B-3 organ, as he did publicly and on more than 70 albums from the early 1960s through the late 2010s, he was a soulful jazz surgeon. Smith died Sept. 28, at age 79, at his home in Fort Lauderdale after a long battle with pulmonary … [Read more...]
Organist Smith heals his audience at Arts Garage
At age 74, Hammond organist Dr. Lonnie Smith still looks like a kid in the candy store every time he gets behind his keyboard. On Saturday, the kid from Lackawanna, N.Y., fed off of the energy of a sold-out crowd at the Arts Garage in Delray Beach. Those attending included some old friends from the 1990s, when the turban-topped keyboardist was part of the house band at … [Read more...]