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Murphy Dunne | |
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| Born | George Dunne June 22, 1942 |
| Occupation(s) | Actor, musician |
| Years active | 1969–present |
George "Murphy" Dunne [1] (born June 22, 1942) is an American actor and musician. He played "Murph", the keyboardist for the Blues Brothers, in the 1980 film The Blues Brothers , a role he reprised in the sequel, Blues Brothers 2000 .
Dunne grew up in Chicago, the son of Agnes and George Dunne. He has two sisters, Mary and Eileen. [1] [2] In the late 1960s he became Precinct Captain of the 42nd ward, also known as Rush Street. Rush Street was home to many music venues and while visiting the clubs Dunne decided to pursue an active career in show business. He started playing piano in a back room of Lake Shore Park and joined one of the early 1970s comedy ensembles, The Conception Corporation.[ citation needed ]
In 1968 he joined the improvisional theatre company The Second City. [2]
In 1969 Dunne co-produced Chicago's first Free Blues Festival at Grant Park Band Shell, where he met Willie Dixon, Albert King and his future Blues Brothers band-mate Steve Cropper.[ citation needed ]
In 1977 Dunne had a small role as a keyboard player in Joan Tewkesbury's Old Boyfriends , where he met John Belushi.
In 1979 Dunne played keyboards for Lenny and the Squigtones on the album Lenny & Squiggy Present Lenny and the Squigtones, under the pseudonym Lars Svenki.
In September 1992, he performed a solo piece entitled "Murphy Dunne Nevertheless" at the Globe Playhouse in West Hollywood, California. It was co-written with Lewis Arquette. [2]
Dunne won the role in The Blues Brothers after their original pianist, Paul Shaffer, could not accept the part due to his contractual obligations with Saturday Night Live , as well as his choice to take part in Gilda Live . Dunne played himself in both of the two Blues Brothers films, with a fictional storyline: Murphy "Murph" Dunne was an original member of the Blues Brothers until "Joliet" Jake went to prison in the 1970s. He then started his own band called "Murph and the MagicTones" [3] along with four other ex-Blues Brothers Band members; Donald "Duck" Dunn, Steve "The Colonel" Cropper, Willie "Too Big" Hall and Tom "Bones" Malone. While performing a regular set at the Armada Room in a Chicago area Holiday Inn, Jake and Elwood Blues again approached the band to reform the Blues Brothers band. After a brief tour, Murph was sent to prison with the rest of the Blues Brothers Band.
When the real-life Blues Brothers toured in 1980 to promote the film, Dunne performed live with the band along with Shaffer. His work can be heard on their 1980 live album, Made in America .[ citation needed ]
Dunne also appeared in Chesty Anderson, USN (1976),[ citation needed ] the disaster spoof The Big Bus (1976), [2] Mel Brooks's High Anxiety (1977) as a lounge-room piano player, [2] three commercial parody films; Tunnel Vision (1976), American Raspberry (1977) and Loose Shoes (1980), and the teen comedy Bad Manners (aka: Growing Pains ) (1984). He played a court stenographer in the movie Oh, God! (1977). Later films include The Main Event (1979), The Last Married Couple in America (1980), Honky Tonk Freeway (1981), Perfect (1985), Hero and the Terror (1988), Phoenix (1998) and The Mothman Prophecies (2002). He has also acted in numerous television shows including Night Court as well as working as a voice actor, and can be heard in Cowboy Bebop: The Movie , Ghost in the Shell: Standalone Complex and in the game, Star Trek: Klingon Academy .[ citation needed ]
John Adam Belushi was an American comedian, actor, and musician. He was one of the seven original cast members of the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live (SNL). Throughout his career, Belushi had a personal and artistic partnership with his fellow SNL star Dan Aykroyd, whom he met while they were both working at Chicago's Second City comedy club.
Paul Allen Wood Shaffer is a Canadian singer, composer, actor, author, comedian, and musician who served as David Letterman's musical director, band leader, and sidekick on the entire run of both Late Night with David Letterman (1982–1993) and Late Show with David Letterman (1993–2015).
The Blues Brothers are an American blues and soul revivalist band founded in 1978 by comedians Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi as part of a musical sketch on Saturday Night Live. Belushi and Aykroyd were lead vocalist 'Joliet' Jake Blues and harmonica player and vocalist Elwood Blues, respectively, donning black suits with matching trilby hats and sunglasses. The band was composed of well-known musicians and debuted as the musical guest in a 1978 episode of Saturday Night Live, opening the show performing "Hey Bartender" and "Soul Man".
Booker T. & the M.G.'s were an American instrumental R&B/funk band that was influential in shaping the sound of Southern soul and Memphis soul. The original members of the group were Booker T. Jones, Steve Cropper (guitar), Lewie Steinberg (bass), and Al Jackson Jr. (drums). In the 1960s, as members of the Mar-Keys, the rotating slate of musicians that served as the house band of Stax Records, they played on hundreds of recordings by artists including Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, Bill Withers, Sam & Dave, Carla Thomas, Rufus Thomas, Johnnie Taylor and Albert King. They also released instrumental records under their own name, including the 1962 hit single "Green Onions". As originators of the unique Stax sound, the group was one of the most prolific, respected, and imitated of its era. By the mid-1960s, bands on both sides of the Atlantic were trying to sound like Booker T. & the M.G.'s.
Blues Brothers 2000 is a 1998 American musical comedy film directed by John Landis from a screenplay written by Landis and Dan Aykroyd, both of whom were also producers, and starring Aykroyd and John Goodman. The film serves as a sequel to the 1980 film The Blues Brothers. It also includes cameo appearances by various musicians.
Booker Taliaferro Jones Jr. is an American musician, songwriter, record producer and arranger, best known as the frontman of the band Booker T. & the M.G.'s. He has also worked in the studios with many well-known artists of the 20th and 21st centuries, earning him a Grammy Award for lifetime achievement.
Steven Lee Cropper, sometimes known as "The Colonel", is an American guitarist, songwriter and record producer. He is the guitarist of the Stax Records house band, Booker T. & the M.G.'s, which backed artists such as Otis Redding, Sam & Dave, Carla Thomas, Rufus Thomas and Johnnie Taylor. He also acted as the producer of many of these records. He was later a member of the Blues Brothers band. Rolling Stone magazine ranked him 36th on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time, while he has won two Grammy Awards from his seven nominations.
Donald "Duck" Dunn was an American bass guitarist, session musician, record producer, and songwriter. Dunn was notable for his 1960s recordings with Booker T. & the M.G.'s and as a session bassist for Stax Records. At Stax, Dunn played on thousands of records, including hits by Otis Redding, Sam & Dave, Rufus Thomas, Carla Thomas, William Bell, Eddie Floyd, Johnnie Taylor, Albert King, Bill Withers, Elvis Presley and many others. In 1992, he was inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Booker T. & the M.G.'s. He is ranked number 40 on Bass Player magazine's list of "The 100 Greatest Bass Players of All Time".
Thomas "Bones" Malone is an American jazz musician, arranger, and producer. As his nickname implies, he specializes on the trombone but he also plays saxophone, trumpet, tuba, flute, and bass guitar. He has been a member of The Blues Brothers, Saturday Night Live Band, Blood, Sweat & Tears, and the CBS Orchestra, the house band for the Late Show with David Letterman.
The Saturday Night Live Band is the house band of the NBC television program Saturday Night Live (SNL).
The Blues Brothers is a 1980 American musical comedy film directed by John Landis. It stars John Belushi as "Joliet" Jake Blues and Dan Aykroyd as his brother Elwood, characters developed from the recurring musical sketch "The Blues Brothers" on NBC variety series Saturday Night Live. The script is set in and around Chicago, Illinois, where it was filmed, and the screenplay was written by Aykroyd and Landis. It features musical numbers by rhythm and blues (R&B), soul, and blues singers James Brown, Cab Calloway, Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, Chaka Khan, and John Lee Hooker. It features non-musical supporting performances by Carrie Fisher, Henry Gibson, Charles Napier, Kathleen Freeman and John Candy.
Made in America is the third album by The Blues Brothers. The second live album by the band, it was released in December 1980 as a followup to their hit film released that year, The Blues Brothers. To support the film, the band embarked on a 22 dates tour in North America, culminating with seven dates at the Universal Amphitheater in Los Angeles. Keyboardist and musical director Paul Shaffer, sax player Tom Scott and drummer Steve Jordan, who were absent in the film and the soundtrack due to scheduling conflicts, reprised their roles as full-fledged band members. Drummer Willie Hall was let go but the band decided to retain Murphy Dunne, who had replaced Shaffer in the film, as additional keyboards player. Session man Jeff Mironov was brought in to provide additional guitar for the record.
Best of the Blues Brothers is the fourth and final Blues Brothers album released before John Belushi's death in 1982. It is the first compilation album by the band and it was released by Atlantic Records on November 30, 1981. Along with tracks from the first three albums, Briefcase Full of Blues, The Blues Brothers: Music from the Soundtrack and Made in America, it includes unreleased live versions of "Everybody Needs Somebody to Love", "Rubber Biscuit", and a new song, "Expressway to Your Heart". The album was remixed by Steve Jordan and Donald “Duck” Dunn. Belushi’s wife, Judith Jacklin, designed the sleeve.
Blues Brothers and Friends: Live from Chicago's House of Blues is the eleventh album and fourth live album by The Blues Brothers in 1997. It was recorded at the opening of the House of Blues in Chicago and is the first recording to feature James Belushi, performing under the name "Zee Blues". It is also the first album to feature original keyboardist Paul Shaffer since their earlier live recording Made in America in 1980. A number of prominent guests joined the band on stage, including Joe Walsh, Billy Boy Arnold, Charley Musselwhite, Jeff Baxter and Sam Moore. This is also the first album to feature Tommy "Pipes" McDonnell, who had replaced Larry Thurston as lead vocalist.
Blues Brothers 2000: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack is a soundtrack album that features the Blues Brothers. It is a soundtrack album to the 1998 film, Blues Brothers 2000, the sequel to the 1980 film, The Blues Brothers.
The Blues Brothers Band Live in Montreux is an album by The Blues Brothers band. It was released in 1990 on the heels of the band's reunion tour and it's the first album recorded by the band after the death of founding member John Belushi and the only one that doesn't feature Dan Aykroyd. Drummer Steve Jordan and keyboardist Paul Shaffer weren't available to play, and were replaced respectively by Danny Gottlieb and Leon Pendarvis. Vocals duties were assigned to Eddie Floyd and Larry Thurston, who had been previously recruited by Matt Murphy for his short-lived solo outfit Matt "Guitar" Murphy Band. As with most other records by the band, the album was recorded live. Along with regular numbers from the Blues Brothers repertoire, it features material never performed before by the band like "Hold On, I'm Comin'",, "In the Midnight Hour", "The Thrill Is Gone", and two Eddie Floyd signature tunes, "Knock on Wood" and "Raise Your Hand". The album was produced by Tom Malone.
The Very Best of The Blues Brothers is a 1995 greatest hits album by The Blues Brothers. It is one of several compilations of the band's recordings, following Best of The Blues Brothers (1981) and Dancin' wid da Blues Brothers (1983).
Lenny and the Squigtones is a fictional musical group headed in character by Michael McKean and David Lander, the two actors who played Lenny and Squiggy on the U.S. television series Laverne & Shirley, which is set primarily in the 1950s. The group's album, Lenny & Squiggy Present Lenny and the Squigtones, was released on the Casablanca label in 1979. Recorded live at the Roxy Theatre in West Hollywood, they perform parodies of 1950s rock ballads. In between, there a tracks of schtick and banter.
Dancin' wid da Blues Brothers is the fifth album by The Blues Brothers. It is a rare official Atlantic mini LP compiling seven tracks from previous albums, including four tracks taken from The Blues Brothers: Music from the Soundtrack album, two tracks from the Briefcase Full of Blues album, and one track from the Made in America album.
Willie Clarence Hall is an American drummer best known for his work with Isaac Hayes and as a member of the Blues Brothers band.
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