Tommy Eyre

TOMMY EYRE
 
 
Tommy Eyre  (5 July 1949 – 23 May 2001) was a session keyboardist from Sheffield, England, who appeared on records by Joe Cocker, John Martyn, Alex Harvey, Greg Lake, Michael Schenker, Gary Moore, B.B. King, John Mayall, Gerry Rafferty, Tracy Chapman, and Wham!.  He is perhaps most famous for playing on Joe Cocker’s UK chart-topper “With A Little Help From My Friends”, on which he arranged the distinctive organ introduction; and Gerry Rafferty’s “Baker Street” and “Right Down the Line”.  (More from Wikipedia)
 
 
Barely one year later, in October 1968, Joe Cocker released a cover of “With a Little Help from My Friends” – a Number One single in the UK – which gets my vote as the most satisfying Beatles cover of all time.  His version of the song is very different from how the Beatles performed it, and that is what covers should be as far as I am concerned.  Joe Cocker is backed by a stellar band that includes Jimmy Page on guitar (the first Led Zeppelin album came out in the following year), B. J. Wilson of Procol Harum on drums, Chris Stainton on bass, and distinctive organ by Tommy Eyre.  Cocker’s frantic performance of the song was a highlight of the Woodstock film of the original Woodstock Music & Art Fair gathering in 1969. 
 
(June 2015)