Joey DeFrancesco

Joey DeFrancesco ( born April 10, 1971 in Springfield, Pennsylvania) is an American jazz organist.

Life

DeFrancesco is the son of pianist and organist Papa John DeFrancesco; his grandfather played with the Dorsey Brothers. His album debut, he was already 17 years old and played as a teenager with Shirley Scott and Brother Jack McDuff (with whom he also recorded later). A little later he toured with jazz greats like Miles Davis (Tour 1987/8, recording Amandla 1989) or John McLaughlin. In 1989 he graduated from the Philadelphia High School of Creative and Performing Arts. In the same year his first album as a leader. The mid-1990s he worked extensively in a trio with John McLaughlin.

He is regarded as one of the main people responsible for the Hammond B3 boom in the early 1990s. On some albums DeFrancesco is heard as a singer.

It is worth mentioning also his work with Hammond organ legend Jimmy Smith ( Incredible Jazz Festival San Francisco 1999).