Tom Dunne: In Paddy Cole and Garth Hudson, we've lost two giants
Irish saxophonist Paddy Cole, and Garth Hudson of The Band recently passed away.
Bit of a changing of the guard last week. Two giants of the music world checked out. Here, it was Castleblaney’s finest, the inestimable Paddy Cole. In the US, it was The Band’s Garth Hudson, a man who once graced the cover of Time magazine under the banner 'They Have Been to the Mountain'. They both had.
Coverage of Hudson’s death was particularly poignant. I saw it first on social media. There was some phone footage of an elderly man in a nursing home, grey haired and frail, a wrap over his shoulders against the cold.
He was playing a piano in a space that looked like a daycare room. Other residents were passing by, seemingly oblivious. But the high forehead, the touch and the voice were unmistakable. My heart gently broke. The twilight of a generational talent.
Hudson was born in Windsor, Ontario in 1937. His parents were musical, and Garth was soon learning Bach preludes and fugues and studying music theory, harmony and counterpoint. He first played in public at St. Luke’s Anglican Church and at his uncle’s funeral home.
His musicianship brought him to the attention of Ronnie Hawkins, a Canadian musician famed for his ability to spot talent as much as play. His band, the Hawks was seen as a training ground for many musicians who would later become legends.
By 1963 the line-up had solidified around Levon Helm (drums, vocals), Robbie Robertson (guitar), Rick Danko (bass, vocals) and Richard Manuel (piano, vocals.) Hudson was the missing piece in what would become a band of seemingly infinite versality.
Garth’s parents were so against him joining that Hawkins had to offer to buy him a new organ – a distinctive Lowrey as opposed to the more popular Hammond – pay him an extra $10 a week to give the others music lessons and grant him the title “music consultant.” History will record that it was money well spent.
History itself interceded at this point. In 1965/66 as Dylan “went electric”, it was to The Band he turned to tour with. They were with him on stage as audiences shouted “Judas” through that famed 1966 tour.
Back home when The Band and Dylan set up camp at the now famous Big Pink house in Woodstock it was Hudson that procured and set up the recording equipment. This ensured that as they developed what Dylan would describe as “American Music” it would be recorded for posterity as the now legendary “Basement Tapes".
Standing close to talent always seems to be a great catalyst to help others develop. Hence, when The Band released their own albums, Music from the Big Pink, The Band, and my all-time favourite, Stage Fright, audiences marvelled.
They seemed to have distilled America’s entire musical past. There were echoes of the Civil War, the nation’s rural beginnings, drama, excitement, hope and regret. It was rock, it was country, it was R&B. It was a phenomenon.
And though it all was Garth Hudson, like their own little Sir George Martin. He played keyboards, saxophone, accordion, synthesiser, trumpet, French horn, violin. He arranged the music and tweaked the recordings. Their music without him would be like 'Yesterday' without the strings.
In Ireland we had limited access to such magic. You were unlikely to see them play or even hear them on the radio. But oddly there were bands who could play some of their stuff and play it amazing well. They were showbands and at the heart of some of the best of them was Paddy Cole.
Paddy was born two years after Garth, in 1939 in Castleblayney. His dad played saxophone with the local Regal Dance Band and Paddy lamented that he was often required to stay and practice while his friends were playing. He was performing publicly by 12, and in a showband by 15.
Thereafter he performed with the Capitol Showband before moving to Las Vegas with the Big Eight. He was sidestage the night Elvis came to marvel at Brendan Bowyer. The showbands were derided for being unoriginal, but they were an engine for huge cultural change and freedom in Ireland.
I knew Paddy well. The last time I saw him I was with my daughter, Eva, in RTÉ. “Is this your girl, Tom?” he asked, pushing a €20 into her fist with a magician’s sleight of hand. He like Garth, was a huge presence. Boys with gentle souls who became big men with big talents. We will miss them.
