Music has changed a lot, but it’s important to see where the shuffle evolved from, because it really has a lot to do with all of the other rhythms that you play. For example, when I was playing “Kissing my Love” on Bill Withers’ second album, Still Bill in 1972, it started out as a shuffle, but the way Bill phrased it, it went into a six-bar phrase where it was undanceable. We had to get something together, so I came up with a special beat with the shuffle on the top. I think I also played a shuffle on The Nightfly by Donald Fagen. It was an example of how you heard it, but you might not know where it came from. The first time I learned the Texas shuffle, I was playing with a group called Hank Ballard and the Midnighters. They had records out in the ‘50s […]

August 2021 Issue