Oteil Burbridge profile picture

Profile: Oteil Burbridge

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I’m excited for this one, Oteil is one of the greatest extant musicians, and has played with basically everybody important in the jam scene. I’m happy to continue celebrating musicians of color today, although I think I’ll switch back to POC comics creators in the next post, so keep your eyes peeled for that one. There are links at the bottom of the post for organizations you can donate to; let me know if I should add any!

Oteil Burbridge

Bass Guitar, Drums, Banjo, Bass Clarinet, Piano, Vocals

Hooooo boy, talk about a musician’s musician. Multi-Grammy-winner Oteil Burbridge has been in the scene since 1991, bursting onto the scene as one of the founding members of the Aquarium Rescue Unit. Being an integral part of that band is accomplishment enough, but he and his brother Kofi (who passed away last year) have touched most corners of the jam band/improvisational scene.

Oteil joined the Allman Brothers Band from 1997 until their retirement in 2014, bringing the heat and winning a Lifetime Grammy for his work with the band. If you’re into the Allmans, check out the Live At The Beacon Theatre DVD to see some of Oteil’s fine work. During this time, he also joined with Phish keyboardist Page McConnell and Russell Batiste, Jr. to form Vida Blue, a pretty hip trio of electronic music with vocals.

In 2010, he and his brother Kofi joined with Derek Trucks to form the 11-piece Tedeschi Trucks Band, which has played some fire performances over the years in various configurations. It was also about this time that he scaled back some of his touring to focus on having children.

That didn’t stop him from playing through with the Allmans, or from forming Dead & Co. in 2015 with three of the surviving members of the Grateful Dead (and John Mayer). They’ve been touring every year since, and having seen them a couple of times, I can say that Oteil brings a really cool energy to the music. Also any time he sings he blows everyone else out of the water, he is an incredibly soulful singer.

Oteil has played with many more greats from the last three decades of live music, and I don’t think he’s stopping any time soon (virus permitting). He’s not touring right now of course, but you can support him by going to his merch page and tossing him a few bucks: https://oteilburbridge.hilinemerch.com/.

Organizations

Here are some places that can use your support!