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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Donald Dunn |
| Also known as | Duck |
| Born | November 24, 1941 Memphis, Tennessee, United States |
| Died | May 13, 2012 (aged 70) Tokyo, Japan |
| Genres | Rock, soul, rhythm and blues |
| Occupation(s) | Songwriter, producer, actor |
| Instruments | Bass guitar |
| Years active | 1960–2012 |
| Associated acts | Otis Redding, Booker T & the MG’s, Albert King, The Mar-Keys, The Blues Brothers, Sam & Dave |
| Website | duckdunn.com |
| Notable instruments:
1957-2012: Fender Precision Bass 2004-2012: Lakland Duck Dunn Signature Bass (Precision copy) |
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Donald “Duck” Dunn (November 24, 1941 – May 13, 2012) 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, 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”.
With a penchant for finding the perfect pocket, Duck was to Memphis soul what Jamerson was to Motown. As a member of Stax Records’ house band, Booker T. & the M.G.’s Dunn influenced a generation of deep groovers with his tight, economical P-Bass lines, playing on eternal soul classics like “In the Midnight Hour,” “Soul Man,” and “Dock of the Bay.”
Dunn was born in Memphis, Tennessee. His father nicknamed him “Duck” while watching Disney cartoons with him one day. Dunn grew up playing sports and riding his bike with another future professional musician, Steve Cropper.
After Cropper began playing guitar with their friend Charlie Freeman, Dunn decided to learn to play the bass guitar. Eventually, along with the drummer Terry Johnson, the four became the Royal Spades. The Messick High School group added the keyboardist Jerry Lee “Smoochy” Smith, the singer Ronnie Angel (also known as Stoots), and a budding young horn section in the baritone saxophone player Don Nix, tenor saxophone player Charles “Packy” Axton, and trumpeter (and future co-founder of the Memphis Horns) Wayne Jackson.
Cropper has noted how the self-taught Dunn started out playing along with records, filling in what he thought should be there. “That’s why Duck Dunn’s bass lines are very unique”, Cropper said, “They’re not locked into somebody’s schoolbook somewhere”. Axton’s mother, Estelle, and her brother Jim Stewart owned Satellite Records and signed the band, who had a national hit with “Last Night” in 1961 under their new name, the “Mar-Keys”. Dunn was the bassist on “Last Night”, but he left the Mar-Keys in 1962 to join Ben Branch’s big band.
Booker T. and the M.G.’s was founded by Cropper and Booker T. Jones in 1962, with the drummer Al Jackson, Jr..The original bassist, on early hits such as “Green Onions”, was Lewie Steinberg; Dunn replaced him in 1964
Stax became known for Jackson’s drum sound, the sound of the Memphis Horns, and Dunn’s grooves. The MG’s and Dunn’s bass lines on songs like Otis Redding’s “Respect” and “I Can’t Turn You Loose”, Sam & Dave’s “Hold On, I’m Comin'”, and Albert King’s “Born Under a Bad Sign” influenced musicians everywhere.
Dunn went on to play for Muddy Waters, Freddie King, Jerry Lee Lewis, Eric Clapton and Rod Stewart. He was the featured bass player on the single “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around”, by Stevie Nicks and Tom Petty, from Nicks’s debut solo album Bella Donna (1981), and on other tracks by Petty between 1976 and 1981. He reunited with Cropper as a member of Levon Helm’s RCO All Stars and also displayed his quirky Southern humor making two movies with Cropper, former Stax drummer Willie Hall, and Dan Aykroyd, as a member of the Blues Brothers band. Dunn was the bassist in Eric Clapton’s band for Clapton’s appearance at Live Aid in 1985.
Dunn played himself in the 1980 feature The Blues Brothers, where he famously uttered the line, “We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline!” and was frequently shown smoking a pipe whilst playing. He appeared in the 1998 sequel, Blues Brothers 2000, once again playing himself. Dunn & the MGs were the house band for Bob Dylan’s concert celebrating Dylan’s 30th anniversary in the music business at Madison Square Garden playing behind Dylan, George Harrison, Eric Clapton, Tom Petty, Stevie Wonder, Sinéad O’Connor, Eddie Vedder, and Neil Young, who recruited the MGs to tour with him and recorded with Dunn several times since.
On the morning of May 13, 2012, Dunn died in his sleep after finishing his fifth double show at the Blue Note nightclub in Tokyo with Cropper the night before. He had been in Japan as part of an ongoing tour with Cropper and Eddie Floyd. He is survived by his wife, June; a son, Jeff; and a grandson, Michael.
When he was 16, he acquired his first Fender Precision Bass, a 1958 model with sunburst body, one-piece maple neck and gold anodized pickguard, an instrument he owned until his death. During the 1960s, he used a 1959 model, which was identical to his 1958, but with a rosewood fretboard. He was an avid user of thick La Bella flatwound strings, as was James Jamerson. While filming The Blues Brothers, Dunn used a sunburst mid-sixties Fender Precision bass with a rosewood fretboard and a tortoise pickguard. In 1998, he collaborated with Fender to produce a signature Precision Bass, a candy apple red model based on the late 1950s style, with a gold anodized pickguard, a split-coil humbucking pickup and vintage hardware. The Duck Dunn P-Bass became the basis for a Lakland Skyline Series signature bass made by the Chicago bass company Lakland a few years later.
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