Hugh McCracken is a rhythm guitar player and session musician

Session musician

Session musicians are instrumental and vocal performers, musicians, who are available to work with others at live performances or recording sessions. Usually such musicians are not permanent members of a musical ensemble and often do not achieve fame in their own right as soloists or bandleaders...

, arranger and producer based in New York.

Especially in demand in the 60s, 70s and 80s, he appears on many recordings by Steely Dan

Steely Dan

Steely Dan is an American rock band; its core members are Donald Fagen and Walter Becker. The band's popularity peaked in the late 1970s, with the release of seven albums blending elements of jazz, rock, funk, R&B, and pop...

, as well as albums by Donald Fagen

Donald Fagen

Donald Jay Fagen is an American musician and songwriter, best known as the co-founder, lead singer, and the principal songwriter of the rock band Steely Dan ....

, Jimmy Rushing

Jimmy Rushing

James Andrew Rushing , known as Jimmy Rushing, was an American blues shouter and swing jazz singer from Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, best known as the featured vocalist of Count Basie's Orchestra from 1935 to 1948.Rushing was known as "Mr...

, Billy Joel

Billy Joel

William Martin "Billy" Joel is an American musician and pianist, singer-songwriter, and classical composer. Since releasing his first hit song, "Piano Man", in 1973, Joel has become the sixth best-selling recording artist and the third best-selling solo artist in the United States, according to...

, Roland Kirk, Roberta Flack

Roberta Flack

Roberta Flack is an American singer, songwriter, and musician who is notable for jazz, soul, R&B, and folk music...

, B. B. King

B. B. King

Riley B. King , known by the stage name B.B. King, is an American blues guitarist and singer-songwriter.Rolling Stone magazine ranked him at No.3 on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time. According to Edward M...

, John Lennon

John Lennon

John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...

, Paul McCartney

Paul McCartney

Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE, Hon RAM, FRCM is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. Formerly of The Beatles and Wings , McCartney is listed in Guinness World Records as the "most successful musician and composer in popular music history", with 60 gold discs and sales of 100...

, Paul Simon

Paul Simon

Paul Frederic Simon is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist.Simon is best known for his success, beginning in 1965, as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, with musical partner Art Garfunkel. Simon wrote most of the pair's songs, including three that reached number one on the US singles...

, Idris Muhammad

Idris Muhammad

Idris Muhammad is a jazz drummer. He changed his name in the 1960s upon his conversion to Islam. He is known for his funky playing style. He has released a number of albums as leader, and has played with a number of jazz legends including Lou Donaldson, Johnny Griffin, Pharoah Sanders and Grover...

, James Taylor

James Taylor

James Vernon Taylor is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A five-time Grammy Award winner, Taylor was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2000....

, Phoebe Snow, Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...

, Linda McCartney

Linda McCartney

Linda Louise McCartney, Lady McCartney was an American photographer, musician and animal rights activist. Her father and mother were Lee Eastman and Louise Sara Lindner Eastman....

, Graham Parker

Graham Parker

Graham Parker is a British rock singer and songwriter, who is best known as the lead singer of the popular British band Graham Parker & the Rumour.-Early career :...

, Yoko Ono

Yoko Ono

is a Japanese artist, musician, author and peace activist, known for her work in avant-garde art, music and filmmaking as well as her marriage to John Lennon...

, Eric Carmen

Eric Carmen

Eric Howard Carmen is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist and keyboardist.He scored numerous hit songs across the 1970s and 1980s, first as a member of the Raspberries , and then with his solo career, including hits such as "All By Myself", "Never Gonna Fall in Love Again", "She Did It",...

, Loudon Wainwright III

Loudon Wainwright III

Loudon Snowden Wainwright III is a Grammy Award-winning American songwriter, folk singer, humorist, and actor. He is the father of musicians Rufus Wainwright, Martha Wainwright and Lucy Wainwright Roche, brother of Sloan Wainwright, and the former husband of the late folk singer Kate McGarrigle.To...

, Lou Donaldson

Lou Donaldson

Lou Donaldson is a jazz alto saxophonist. He was born in Badin, North Carolina. He is best known for his soulful, bluesy approach to playing the alto saxophone, although in his formative years he was, as many were of the bebop era, heavily influenced by Charlie Parker.His first recordings were...

, Aretha Franklin

Aretha Franklin

Aretha Louise Franklin is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Although known for her soul recordings and referred to as The Queen of Soul, Franklin is also adept at jazz, blues, R&B, gospel music, and rock. Rolling Stone magazine ranked her atop its list of The Greatest Singers of All...

, Van Morrison

Van Morrison

Van Morrison, OBE is a Northern Irish singer-songwriter and musician. His live performances at their best are regarded as transcendental and inspired; while some of his recordings, such as the studio albums Astral Weeks and Moondance, and the live album It's Too Late to Stop Now, are widely...

, The Four Seasons

The Four Seasons (group)

The Four Seasons are an American rock and pop band who became internationally successful in the mid-1960s. The Vocal Group Hall of Fame has stated that the group was the most popular rock band before The Beatles...

, Daryl Hall & John Oates, Hank Crawford

Hank Crawford

Bennie Ross "Hank" Crawford, Jr. was an American R&B, hard bop, jazz-funk, soul jazz alto saxophonist, arranger and songwriter...

, Jerry Jemmott

Jerry Jemmott

Gerald Joseph Stenhouse "Jerry" Jemmott is an American bass guitarist. Also known as Gerald "Fingers" Jemmott, Rasan Mfalme or "the Groovemaster", Jemmott was one of the chief session bassists of the late 1960s and early 1970s, working with many of the period's well known soul, blues, and jazz...

 and Gary Wright

Gary Wright

Gary Malcolm Wright is an American musician, best known for his song, "Dream Weaver". He was the piano player on Harry Nilsson's version of "Without You".-Early life:...

.

In the middle 60's Hugh played in a North Jersey night club cover band called The Funatics under the stage name of Mack Pierce. The band became Mario & The Funatics for a short time when it merged with saxophonist/bandleader Mario Madison,(Pizzuto). (Mario & The Flips)
He was a member of Mike Mainieri

Mike Mainieri

Michael T. Mainieri, Jr. is a vibraphonist best known for his work with the jazz fusion group Steps Ahead....

's White Elephant Orchestra

White Elephant Orchestra

The White Elephant Orchestra was a jazz-rock big band made up of session and studio musicians based in New York City.Under the direction of Mike Mainieri, bandmembers included George Young, Frank Vicari, Michael Brecker, and Ronnie Cuber on saxes; Jon Faddis, Lew Soloff and Randy Brecker on...

 (1969–1972), a 20-piece experimental/jazz-rock outfit based in New York City. The band was made up of many of today's most sought-after session musicians, including Steve Gadd

Steve Gadd

Steve Gadd is an American session and studio drummer, notable for his work with popular musicians from a wide range of genres.-Biography:...

, Tony Levin

Tony Levin

Tony Levin is an American progressive rock musician, specializing in bass guitar, Chapman stick and upright bass ....

, Warren Bernhardt

Warren Bernhardt

Warren Bernhardt is a noted pianist in jazz, pop and classical music.His father was a pianist, leading him to have early childhood exposure to piano, and he learned some rudiments of keyboarding from his friends. At five his parents moved to New York City where he began studying seriously under...

, George Young, Frank Vicari

Frank Vicari

Frank Vicari was a New York-based jazz saxophonist.After serving in the Air Force from 1951-55, where he played in various service bands, Vicari returned to New York City and played in various bands until he joined Maynard Ferguson's big band in 1960...

, Michael Brecker

Michael Brecker

Michael Leonard Brecker was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Acknowledged as "a quiet, gentle musician widely regarded as the most influential tenor saxophonist since John Coltrane," he has been awarded 15 Grammy Awards as both performer and composer and was inducted into Down Beat Jazz...

, Ronnie Cuber

Ronnie Cuber

Ronnie Cuber is a jazz saxophonist. He has also played in Latin, pop, rock and blues sessions. In addition to his primary instrument, baritone sax, he has also played tenor sax, soprano sax and flute, the latter on an album by Eddie Palmieri. As a leader, Cuber is known for hard bop and Latin jazz...

, Jon Faddis

Jon Faddis

Jon Faddis is an American jazz trumpet player, conductor, composer, and educator renowned for both his highly virtuosic command of the instrument and for his expertise in the field of music education...

, Lew Soloff

Lew Soloff

Lew Soloff is a jazz trumpeter, composer and actor. He studied trumpet at the Eastman School of Music and the Juilliard School. He is likely best known for his work with Blood, Sweat & Tears from 1968 to 1973...

, Randy Brecker

Randy Brecker

Randal "Randy" Brecker is an American trumpeter and flugelhornist. He is a highly sought after performer in the genres of jazz, rock, and R&B, and has performed or recorded with Stanley Turrentine, Billy Cobham, Bruce Springsteen, Lou Reed, Sandip Burman, Charles Mingus, Blood, Sweat & Tears,...

, Barry Rogers

Barry Rogers

Barry Rogers was a salsa musician and jazz fusion trombonist.Born Barron W. Rogers in The Bronx, he descended from Polish Jews who came to New York City via London and was raised in Spanish Harlem...

, Jon Pierson, Steve Goodman

Steve Goodman

Steve Goodman was an American folk music singer-songwriter from Chicago, Illinois. The writer of "City of New Orleans", made popular by Arlo Guthrie, Goodman won two Grammy Awards.-Personal life:...

, David Spinozza

David Spinozza

David Spinozza is an American musician , who worked with former Beatles Paul McCartney and John Lennon during the 1970s, and had a long collaboration with singer-songwriter James Taylor, producing Taylor's album Walking Man....

 and Joe Beck

Joe Beck

Joe Beck was an American guitarist who had been notable in jazz for more than 30 years.Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Beck also briefly flirted with rock music in the late 1960s and early 1970s...

.

Among the many collectors' albums he appears on is the 1970 recording by Robert Palmer

Robert Palmer (author/producer)

Robert Franklin Palmer Jr. was a 20th century American writer, musicologist, clarinetist, saxophonist, and blues producer...

's Insect Trust, Hoboken Saturday Night, together with drum legends Bernard "Pretty" Purdie and Elvin Jones

Elvin Jones

Elvin Ray Jones was a jazz drummer of the post-bop era. He showed interest in drums at a young age, watching the circus bands march by his family's home in Pontiac, Michigan....

.

He also arranged, co-produced—together with Tommy LiPuma

Tommy LiPuma

Tommy LiPuma is an American music producer. In his long career, he has worked with many musicians, including Barbra Streisand, Miles Davis, Al Jarreau, Anita Baker, Natalie Cole, Claudine Longet, Dave Mason, the Yellowjackets, Michael Franks, Diana Krall, and The Story...

—and played on Dr. John

Dr. John

Malcolm John "Mac" Rebennack, Jr. , better known by the stage name Dr. John , is an American singer-songwriter, pianist and guitarist, whose music combines blues, pop, jazz as well as Zydeco, boogie woogie and rock and roll.Active as a session musician since the late 1950s, he came to wider...

's City Lights (1978) and Tango Palace (1979).

Discography

• 1969: B.B. King, Completely Well
  Completely Well
  Completely Well is a 1969 studio album by blues guitarist B. B. King. It is notable for the inclusion of "The Thrill Is Gone," which became a hit on both the pop and the R&B charts....
  
  
• 1970: A Time To Remember! - The Artie Kornfeld Tree
• 1970: Hoboken Saturday Night - The Insect Trust
  The Insect Trust
  The Insect Trust was a rock band that formed in New York in 1967.The members of the band were Nancy Jeffries on vocals, Bill Barth on guitar, Luke Faust, formerly of the Holy Modal Rounders, on guitar, banjo, fiddle, and harmonica, Trevor Koehler on saxophone, and Robert Palmer on clarinet and...
  
  
• 1970: Outlaw - Eugene McDaniels
• 1970: Headless Heroes of the Apocalypse
  Headless Heroes of the Apocalypse
  Headless Heroes of the Apocalypse is an album of American soul music by artist Eugene McDaniels, released in 1971.As with McDaniel's previous album, this is not a typical Soul album, which can even be seen by the cover image .This album dabbles in form between soul, Funk, jazz and even folk...
  
  - Eugene McDaniels
• 1971: Ram
  Ram (album)
  Ram is an album by Paul McCartney and Linda McCartney, released in 1971, the only album credited to the pair. It was the second of the two albums McCartney released between leaving The Beatles and forming Wings...
  
  - Paul McCartney
  Paul McCartney
  Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE, Hon RAM, FRCM is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. Formerly of The Beatles and Wings , McCartney is listed in Guinness World Records as the "most successful musician and composer in popular music history", with 60 gold discs and sales of 100...
  
  
• 1972: Album III
  Album III
  Album III, as its title indicates, is the third full album from Loudon Wainwright III. It was originally released in 1972 on Columbia Records. Album III would spawn Loudon Wainwright's most popular hit single, "Dead Skunk", making this his commercial 'breakthrough' album...
  
  - Loudon Wainwright III
  Loudon Wainwright III
  Loudon Snowden Wainwright III is a Grammy Award-winning American songwriter, folk singer, humorist, and actor. He is the father of musicians Rufus Wainwright, Martha Wainwright and Lucy Wainwright Roche, brother of Sloan Wainwright, and the former husband of the late folk singer Kate McGarrigle.To...
  
  
• 1973: Sassy Soul Strut
  Sassy Soul Strut
  Sassy Soul Strut is an album by jazz saxophonist Lou Donaldson recorded for the Blue Note label featuring Donaldson with Thad Jones, Garnett Brown, Seldon Powell, Buddy Lucas, Paul Griffin, Horace Ott, Hugh McCracken, David Spinozza, John Tropea, Wilbur Bascomb, Bernard Purdie, Omar Clay, and Jack...
  
  - Lou Donaldson
  Lou Donaldson
  Lou Donaldson is a jazz alto saxophonist. He was born in Badin, North Carolina. He is best known for his soulful, bluesy approach to playing the alto saxophone, although in his formative years he was, as many were of the bebop era, heavily influenced by Charlie Parker.His first recordings were...
  
  
• 1973: From the Depths of My Soul
  From the Depths of My Soul
  From the Depths of My Soul is an album by American vocalist Marlena Shaw recorded in 1973 and released on the Blue Note label.-Track listing:# "Prelude / I Know I Love Him" - 3:11# "Hum This Song" - 3:08# "But For Now" - 3:48# "Easy Evil" - 3:39...
  
  - Marlena Shaw
  Marlena Shaw
  Marlena Shaw is an American singer. Shaw began her singing career in the 1960s and is still singing today. Her music has often been sampled in hip hop music, and used in television commercials.-Biography:She was first introduced to music by her uncle Jimmy Burgess, a jazz trumpet player...
  
  
• 1975: Still Crazy After All These Years
  Still Crazy After All These Years
  Still Crazy After All These Years is the fourth studio album by Paul Simon.Recorded in 1975, the album produced four US Top 40 hits, "Gone at Last" , "My Little Town" , "50 Ways To Leave Your Lover" and the title track . It won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 1976...
  
  - Paul Simon
  Paul Simon
  Paul Frederic Simon is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist.Simon is best known for his success, beginning in 1965, as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, with musical partner Art Garfunkel. Simon wrote most of the pair's songs, including three that reached number one on the US singles...
  
  
• 1975: Feel Like Makin' Love
  Feel Like Makin' Love (Roberta Flack album)
  Released in 1975, Feel Like Makin' Love is Roberta Flack's fifth solo album and sixth overall, when counting her duet album with Donny Hathaway, Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway from 1972.-Track listing:-Personnel:*Roberta Flack - vocals, piano...
  
  - Roberta Flack
  Roberta Flack
  Roberta Flack is an American singer, songwriter, and musician who is notable for jazz, soul, R&B, and folk music...
  
  
• 1975: New York Connection
  New York Connection
  New York Connection is an album released by Tom Scott in 1975 on Ode SP-77033. This presentation entered the US Album charts on December 20, 1975, and stayed on the charts for 25 weeks, peaking at #42.- Track listing :# "Dirty Old Man"...
  
  - Tom Scott
  Tom Scott (musician)
  Tom Scott is an American saxophonist, composer, arranger, conductor and bandleader of the west coast jazz/jazz fusion ensemble The L.A. Express.-Biography:Scott was born in Los Angeles, California...
  
  
• 1976: Just a Matter of Time
  Just a Matter of Time (Marlena Shaw album)
  Just a Matter of Time is an album by American vocalist Marlena Shaw recorded in 1976 and released on the Blue Note label.The song "Be For Real" was covered by Leonard Cohen on his 1992 album The Future.-Reception:...
  
  - Marlena Shaw
  Marlena Shaw
  Marlena Shaw is an American singer. Shaw began her singing career in the 1960s and is still singing today. Her music has often been sampled in hip hop music, and used in television commercials.-Biography:She was first introduced to music by her uncle Jimmy Burgess, a jazz trumpet player...
  
  
• 1976: Yellow & Green - Ron Carter
  Ron Carter
  Ron Carter is an American jazz double-bassist. His appearances on over 2,500 albums make him one of the most-recorded bassists in jazz history, along with Milt Hinton, Ray Brown and Leroy Vinnegar. Carter is also an acclaimed cellist who has recorded numerous times on that...
  
  
• 1976: Second Childhood
  Second Childhood
  Second Childhood is the second album by singer–songwriter Phoebe Snow, released in 1976 .-Track listing:All songs by Phoebe Snow, except where noted#"Two Fisted Love" 4:03#"Cash In" 5:44#"Inspired Insanity" 3:56...
  
  - Phoebe Snow
• 1977: The Stranger
  The Stranger (album)
  The Stranger is the fifth studio album by musician Billy Joel, released in 1977 . While his four previous albums had been moderate chart successes, this was his breakthrough album, and is generally regarded by critics as his magnum opus, spending six weeks at #2 in the U.S. album charts...
  
  - Billy Joel
  Billy Joel
  William Martin "Billy" Joel is an American musician and pianist, singer-songwriter, and classical composer. Since releasing his first hit song, "Piano Man", in 1973, Joel has become the sixth best-selling recording artist and the third best-selling solo artist in the United States, according to...
  
  
• 1978: City Lights - Dr. John
  Dr. John
  Malcolm John "Mac" Rebennack, Jr. , better known by the stage name Dr. John , is an American singer-songwriter, pianist and guitarist, whose music combines blues, pop, jazz as well as Zydeco, boogie woogie and rock and roll.Active as a session musician since the late 1950s, he came to wider...
  
  
• 1979: Tango Palace - Dr. John
  Dr. John
  Malcolm John "Mac" Rebennack, Jr. , better known by the stage name Dr. John , is an American singer-songwriter, pianist and guitarist, whose music combines blues, pop, jazz as well as Zydeco, boogie woogie and rock and roll.Active as a session musician since the late 1950s, he came to wider...
  
  
• 1979: Headin' Home
  Headin' Home (album)
  Headin' Home is the sixth solo album by one-time Spooky Tooth keyboard player Gary Wright released in 1979.-Track listing:All songs written by Gary Wright;except as noted#"Keep Love In Your Soul"...
  
  - Gary Wright
  Gary Wright
  Gary Malcolm Wright is an American musician, best known for his song, "Dream Weaver". He was the piano player on Harry Nilsson's version of "Without You".-Early life:...
  
  
• 1980: Double Fantasy
  Double Fantasy
  Double Fantasy is an album released by John Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, in 1980. Though initially poorly received, the album is notable for its association with Lennon's murder three weeks after its release, whereupon it become a worldwide commercial success, and went on to win the 1981 Album...
  
  - John Lennon
  John Lennon
  John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
  
   and Yoko Ono
  Yoko Ono
  is a Japanese artist, musician, author and peace activist, known for her work in avant-garde art, music and filmmaking as well as her marriage to John Lennon...
  
  
• 1980: One-Trick Pony
  One-Trick Pony (album)
  One-Trick Pony is the fifth solo album released by Paul Simon, in 1980.Paul Simon's One-Trick Pony was released concurrently with the film of the same name, in which Simon also starred...
  
  - Paul Simon
  Paul Simon
  Paul Frederic Simon is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist.Simon is best known for his success, beginning in 1965, as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, with musical partner Art Garfunkel. Simon wrote most of the pair's songs, including three that reached number one on the US singles...
  
  
• 1980: Gaucho
  Gaucho (album)
  Gaucho is the seventh studio album by the American Jazz rock band Steely Dan, released in 1980. The sessions for Gaucho represented the peak of Steely Dan's recording studio perfectionism and obsessive recording techniques...
  
  - Steely Dan
  Steely Dan
  Steely Dan is an American rock band; its core members are Donald Fagen and Walter Becker. The band's popularity peaked in the late 1970s, with the release of seven albums blending elements of jazz, rock, funk, R&B, and pop...
  
  
• 1981: Season of Glass
  Season of Glass
  Season of Glass is a 1981 album by Yoko Ono, her first solo recording after the murder of her husband John Lennon. The album was released less than six months after Lennon's death and deals with it directly in songs such as "Goodbye Sadness" and "I Don't Know Why".The front cover features Lennon's...
  
  - Yoko Ono
  Yoko Ono
  is a Japanese artist, musician, author and peace activist, known for her work in avant-garde art, music and filmmaking as well as her marriage to John Lennon...
  
  
• 1982: The Nightfly
  The Nightfly
  The Nightfly is the first solo album by Steely Dan co-founder Donald Fagen, released in 1982. It was one of the first fully digital recordings of popular music...
  
  - Donald Fagen
  Donald Fagen
  Donald Jay Fagen is an American musician and songwriter, best known as the co-founder, lead singer, and the principal songwriter of the rock band Steely Dan ....
  
  
• 2003: Everything Must Go
  Everything Must Go
  Everything Must Go may refer to:* Everything Must Go ** "Everything Must Go" , the title song* Everything Must Go * "Everything Must Go!", a song by The Weakerthans from Left and Leaving...
  
  - Steely Dan
  Steely Dan
  Steely Dan is an American rock band; its core members are Donald Fagen and Walter Becker. The band's popularity peaked in the late 1970s, with the release of seven albums blending elements of jazz, rock, funk, R&B, and pop...