Kooper Sessions

IF HE'D DONE nothing before or after he dropped by a Bob Dylan recording session in June 1965, sat down at the Hammond organ – an instrument he was previously unfamiliar with – and came up with a part that pleased Dylan and wound up being a crucial element on 'Like a Rolling Stone', Al Kooper would still have a secure place in rock history. His keyboard answers and propels Dylan's tumble of words; it's like a sound that draws you to the fairway of a carnival, to the blinking lights, the tantalizing games and rides, and it wound up being a key element of the subsequent album, Highway 61 Revisited. And that all happened because Tom Wilson, the producer of 'Like a Rolling Stone', invited him to Columbia Studio A to hang out.