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Harmonica sensation Magic Dick is best known for his years with the J. Geils Band. And while his high-profile presence on the band\u2019s critically-acclaimed (and sometimes Platinum-selling) albums helped catapult him to well-deserved fame, that\u2019s just part of his story. Richard \u201cMagic Dick\u201d Salwitz\u2019s lifelong love for (and immersion in) the blues has yielded some of his best work.<\/p>\n
Although Magic Dick is one of the most prominent and celebrated exponents of the harmonica (or the blues harp, if you prefer), it wasn\u2019t his first instrument. Or at least not exactly. \u201cWhen I was three years old, I was very sick with the flu,\u201d he recalls. \u201cMy mother thought, \u2018Maybe if we give him a harmonica, that\u2019ll cheer him.\u2019\u201d Young Dick was so excited that he began jumping up and down on his bed as if it were a trampoline. He had been bitten by the musical bug. \u201cBut I didn\u2019t get back to the harmonica until I was 21,\u201d he admits with a chuckle.<\/p>\n
Magic Dick\u2019s true introduction to playing music would come just a few years later. \u201cI started with trumpet at nine years old,\u201d he says, noting that his parents were supportive of all of his musical endeavors. Growing up in Connecticut, the trumpet was his first musical love. \u201cThat came from my love of Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis,\u201d he says. \u201cTheir approaches, their trumpet sound, inspired me.\u201d<\/p>\n
He studied the instrument for many years, focusing on the attack of the sound. \u201cAnd that attack,\u201d he explains, \u201cis what I try to bring to the harp.\u201d Further inspired by blues harmonica greats like Little Walter, Sonny Boy Williamson I and II, James Cotton and Junior Wells, as a young man Magic Dick developed his own style as a follow-on from the power they brought to the blues.<\/p>\n
Astute listeners often remark on the \u201cvocal\u201d quality of the blues harp, and Magic Dick agrees with that observation. \u201cIt\u2019s in between a saxophone and a trumpet in terms of its sonic aspects,\u201d he says. \u201cThe sound of it is very much like the human voice.\u201d<\/p>\n
Attending college in the mid 1960s, Dick met guitarist John \u201cJ.\u201d Geils and bassist Danny Klein. Becoming fast friends, the three launched the J. Geils Band in 1965. Initially an acoustic trio, the band soon expanded and went electric, eventually adding drummer Stephen Jo Bladd, keyboardist Seth Justman and singer Peter Wolf. A hard-touring act, the band built a following opening for headliners like The Allman Brothers Band, B.B. King and Johnny Winter, landing a record deal in 1969.<\/p>\n
A critics\u2019 favorite, the J. Geils Band\u2019s brand of blues- and r&b-flavored rock scored with live audiences as well. Among the band\u2019s 14 albums of new material, their live sets \u2013 especially 1972\u2019s Live Full House<\/i> with its incendiary blues harp showcase \u201cWhammer Jammer\u201d \u2013 are often cited as their very best.<\/p>\n
The band reached its commercial peak with an MTV-era breakthrough, 1981\u2019s Freeze-Frame<\/i>. Combining the band\u2019s bluesy foundation with a keyboard-focused new wave character, J. Geils Band stormed the charts with a No. 1 album and three Top 40 singles: the title track, \u201cAngel in Blue\u201d and the No. 1 hit \u201cCenterfold.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though he\u2019s a bluesman through and through, Magic Dick had no problem \u2013 then or now \u2013 with his band\u2019s turn toward a more radio-ready style. \u201cA working, touring band needs to have growth,\u201d he explains. \u201cIf you don\u2019t grow, you stagnate. And if you stagnate, you won\u2019t be commercially successful.\u201d And without commercial success, the bills don\u2019t get paid. But Magic Dick says that the band never compromised its musical values. \u201cWe were interested in growth,\u201d he says, \u201cbut consistent with our tastes.\u201d<\/p>\n
The J. Geils Band went inactive after 1985, with occasional reunions in the years to come. Magic Dick and Geils teamed up again in 1992 with Bluestime, a band that celebrated jump blues, swing and jazz; the group toured extensively and released a pair of well-received albums. Geils died in 2017.<\/p>\n
In the years to follow, Magic Dick continued to immerse himself in the music he loves. In 2014 he began a musical partnership with fingerstyle guitarist Shun Ng. The duo\u2019s acoustic blues reading of James Brown\u2019s \u201cPapa\u2019s Got a Brand New Bag\u201d is at once a faithful tribute and a radical reinvention of the song. Magic Dick and Ng toured as part of the all-star Legendary Rhythm & Blues Revue, and released an album, About Time<\/i> in 2016.<\/p>\n
For the last several years \u2013 offhand he can\u2019t even recall just how many \u2013 Magic Dick has been a featured member of Mark Hummel\u2019s Allstar Harmonica Blowout. \u201cFor maybe 30 years now Mark has been doing these Blowouts in the form of a revue,\u201d he says. Backed by a core band, a succession of harmonica stars take their turn blowing in the spotlight. This year\u2019s lineup features Hummel and Magic Dick along with Steve Freund, Anson Funderburgh, Rodrigo Mantovani, RJ Mischo, Curtis Salgado and Wes Starr. The Blowout tours to a dozen West Coast locales in February.<\/p>\n
With all the accolades he\u2019s received, it stands to reason that Magic Dick\u2019s work with the J. Geils Band should be recognized by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The group has been nominated multiple times, but never selected. \u201cGiven the caliber of our live performances, I found it a bit frustrating,\u201d he admits. \u201cBut I have seen tons of comments from fans saying that we\u2019re deserving and long overdue.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Harmonica sensation Magic Dick is best known for his years with the J. Geils Band. And while his high-profile presence on the band\u2019s critically-acclaimed (and sometimes Platinum-selling) albums helped catapult […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30981,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,41],"tags":[5888,5887],"class_list":["post-30980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blues","category-interview","tag-j-geils-band","tag-magic-dick","cat-9-id","cat-41-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30980"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30982,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30980\/revisions\/30982"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}