Gerald Joseph Stenhouse "Jerry" Jemmott (born March 22, 1946 in the borough of The Bronx

The Bronx

The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...

, in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

) is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 bass guitar

Bass guitar

The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

ist. Also known as Gerald "Fingers" Jemmott, Rasan Mfalme or "the Groovemaster", Jemmott was one of the chief session

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...

 bassists of the late 1960s and early 1970s, working with many of the period's well known soul

Soul music

Soul music is a music genre originating in the United States combining elements of gospel music and rhythm and blues. According to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, soul is "music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm & blues into a form of...

, blues, and jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 artists.

Biography

Jemmott began playing the acoustic bass

Double bass

The double bass, also called the string bass, upright bass, standup bass or contrabass, is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra, with strings usually tuned to E1, A1, D2 and G2...

 when he discovered Paul Chambers

Paul Chambers

Paul Laurence Dunbar Chambers, Jr. was a jazz bassist. A fixture of rhythm sections during the 1950s and 1960s, his importance in the development of jazz bass can be measured not only by the length and breadth of his work in this short period but also his impeccable time, intonation, and virtuosic...

 at age 10. Jemmott began his career at age 12, and after switching to the electric bass

Bass guitar

The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

, was discovered by saxophonist King Curtis

King Curtis

Curtis Ousley , who performed under the stage name King Curtis, was an American saxophone virtuoso known for rhythm and blues, rock and roll, soul, funk and soul jazz. Variously a bandleader, band member, and session musician, he was also a musical director and record producer...

 in 1966. With his connection through Curtis to Atlantic Records

Atlantic Records

Atlantic Records is an American record label best known for its many recordings of rhythm and blues, rock and roll, and jazz...

, Jemmott soon began recording with other Atlantic recording artists, including 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...

, Ray Charles

Ray Charles

Ray Charles Robinson , known by his shortened stage name Ray Charles, was an American musician. He was a pioneer in the genre of soul music during the 1950s by fusing rhythm and blues, gospel, and blues styles into his early recordings with Atlantic Records...

, Wilson Pickett

Wilson Pickett

Wilson Pickett was an American R&B/Soul singer and songwriter.A major figure in the development of American soul music, Pickett recorded over 50 songs which made the US R&B charts, and frequently crossed over to the US Billboard Hot 100...

, The Rascals

The Rascals

The Rascals were an American blue-eyed soul group initially active during the years 1965–72. The band released numerous top ten singles in North America during the mid- and late-1960s, including the U.S. #1 hits "Good Lovin'" , "Groovin'" , and "People Got to Be Free"...

, Roberta Flack

Roberta Flack

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

 and Margie Joseph

Margie Joseph

Margaret Marie "Margie" Joseph is an American R&B, soul and gospel singer. Her greatest success came in the 1970s, with her biggest hits being her version of Paul McCartney's "My Love", her version of The Supremes' "Stop! In the Name of Love" and her duet with Blue Magic...

. Jemmott also recorded with noted blues artists B.B. King, Freddie King

Freddie King

Freddie King , thought to have been born as Frederick Christian, originally recording as Freddy King, and nicknamed "the Texas Cannonball", was an influential African-American blues guitarist and singer. He is often mentioned as one of "the Three Kings" of electric blues guitar, along with Albert...

, Chuck Berry

Chuck Berry

Charles Edward Anderson "Chuck" Berry is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter, and one of the pioneers of rock and roll music. With songs such as "Maybellene" , "Roll Over Beethoven" , "Rock and Roll Music" and "Johnny B...

, Duane Allman

Duane Allman

Howard Duane Allman was an American guitarist, session musician and the primary co-founder of the southern rock group The Allman Brothers Band...

, Otis Rush

Otis Rush

Otis Rush is a blues musician, singer and guitarist. His distinctive guitar style features a slow burning sound and long bent notes...

, Champion Jack Dupree

Champion Jack Dupree

William Thomas Dupree, best known as Champion Jack Dupree, was an American blues pianist. His birth date is disputed, given as July 4, July 10, and July 23, in the years 1908, 1909, or 1910. He died on January 21, 1992.-Biography:...

, and backed jazz artists Herbie Hancock

Herbie Hancock

Herbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...

, Freddie Hubbard

Freddie Hubbard

Frederick Dewayne "Freddie" Hubbard was an American jazz trumpeter. He was known primarily for playing in the bebop, hard bop and post bop styles from the early 1960s and on...

, Erroll Garner

Erroll Garner

Erroll Louis Garner was an American jazz pianist and composer known for his swing playing and ballads. His best-known composition, the ballad "Misty", has become a jazz standard...

, Les McCann

Les McCann

Les McCann is an American soul jazz piano player and vocalist whose biggest successes came as a crossover artist into R&B and soul.-Biography:...

, Eddie Harris

Eddie Harris

Eddie Harris was an American jazz musician, best known for playing tenor saxophone and for introducing the electrically amplified saxophone. He was also fluent on the electric piano and organ...

, Houston Person

Houston Person

Houston Person is an American jazz tenor saxophonist and record producer. Although he has performed in the hard bop and swing genres, he is most experienced in and best known for his work in soul jazz. Person is also known for his distinctive sassy sound and his expressive style of playing...

, George Benson

George Benson

George Benson is a ten Grammy Award winning American musician, whose production career began at the age of twenty-one as a jazz guitarist....

, Archie Shepp

Archie Shepp

Archie Shepp is a prominent African-American jazz saxophonist. Shepp is best known for his passionately Afrocentric music of the late 1960s, which focused on highlighting the injustices faced by the African-Americans, as well as for his work with the New York Contemporary Five, Horace Parlan, and...

, Lionel Hampton

Lionel Hampton

Lionel Leo Hampton was an American jazz vibraphonist, pianist, percussionist, bandleader and actor. Like Red Norvo, he was one of the first jazz vibraphone players. Hampton ranks among the great names in jazz history, having worked with a who's who of jazz musicians, from Benny Goodman and Buddy...

, Herbie Mann

Herbie Mann

Herbert Jay Solomon , better known as Herbie Mann, was a Jewish American jazz flutist and important early practitioner of world music...

, Eddie Palmieri

Eddie Palmieri

Eddie Palmieri , is a Grammy Award winning Puerto Rican pianist, bandleader and musician, best known for combining jazz piano and instrumental solos with Latin rhythms.-Early years:...

 and Charles Earland

Charles Earland

Charles Earland was an American jazz composer, organist, and saxophonist in the soul jazz idiom.-Biography:...

. He played the bass line for the original recording of "Mr. Bojangles

Mr. Bojangles (song)

Mr. Bojangles is the title of a song originally written and recorded by American country music artist Jerry Jeff Walker for his 1968 album of the same title...

", and contributed to B.B. King's "The Thrill Is Gone

The Thrill Is Gone

"The Thrill Is Gone" is a blues song written by Rick Darnell and Roy Hawkins in 1951 and popularized by B.B. King in 1970.-History:The song was first recorded by Roy Hawkins, its co-author, and became a minor hit for the musician. B.B. King recorded his version of the song in June 1969 for his...

."

After Jemmott's recording sessions started to decline in 1975, he continued to work in film and theater as an arranger

Arranger

In investment banking, an arranger is a provider of funds in the syndication of a debt. They are entitled to syndicate the loan or bond issue, and may be referred to as the "lead underwriter". This is because this entity bears the risk of being able to sell the underlying securities/debt or the...

 and conductor

Conducting

Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance by way of visible gestures. The primary duties of the conductor are to unify performers, set the tempo, execute clear preparations and beats, and to listen critically and shape the sound of the ensemble...

, working with John Williams

John Williams

John Towner Williams is an American composer, conductor, and pianist. In a career spanning almost six decades, he has composed some of the most recognizable film scores in the history of motion pictures, including the Star Wars saga, Jaws, Superman, the Indiana Jones films, E.T...

, The Boston Pops

Boston Pops Orchestra

The Boston Pops Orchestra is an American orchestra based in Boston, Massachusetts, that specializes in playing light classical and popular music....

 and Bette Midler

Bette Midler

Bette Midler is an American singer, actress, and comedian, also known by her informal stage name, The Divine Miss M. She became famous as a cabaret and concert headliner, and went on to star in successful and acclaimed films such as The Rose, Ruthless People, Beaches, and For The Boys...

. Jemmott was cited as a major influence by fellow jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 bass guitar

Bass guitar

The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

 pioneer, Jaco Pastorius

Jaco Pastorius

John Francis Anthony Pastorius III , known as Jaco Pastorius, was an American jazz musician and composer widely acknowledged as a virtuoso electric bass player....

, who incorporated Jemmott's stuttering funk

Funk

Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...

 basslines into his own syncopated

Syncopation

In music, syncopation includes a variety of rhythms which are in some way unexpected in that they deviate from the strict succession of regularly spaced strong and weak but also powerful beats in a meter . These include a stress on a normally unstressed beat or a rest where one would normally be...

 style. Jemmott was also the host and had a hand in the production of the instructional video Modern Electric Bass which featured lessons and guidance by Pastorius and was released in 1985.

Most recently, Jemmott recorded solo recordings for the Japanese P-Vine Records

P-Vine Records

P-Vine Records is a record label started by Blues Interactions, Inc., a firm in Tokyo, Japan established in 1975 by Yasufumi Higurashi and Akira Kochi...

, Caught in the Low Beam and The New York View, as well as Make It Happen! for Whatcha Gonna Do Records. Jemmott continues to work as an educator teaching workshops and clinics, has written articles, four books, and released audio and video bass instruction material.
He is the recipient of the 2001 Bass Player

Bass Player

Bass player can refer to:*Bass Player , an album by Rhombus*Bass Player , a magazine for bassists*Bassist, or bass player, a musician who plays the bass guitar...

 magazine's Lifetime Achievement Award and Chairman of the Electric Bass Department at the Richard Davis Foundation for Young Bassists Inc.

As "Jerry Jemmott & Souler Energy" he has performed a mix of his original "Cool Groove" songs and music along with his classic hits in addition to presenting his “Soul Kitchen”, improvisation workshops and clinics.

In 2009 Jemmott joined Gregg Allman

Gregg Allman

Gregory Lenoir Allman , known as Gregg Allman, is a rock and blues singer, keyboardist, guitarist and songwriter, and a founding member of The Allman Brothers Band. He was inducted with the band into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Georgia...

's backing band ("Gregg Allman & Friends") in addition to Cornell Dupree

Cornell Dupree

Cornell Luther Dupree was an American jazz and R&B guitarist. He worked at various times with Bill Withers, Donny Hathaway, King Curtis and Steve Gadd, appeared on David Letterman, and wrote a book on soul and blues guitar: Rhythm and Blues Guitar ISBN 0-634-00149-3...

’s Soul Survivors. That same year, he was one of many very special guests at The Allman Brothers Band

The Allman Brothers Band

The Allman Brothers Band is an American rock/blues band once based in Macon, Georgia. The band was formed in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1969 by brothers Duane Allman and Gregg Allman , who were supported by Dickey Betts , Berry Oakley , Butch Trucks , and Jai Johanny "Jaimoe"...

's 40th anniversary at the Beacon Theatre, in New York City. This was an auspicious special version of the Allman's annual multiple-night stand there, including artists as varied as Levon Helm

Levon Helm

Mark Lavon "Levon" Helm , is an American rock multi-instrumentalist and actor who achieved fame as the drummer and frequent lead and backing vocalist for The Band....

, members of Phish

Phish

Phish is an American rock band noted for its musical improvisation, extended jams, and exploration of music across genres. Formed at the University of Vermont in 1983 , the band's four members – Trey Anastasio , Mike Gordon , Jon Fishman , and Page McConnell Phish is an American rock band...

, Eric Clapton

Eric Clapton

Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...

, Johnny Winter

Johnny Winter

John Dawson "Johnny" Winter III is an American blues guitarist, singer, and producer. Best known for his late 1960s and 1970s high-energy blues-rock albums and live performances, Winter also produced three Grammy Award-winning albums for blues legend Muddy Waters...

, and Sonny Rollins

Sonny Rollins

Theodore Walter "Sonny" Rollins is a Grammy-winning American jazz tenor saxophonist. Rollins is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential jazz musicians. A number of his compositions, including "St...

, amongst the participants, who came in part, to honor the late Duane Allman

Duane Allman

Howard Duane Allman was an American guitarist, session musician and the primary co-founder of the southern rock group The Allman Brothers Band...

.

Solo

• New York View (P-Vine Records
  P-Vine Records
  P-Vine Records is a record label started by Blues Interactions, Inc., a firm in Tokyo, Japan established in 1975 by Yasufumi Higurashi and Akira Kochi...
  
   December 25, 1995)
• Make It Happen! (Whatchagonnado? 2005)
• Home Cookin (Whatchagonnado? 2006)
• Bass on the Case (Whachagonnado? 2009)

As sideman

With Candido Camero

Candido Camero

Candido de Guerra Camero, also known simply as Candido is a Cuban percussionist who backed many Afro-Cuban jazz and straightforward jazz acts since the 1950s...

• Beautiful
  Beautiful (Candido Camero album)
  Beautiful is an album by Cuban jazz percussionist Candido Camero recorded in 1970 and released on the Blue Note label.-Reception:The Allmusic review by Matt Collar awarded the album 3 stars stating "Beautiful isn't the most essential of Candido's recordings, but should hold a fascination for...
  
   (Blue Note, 1970)

With Richard Groove Holmes

Richard Holmes (organist)

Richard Arnold "Groove" Holmes was an American jazz organist who performed in the hard bop and soul jazz genre...

• Comin' on Home
  Comin' on Home
  Comin' on Home is an album by American organist Richard Groove Holmes recorded in 1971 and released on the Blue Note label. The album was Holmes' only release on the label.-Reception:The Allmusic review awarded the album 3 stars....
  
  (Blue Note, 1971)

External references

• Jerry Jemmott.com
• [ Jerry Jemmott on the Allmusic Guide]
• http://jemmott.com/humanlivestock.html