UPDATES
Pinkburst Project Auction Results
The Pinkburst Project [Premier Guitar, February
2011] raised over $110,000 for the Uveitis
Foundation at the April 29 benefit concert and
May 1 auction in Boston, according to the project’s
Facebook page. The page also reports that t-shirts
and mini Pinkburst Les Pauls will be available for
sale shortly. The Cambridge Chronicle reports that
the Pinkburst Project donated $110,000 to the
Cambridge-based Ocular Immunology and Uveitis
Foundation on May 10.
Fishman vs. Esteban Trial
A judge in the case of Fishman versus Esteban and
the Home Shopping Network [Premier Guitar,
May 2011] ruled that Fishman was not due any
monetary compensation for trademark infringement. According to court records, a jury found that
Esteban and HSN Interactive had been guilty of
infringement, but it had not been willful—the defendants were not aware that the pickups advertised
as Fishman in their guitars were not indeed Fishman
pickups. Stating that the two entities are not in direct competition and the benefit gained from
the infringement was slight, the judge declined to award damages to Fishman.
Cornell Dupree,
1942–2011
BY REBECCA DIRKS
FORT WORTH, TX – Prolific session guitarist Cornell Dupree
succumbed to emphysema on
May 8, 2011, while awaiting a
lung transplant. He was 69.
Dupree was best known
as a session guitarist who, by
his own estimation, played
on more than 2,500 albums.
He worked with superstars
as diverse as Aretha Franklin,
Barbra Streisand, Paul Simon,
Joe Cocker, Ringo Starr, James
Brown, Miles Davis, and
Mariah Carey, transitioning
with ease between rhythm and
blues, pop, funk, and jazz.
His mastery of the instrument was noted by Atlantic
Records producer Jerry Wexler
in the liner notes to Dupree’s
1995 album, Bop ’n’ Blues:
“It was our practice to use
three or even more guitarists
on a record session … when
Mr. Dupree, the pride of Fort
Worth, came to our rescue,
it was bye-bye to multiple
guitarists … one man playing
rhythm and lead at the same
time took the place of three.”
Dupree got his start with
King Curtis and the Kingpins,
at one point sharing guitar
duties with a young Jimi
Hendrix. It was this associa-
tion that landed him on tour
with Aretha Franklin in 1967,
a decade-long gig that spanned
some of the most successful
years of Franklin’s career.
In the late ’70s, Dupree
formed the band Stuff, comprising fellow studio musicians
Eric Gale, Richard Tee, and
Steve Gadd, and led by bassist
Gordon Edwards. The group
recorded four instrumental
albums for Warner Bros.
As a leader, Dupree recorded
10 albums. The most recent
album, according to the
Washington Post, was recorded in
April in the midst of his illness.
Dupree was known for
playing a modified Telecaster,
and had a Yamaha signature
model called the Super Jam
SJ-800.
You can listen to Dupree’s
licks on Brook Benton’s “Rainy
Night in Georgia,” Aretha
Franklin’s Live at Fillmore
West, Paul Simon’s There Goes
Rhymin’ Simon, and Miles
Davis’ Get Up with It, and
countless other recordings.
Antares Introduces
Auto-Tune for Guitar
BY REBECCA DIRKS
SCOTTS VALLEY, CA – Antares
Audio Technologies, the company
behind the ubiquitous Auto-Tune
vocal processors, announced in
May the release of ATG- 6 Auto-Tune technology for guitar.
