Sam Fribush Organ Trio

By Billy Ingram

“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

I was covering a shift in a comic book store one sunny Saturday when musician/songwriter Sam Fribush strolled over from his nearby home to discuss the latest steps on his remarkable mellifluous journey. He, together with Grammy-winners guitarist/bassist Charley Hunter and drummer Calvin Napper, form The Sam Fribush Organ Trio for an album released in March of this year, People Please, a swingingly soulful suture of melodies reminiscent of a time, many decades ago, when rhythmic instrumental riffs ruled the Billboard Hot 100.

Raised in Sunset Hills, Fribush reflects on his musical undertones, “My parents are both self-taught, old time folk musicians so I grew up with music in the house. Folk Appalachian music is maybe the first line in my DNA.” While attending Weaver Academy between 2009 to 2013, with Mark Freundt as his instructor, Fribush began seriously focusing on piano, “They had a block schedule so I just sat at the keyboard for an hour and a half every day and practiced, that was a big part of getting my technical facility together.”

From there, he attended the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston for undergraduate studies, simultaneously spending those couple of years picking up local gigs. “That's when I started playing the Hammond organ in a black Baptist church in the south part of Massachusetts,” Fribush says. “A really tough learning environment, got my ass kicked in all the best ways.”

A move to New Orleans led to the musician pounding keys in dimly-lit clubs on Bourbon and Frenchmen Streets. “The school of hard knocks,” is how Fribush describes that experience. “Without rehearsed material, having to know tons and tons of songs, just using my ears, that’s when I really got my ass kicked!”

After the pandemic hit, like a surprising number of other talented individuals (a blessing in disguise it turns out) — he returned to Greensboro. “I love being back here,” Fribush says. “It's a great home base of operation. I moved to College Hill and joined the band Hiss Golden Messenger from Durham.” Relocating proved fortuitous, “I also met Charlie Hunter who randomly moved to Greensboro when I did, we happened to be into the same type of music and started playing together.”

When Fribush and I spoke that afternoon, he had just returned from laying down tracks for his next album in Richmond. “I’m on a little bit of marathon recording new stuff right now,” he explains. “I’ve been really going down a deep rabbit hole of writing. It’s been rewarding, having all these demos.” In Richmond, he connected in the studio with some of the guys from Butcher Brown, “We were just pulling songs off my demo list. It was really fun to have these original sparks then see what they turn into.” The week following our convo, he was jetting off to Denver to record with Adam Deitch from the funktastic ensemble Lettuce.

Fribush is especially looking forward to jamming once again with his People Please collaborators at the N.C. Folk Festival. When he was first approached, “I was like, well, I would really like to get those guys in on it too. And we were able to work that out.” The only other live performance this trio have played as a unit was an album release party at Flat Iron but, “Whenever the three of us get together, it's always awesome.”

Taking a break from touring with TMF (The Music Forever), Winston-Salem resident Calvin Napper (late of Maze featuring Frankie Beverly) is renowned for beating out percussive blasts for gospel greats Kirk Franklin, Shirley Caesar, and CeCe Winans to name a few. He was awarded a Grammy for his contribution to Psalms, Hymns & Spiritual Songs by Donnie McClurkin. “Calvin Napper is a natural born drummer,” Smooth Jazz Daily opines. “Although addicted to gospel music he pursues his musical destination in smooth jazz or more precisely funk.”

Cruising into Latin and Caribbean inspired grooves on recordings with D’Angelo, Frank Ocean, Mos Def, and John Mayer, world-renowned Jazz and R&B guitarist/bassist Charlie Hunter’s signature Novax 7- and 8-string instruments allow him to play both bass and guitar simultaneously. “I’ve been a fan of Charlie Hunter for a really long time,” John Mayer once said about their extemporaneous session composing ‘In Repair.’ “One of the values that he’s kind of instilled in me, just from my being a fan of his, is his willingness to want to get into other musical situations than what he’s familiar with.”

On The Charlie Hunter Quartet’s highly-acclaimed 2001 Blue Note album Songs of the Analog Playground, it was Hunter’s transcendent interpretations of Roxy Music’s ‘More Than This’ and Nick Drake’s hauntingly sensual ‘Day Is Done’ for an unknown vocalist, Norah Jones, that introduced the future 9-time GRAMMY winning singer/songwriter to the world. A year later, Jones’ debut album became one of the best-selling platters of all time.

Intertwined on People Please, these three virtuosos have created an extraordinary sonic playground reminiscent of those ubiquitous, highly infectious instrumentals of old like ‘Soul Bossa Nova’ (the theme from Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery) by Quincy Jones; Oscar Peterson’s jaunty, unparalleled ivory tinkling wizardry across musical genres; Memphis sixties Southern grooves typified by ‘Green Onions’ from Booker T. and the MG’s; in addition to that sweet Philly soul sound of the seventies.

“Philly is where most of the Hammond players were from,” Fribush notes about the keyboard that funked up the 1970s before synthesizers’ soullessness desensitized our ears. “Jimmy Smith, Shirley Scott, yeah, that's the sound. Those are my idols.”
People Please may be Sam Fribush’s first assemblage of all original material but even the cover tunes on his 2 previous records are, for the most part, practically undetectable as such owing to his singularly preternatural approach. “That was the point,” Fribush says. “Finding deep cuts then arranging them in interesting ways.”

This musical artist has somehow managed to make that instantly recognizable Hammond Tonewheel B-3’s harmonic resonance fresh again. One reason that sound is relatively uncommon today? The manufacturer stopped making them a half century ago. “Most of my Hammonds are from late fifties, early sixties,” which means that, out of necessity, Fribush has to repair and refurbish those organs and antiquated amps himself. “They are 100% analog, no chipboard, it’s all tubes, pretty straightforward. In the jazz and funk organ idiom, It’s a hard sound to replicate because of the warmth of the Hammond.”

Are The Sam Fribush Organ Trio’s electronic earworms pedaling us back to a post-synth future, 21st century beach music style? They may be the closest thing to a so-called ’super-group’ the NC FOLK FESTIVAL proffers this year.

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