Bobby Ogdin

Robert Ford Ogdin (born September, 1945) is a Nashville-based recording session pianist. He is best known as a member of Elvis Presley's TCB band. He performed on 20 of Presley's recordings and accompanied him on 45 live shows until Presley's death in 1977. Ogdin's piano playing was synchronized with archival footage of Presley's vocal performance on "Unchained Melody" in the 2022 motion picture, Elvis directed by Baz Luhrman. Ogdin's experiences during the Presley tours have been chronicled in a four-part series of video interviews by Billy Stallings. Over a career spanning four decades as a session musician, Ogdin recorded with country artists including Kenny Rogers, Willie Nelson, George Jones, The Judds, Kenny Chesney, Ray Charles, and Ronnie Milsap. In rock music, he was a member of the Marshall Tucker Band for five years (1984–1989) after departures of some of the original members. He also recorded and performed concerts with the alternative rock band Ween.

Career

Born in Detroit, Ogdin grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee. As a youth, he studied piano and violin from age 4 to 16 and won a Knoxville Symphony Orchestra music-writing contest. His father was an executive at Robertshaw Controls Company; his sister, Sue Ogdin Lynch, is a visual artist. As a teen, he became interested in rock and roll music and played piano and a Hammond B3 organ in local bands. including Elvis Presley, Willie Nelson, Kenny Rogers, The Judds, Travis Tritt, George Jones, Kenny Chesney, Ray Charles, Barbara Mandrell, Dan Hill, Amy Grant and Ronnie Milsap. Ogdin was chosen as his replacement primarily by Briggs and by Elvis' record producer Felton Jarvis, seconded by Bob Beckham. When Ogdin accepted, Jarvis told him there were no charts and no rehearsals. He was given a cassette tape of the show to memorize. There were no sound checks for him to attend; the instruments were transported, positioned and tuned by roadies and sound levels and monitors were done by a crew supervised by veteran sound engineer Bill Porter. was on March 23, 1977, at Arizona State University in Tempe. he witnessed Presley suddenly going off script— he commandeered the grand piano and started singing Unchained Melody while accompanying himself. This was nothing new to Ogdin who had overdubbed about 20 of Elvis' previous recordings. "Unchained Melody" had been captured on 24 track tape. Working with engineer Al Patchucki, The video of Presley (with audio overdubs) has been viewed millions of times via YouTube. had an upheaval in 1983 when five of the original seven members quit the band. The two remaining founders, Doug Gray and Jerry Eubanks decided to recruit replacements and carry on. They chose primarily studio musicians including Ogdin, bassist Bob Wray, drummer James Stroud, and guitarists Rusty Milner and Ken Mimms. Ogdin played in the group for five years (1983-1988) and recorded the album Still Holdin' On which yielded two country chart singles, "Hangin' Out in Smokey Places" (No. 44) and "Once You Get The Feel of It" (No. 79).

Bobby Ogdin (far left) with Ween, 2018"Ween", the duo of Aaron Freeman and Mickey Melchiondo, a.k.a. Gene and Dean Ween, built a cult following with their oddball musical parodies in various genres; however, their recordings, said the New York Times, sounded "homemade". That changed in 1996 when they came to Nashville to record a country album on Elektra called "12 Golden Country Greats " (a misnomer since the album contained only 10 songs). This time they used seasoned session players including Charlie McCoy, The Jordanaires, Hargus Robbins, Russ Hicks, and Bobby Ogdin. One of these shows (from October 1996) was released as a live album entitled "Live in Toronto Canada ". Ogdin reunited with Ween for two concerts at Nashville's Ryman Auditorium in October 2018.

Playing style

Ogdin is known musically for his skill in playing to bring out or enhance the vocalist or soloist without overplaying. Although it sounds simple, many otherwise skilled players cannot seem to master it.