Eric Weissberg, half of the duo that recorded “Dueling Banjos” for the film “Deliverance” in 1973, resulting in an unlikely smash hit single and album, has died at 80. Family members and friends said Weissberg had been suffering from Alzheimer’s for years.
Weissberg was a fixture on the New York folk scene before being enlisted to bring his banjo cover the traditional but largely unfamiliar instrumental with Steve Mandell for John Boorman’s adventure-thriller in 1972. When it was released as a single, it rose to No. 2 on the Billboard pop chart and stayed there for four weeks in 1973, blocked from the top spot only by Roberta Flack’s “Killing Me Softly With His Song.” An album of Weissberg’s roots music that was rush-released as a soundtrack to “Deliverance” ran into no such hindrance — it topped the album sales chart for three weeks.
In a 2011 conversation with Chris Willman for the Los Angeles Times,...
Weissberg was a fixture on the New York folk scene before being enlisted to bring his banjo cover the traditional but largely unfamiliar instrumental with Steve Mandell for John Boorman’s adventure-thriller in 1972. When it was released as a single, it rose to No. 2 on the Billboard pop chart and stayed there for four weeks in 1973, blocked from the top spot only by Roberta Flack’s “Killing Me Softly With His Song.” An album of Weissberg’s roots music that was rush-released as a soundtrack to “Deliverance” ran into no such hindrance — it topped the album sales chart for three weeks.
In a 2011 conversation with Chris Willman for the Los Angeles Times,...
- 3/24/2020
- by Chris Willman
- Variety Film + TV
Eric Weissberg, who arranged, played banjo on and won a Grammy for “Dueling Banjos,” from the 1972 movie Deliverance, died Sunday of Alzheimer’s disease complications. He was 80.
His son, Will Weissberg, confirmed the news to our sister publication Rolling Stone.
More from DeadlineNotable Hollywood & Entertainment Industry Deaths In 2020: Photo GalleryLifetime Casts Trio In Pilot 'The Lottery', Duo In 'Deliverance Creek'Pilots 'Eye Candy' & 'Deliverance Creek' Cast Regulars
Born on August 16, 1939, in New York City, Weissberg was a bluegrass musician from an early age, having seen Pete Seeger play at his school in Greenwich Village, and went on to attend the Juilliard School of Music in the 1950s. He also played guitar, mandolin, fiddle, pedal steel, and string bass.
He also became a frequent collaborator of Tom Paxton and Judy Collins and worked as a session man for such acts as Bob Dylan, Talking Heads,...
His son, Will Weissberg, confirmed the news to our sister publication Rolling Stone.
More from DeadlineNotable Hollywood & Entertainment Industry Deaths In 2020: Photo GalleryLifetime Casts Trio In Pilot 'The Lottery', Duo In 'Deliverance Creek'Pilots 'Eye Candy' & 'Deliverance Creek' Cast Regulars
Born on August 16, 1939, in New York City, Weissberg was a bluegrass musician from an early age, having seen Pete Seeger play at his school in Greenwich Village, and went on to attend the Juilliard School of Music in the 1950s. He also played guitar, mandolin, fiddle, pedal steel, and string bass.
He also became a frequent collaborator of Tom Paxton and Judy Collins and worked as a session man for such acts as Bob Dylan, Talking Heads,...
- 3/24/2020
- by Erik Pedersen
- Deadline Film + TV
Bluegrass musician Eric Weissberg, whose cover of the Arthur “Guitar Boogie” Smith instrumental “Dueling Banjos” became an unlikely pop hit when it appeared on the soundtrack to the 1972 film Deliverance, died Sunday at the age of 80 after a five-year struggle with dementia. His son, Will Weissberg, confirmed the musician’s death to Rolling Stone.
“Eric Weissberg was a consummate musician, a solid and seemingly effortless player of stringed instruments of all kinds — banjo, guitar, mandolin, fiddle, pedal steel, and string bass,” his lifelong friend and frequent collaborator Happy Traum wrote on Facebook.
“Eric Weissberg was a consummate musician, a solid and seemingly effortless player of stringed instruments of all kinds — banjo, guitar, mandolin, fiddle, pedal steel, and string bass,” his lifelong friend and frequent collaborator Happy Traum wrote on Facebook.
- 3/23/2020
- by Andy Greene
- Rollingstone.com
Released on January 20th, 1975, Blood on the Tracks was many records – in conception, execution and rapid change of mind – on its way to canonization: Bob Dylan’s greatest album of the Seventies and, as much as the singer has denied it since, the most emotionally direct body of songs he has ever committed to a single LP. It was an album born amid a crisis of family, largely composed in retreat – on Dylan’s farm in Minnesota – and initially recorded in New York as his nine-year marriage to the former Sara Lowndes broke down.
- 11/2/2018
- by David Fricke
- Rollingstone.com
“Real Life Rock Top Ten” is a monthly column by cultural critic and Rs contributing editor Greil Marcus.
1. “Nobel Prize winner Bob Dylan plays River Spirit Casino Resort,” Tulsa World (October 13th). Though it does carry an echo of the Cheek to Cheek Lounge of Winter Park, Florida, where in 1986, after a show by a reconstituted version of the Band, pianist Richard Manuel went back to his motel and hanged himself, better this than the White House. I hope he wore his medal.
2. Bob Dylan, More Blood, More Tracks: The Bootleg Series Vol.
1. “Nobel Prize winner Bob Dylan plays River Spirit Casino Resort,” Tulsa World (October 13th). Though it does carry an echo of the Cheek to Cheek Lounge of Winter Park, Florida, where in 1986, after a show by a reconstituted version of the Band, pianist Richard Manuel went back to his motel and hanged himself, better this than the White House. I hope he wore his medal.
2. Bob Dylan, More Blood, More Tracks: The Bootleg Series Vol.
- 10/25/2018
- by Greil Marcus
- Rollingstone.com
Blood on the Tracks has always been one of Bob Dylan’s most mysterious albums, but the upcoming Bootleg Series More Blood, More Tracks, set for release November 2nd, will finally reveal, piece-by-piece, how the 1975 LP came together over just six days at studios in New York City and Minneapolis, Minnesota.
A test pressing of the original album that pre-dated Dylan’s decision to recut five of the songs in Minneapolis has circulated within bootleg circles for decades, but the vast majority of takes on More Blood, More Tracks have never been heard.
A test pressing of the original album that pre-dated Dylan’s decision to recut five of the songs in Minneapolis has circulated within bootleg circles for decades, but the vast majority of takes on More Blood, More Tracks have never been heard.
- 9/20/2018
- by Andy Greene
- Rollingstone.com
Randy gets delivered.
In the South, drinking is the national sport. That’s why they named their beer “Dixie.” Of course, they also name their cars, hunting dogs and little girls “Dixie,” but those are for other columns. This one is about wine and movies, and it says here the best movie about the southern United States is “Deliverance.”
It’s not a feel-good movie. It’s a writhing, retching record of the worst that humanity has to offer, and I don’t mean litterbugs. Those goons are scary stupid, and those city boys are way out of their element. They should have turned around and gone back home at the first sign of trouble, but you know what a bad influence that Burt Reynolds can be.
When Burt told the local yokel that fifty dollars was too much for the ride, maybe he should have used a little more tact.
In the South, drinking is the national sport. That’s why they named their beer “Dixie.” Of course, they also name their cars, hunting dogs and little girls “Dixie,” but those are for other columns. This one is about wine and movies, and it says here the best movie about the southern United States is “Deliverance.”
It’s not a feel-good movie. It’s a writhing, retching record of the worst that humanity has to offer, and I don’t mean litterbugs. Those goons are scary stupid, and those city boys are way out of their element. They should have turned around and gone back home at the first sign of trouble, but you know what a bad influence that Burt Reynolds can be.
When Burt told the local yokel that fifty dollars was too much for the ride, maybe he should have used a little more tact.
- 5/25/2012
- by Danny
- Trailers from Hell
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