‘A.C. Reed Obituary’ – by Keith Woods, from Tales From The Woods
Blues saxophonist A.C. Reed died on 25th February 2004 aged 77. Born Aaron Corthen in Wardell, Missouri on 9th May 1926, Reed was one of the very few horn players to lead a Chicago blues band as well as being a highly regarded accompanist to artists such as Albert Collins, Stevie Ray Vaughan and Bonnie Raitt. During the 1970s he toured with the Rolling Stones. Raised in rural Illinois he moved to Chicago in 1942 where he studied at the Chicago Conservatory of Music and was soon playing for local bands. In the years to come he worked in bands for Willie Mabon and slide guitarist Earl Hooker. During the fifties he did countless amounts of session work for Muddy Waters and other Chicago blues greats. The sixties saw him working with both Buddy Guy and Junior Wells with whom he stayed for ten years before switching to Albert Collins, appearing on the Texan blues guitarist’s five best selling albums before releasing his debut solo album in 1982 ‘Take These Blues And Shove ‘Em’. He recorded his final solo album ‘I Got Money’ in 2002.
Keith Woods
Wikipedia Entry:
Aaron Corthen, better known as A.C. Reed (May 9, 1926 – February 24, 2004) was an American blues saxophonist, closely associated with the Chicago blues scene from the 1940s into the 2000s.
Reed was born in Wardell, Missouri, and grew up in southern Illinois. He took his stage name from his friend Jimmy Reed. He moved to Chicago during World War II, playing with Earl Hooker and Willie Mabon in the 1940s. He toured with Dennis “Long Man” Binder in 1956 and worked extensively as a sideman for Mel London’s blues record labels Chief/Profile/Age in the 1960s, with Lillian Offitt and Ricky Allen, among others. He had a regionally popular single in 1961, “This Little Voice” (Age 29101), and cut several more singles over the course of the decade.
He became a member of Buddy Guy’s band in 1967, playing with him on his tour of Africa in 1969 and, with Junior Wells, opening for the Rolling Stones in 1970. He remained with Guy until 1977. He then played with Son Seals and Albert Collins in the late 1970s and 1980s. He began recording solo material for Alligator Records in the 1980s. His 1987 album, I’m in the Wrong Business, includes cameo appearances by Stevie Ray Vaughan and Bonnie Raitt.
Reed toured extensively in the 1980s and 1990s with his band, the Spark Plugs, playing small venues throughout the United States. He and the Sparkplugs performed in Chicago before he died of cancer in 2004.