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A tasty soul-jazz and blues guitarist, Billy Butler adroitly mixed a <a href="spotify:artist:0WdDpEeDIDmtYh5sqRrdI6">Charlie Christian</a> approach with '50s R&B grooves and backbeats. He coaxed a warm, fat tone from his hollow-bodied electric guitar, and provided deceptively simple solos and fills that became staples of the R&B guitar vocabulary. <a href="spotify:artist:6xGdsn4r7laoQDz0zbm1nY">Bill Doggett</a>'s "Honky Tonk," featuring Butler, is perhaps the prototype R&B guitar instrumental. "Ram-Bunk-Shush" and "Big Boy" are other highlights of his tenure with <a href="spotify:artist:6xGdsn4r7laoQDz0zbm1nY">Doggett</a>. He began playing with doo wop/R&B group the Harlemaires in the late '40s, then led combos until 1952, when he joined <a href="spotify:artist:5AbRH7muICqxwcDQGhcsVe">Doc Bagby</a>'s trio. Butler co-wrote "Honky Tonk" while playing with <a href="spotify:artist:6xGdsn4r7laoQDz0zbm1nY">Doggett</a> from 1954 to 1961. He also recorded with <a href="spotify:artist:0WxOgeRxUt0MwPrI7A5atQ">King Curtis</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:32LHRiof0sa4taYew9i3Fa">Dinah Washington</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:3YqwsNEXzkfW6T57ux4QAr">Panama Francis</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:7lRFrrINQTY35g8hq0kXY5">Johnny Hodges</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:5GXruybcLmXPjR9rKKFyS6">Jimmy Smith</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:5OPNYwuIto3q4ac46rIIZC">David "Fathead" Newman</a> in the '60s. Butler worked in Broadway pit bands beginning in the late '60s, but found time for recording sessions with <a href="spotify:artist:16Xx0WCnAKOA9mwPPSUJmr">Houston Person</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:3EEW6N4m3SnM84Vh7Gh2MJ">Norris Turney</a> in the late '60s and '70s. He led his own band and recorded for <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Prestige%22">Prestige</a> in the late '60s and early '70s. Butler also recorded with <a href="spotify:artist:36evCQa3oLG0Dl8cZx1ATZ">Al Casey</a> and Jackie Williams. He toured Europe frequently in the '70s and '80s, doing sessions there and in America. ~ Ron Wynn & Richard Lieberson, Rovi
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