Pre-launch: Remembering Garth
A tribute to Garth Hudson, organist/multi-instrumentalist of The Band
By Adam Zemel
Hello readers! This newsletter will officially launch with an inaugural post in the first half of March. Until then this site is in public beta mode while I build familiarity with the site and tinker with the layout. While I do that, I’m also sharing this reflection about Garth Hudson, The Band’s organ player and multi-instrumantlist, who passed away last month. This was originally written to introduce my community radio show (“Covered Bridges”, Tuesdays at 7 p.m. , 96.5 WFVR-LP South Royalton) on February 4, 2025, an hour of programming in tribute to Hudson and The Band.
A Night for Garth
Here’s how it works, I think, for a lot of people from my generation who love The Band. First you find Dylan, and you learn the mythology that was just covered in the recent movie: he went electric and shocked the world, alienated a portion of his fans and finally kicked off the 60s as they exist in the American imagination. And The Band is a crucial part of this mythology, because although they didn’t cut the records, or take the stage with him at Newport Folk, they were his backing band for the first tour, joining Dylan for the second set, the electric half of the show. Enduring the jeers in Britain, the vague condescension of the press, the moody turns of their temporary frontman. And then they all moved to Woodstock, Dylan and the Band, and the work began in earnest. The Band’s first album is named after their house in town, “Music from Big Pink”, so you get your hands on that and it’s good. It’s exactly what it needs to be.
And that Dylan mythology looms large in your head because the man was a force. He imposed himself on the world and the world purred and pushed back in strange, alternating turns. But you’re also curious about The Band, who weren’t called The Band until they were associated with Dylan, but had been playing together already for years.
You hear there’s a Scorsese documentary about their final concert. You liked that Big Pink album, maybe you should check it out. Especially because—get this—everyone shows up in this documentary. Dylan, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Dr. John, Muddy Waters, Van Morrison, Eric Clapton, the list of musicians who sat in for this concert goes on and on. And you weren’t there for any of this, so what a joy that you can watch them all play in the space of a 2 hour run time. Filmed by Scorsese, no less.
And then you want to watch it again, and you realize as you watch it that second time that you’re keyed in on The Band, not the guests. And you begin to fall in love.
The Band, in so many ways, is the opposite of Dylan, who you also love. Dylan, singular, the lone burning genius; The Band, collaborative, glowing in their alchemy. The soul of the sound living not inside the five musicians but the spaces between them. The space between the notes. How else to make sense of this band where the rhythm section split the vocals, the players swapped instruments with delightful abandon, the lyricist rarely sang? That could back any singer or instrumentalist on either side of the Mississippi?
The Band achieved what they did by playing as a collective, by laying down ego and playing for the sake of the sound, for each other. No one represents this ethic better than Garth Hudson, the band’s organ player and multi-instrumentalist—organ, pianos, accordion, saxophone...He sat hidden behind his fortress of keyboards, laying down rhythms and ripping off solos, making everyone sound better in the process. He was soft spoken, appearing only briefly in the interview segments that break up the concert footage in the Last Waltz. But he didn’t need to speak, he knew how to express himself.
It’s fitting, in a way, that he would be the last member of the Band to leave us; although he was older than his band mates, he was the last to join. And it was clear, even as a follower born 30 years too late, that he didn’t live as hard as the rest of them. So tonight is his night, and these songs are for him. We will miss you Garth Hudson, whose memory is a blessing.