Jewel, Mayer Honor Elton

Elton John will be honored at the 2003 NAMM Show Concert on January 17th at Arrowhead Pond in Anaheim, California. The show is sponsored by the NAMM (National Association of Music Merchants) and Yamaha, which will present John with its 2003 Lifetime Achievement in Musical Excellence Award.

Sir Elton will perform himself, as will a laundry list of other artists: Ray Charles, Jewel, Norah Jones, John Mayer, Diana Krall, Randy Newman, Vanessa Carlton, Rufus Wainwright, Nikka Costa, Amy Grant, Brian McKnight, Take 6, Bruce Hornsby and Michael McDonald.

A limited number of tickets are available at www.namm.com. Proceeds from the concert will benefit three of NAMM's music education charities: the American Music Conference, the International Foundation for Music Research and the Museum of Making Music.

In other Elton John news, earlier today he and songwriter/collaborator Bernie Taupin received a 2003 Grammy Award nomination for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance for "Original Sin." The song appears on John's most recent studio album, 2001's Songs From the West Coast.

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Song Stories

“All Along the Watchtower”

The Jimi Hendrix Experience | 1968

Jimi Hendrix got hold of Bob Dylan's early John Wesley Harding tapes and in late 1967 recorded a version of "All Along the Watchtower" with the Experience in London. Dissatisfied with that first development, Hendrix brought those tapes with him to New York in early 1968 when he began work on Electric Ladyland. Eddie Kramer, Hendrix's engineer at the time, told Rolling Stone that Hendrix "was still looked upon by his basically white audience as the mammoth black guitar hero. There was a constant fight within him to expand himself." Hendrix's successful take on Dylan's work has long been recognized by the songwriter. "I liked Jimi Hendrix's record of this and ever since he died I've been doing it that way," Dylan wrote in the liner notes to his Biograph box set. "Strange how when I sing it, I always feel it's a tribute to him in some kind of way."

More Song Stories entries »

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