David Briggs, a music force in Alabama and Nashville, dies at 82

Boston Globe

28-04-2025

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The rhythm section at Fame, whose members also included Norbert Putnam on bass and Jerry Carrigan on drums, honed a down-home sound that, with its languid blend of country and soul, stood apart from the R&B coming out of Motown or Stax at the time. 'You Better Move On' attracted the attention of the Rolling Stones, who released their version of the song in 1964. (The Beatles had previously performed Alexander's 'Soldier of Love' on the BBC.)
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Mr. Briggs's other defining moment came when he, Putnam, and Carrigan moved to Nashville in late 1964 and began infusing country recordings with the understated, groove-rich variant of the Nashville Sound that became known as 'countrypolitan.'
'We brought along a more blues and pop-rock thing than what Nashville was doing at the time,' Putnam said in an interview.
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He recalled that singer Ray Stevens, then a top arranger who worked in Muscle Shoals and Nashville, once said, 'You guys play the modern music better than the A-Team we have in Nashville.'
Mr. Briggs would go on to play everything from the funky organ on Tony Joe White's 'Polk Salad Annie' to the pealing barroom piano on Conway Twitty's honky-tonk weeper 'The Image of Me.' He provided empathetic accompaniment on Sammi Smith's 'Help Me Make It Through the Night,' a No. 1 country and Top 10 pop hit in 1971, and Dolly Parton's 'Coat of Many Colors,' which was also a Top 10 country single that year.
After just a few months in Nashville, Mr. Briggs had distinguished himself as one of the city's first-call studio keyboard players. He would go on to take part in hundreds of sessions a year into the 1980s.
(An entirely different rhythm section, known as the Swampers, would take up the slack in Muscle Shoals, working with luminaries including Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin, and Wilson Pickett.)
David Paul Briggs was born March 16, 1943, in Killen, Ala., northeast of Muscle Shoals. He was the elder of two sons of James and Myrtle (Myrick) Briggs. His father was a letter carrier.
Classically trained, Mr. Briggs began playing professionally as an adolescent. He worked in a local band called the Crunk Brothers and, through them, met Putnam and ultimately gained entree to session work at Fame. Mr. Briggs and Putnam played on Tommy Roe's chart-topping 1962 hit, 'Sheila,' and were members of his backing band when Roe was an opening act for the Beatles in their first US concert, in 1964.
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Mr. Briggs, meanwhile, had begun writing songs and releasing the occasional record of his own as both a singer and keyboardist. One was a single produced by Owen Bradley, who urged him to move to Nashville in 1964 to do studio work.
In 1966, Mr. Briggs joined Elvis Presley's TCB Band, a job he would keep, along with his session work, until Presley's death in 1977.
In 1969, Mr. Briggs and Putnam opened Quadraphonic Sound, a much-in-demand studio that hosted projects by Neil Young, Dan Fogelberg, Jimmy Buffett, and the Jacksons. That year, Mr. Briggs joined Area Code 615, a supergroup of session musicians, including Putnam and guitarist Mac Gayden, who died this month. The band released a pair of albums of freewheeling country rock on Polydor Records.
Mr. Briggs and Putnam also founded their own publishing company, Danor Music, which had success with No. 1 pop hits including Steve Winwood's 'Higher Love' and Whitney Houston's 'Didn't We Almost Have It All.'
The two men sold Quadraphonic Sound in 1979, and Mr. Briggs opened another studio, House of David, three years later. The Blasters, Norah Jones, Bootsy Collins, and indie-rock band Yo La Tengo were among House of David's numerous clients, along with B.B. King, for whom Mr. Briggs wrote arrangements.
In the 1970s and '80s, Mr. Briggs began writing and arranging (and sometimes singing) jingles for Coca-Cola, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and other products. In 1988, he became music director for the Country Music Association's annual television awards show, a position he held until 2001.
Along with Putnam, Carrigan, and guitarist Terry Thompson, Mr. Briggs was inducted into the Musicians Hall of Fame in Nashville in 2019. He remained active as a musician and studio owner well into his 70s.
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In addition to his brother, he leaves two sons, Darren and Gabriel, and a grandson. His marriage to Judy McLemore ended in divorce.
Recalling the opening of Quadraphonic Sound in an interview for the National Association of Music Merchants' Oral History Program, Mr. Briggs said of his partnership with Putnam, 'We wanted a studio that was a little better than everywhere else we'd recorded.'
He added: 'When we started, it was going to be a little demo studio, but then we started buying more expensive stuff. It just slowly, slowly grew and became this hot place.'
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