When Chuck Leavell recently wrapped his latest concert tour playing keys for the Rolling Stones, his main gig for the past four decades, he got as far from the stage as imaginable—the rural Georgia land where he raises trees.
The through line in his long music career—during which he’s manned the piano, keyboards, and organ for the Allman Brothers, Eric Clapton, and the aforementioned Stones—is easy to find. “One of the things that struck me was, where does that thing that has given me a great career and so much joy come from? Meaning the piano and the resource of wood,” he says of an epiphany he experienced several years ago. “Growing trees is a way of giving back to what’s been so good to me.”
Leavell estimates he has planted about three hundred acres of longleaf pine—the towering, broad-canopied species that once covered the Coastal Plain from Texas to Virginia—in Twiggs County, Georgia, and in recent years he has become an evangelist for the nation’s natural history. Since 2017 he’s hosted the PBS show America’s Forests With Chuck Leavell, a series about sustainable forestry and habitat restoration that has taken him across the continent, including to the Fender Musical Instruments factory in California.
But above all else, Leavell is a Southerner whose connection and contributions to the music of the region is as deep as his love for the soil. We challenged him to reflect on some of the biggest moments of his life in music—the career that now allows him the freedom to spend his downtime surrounded by giants of a different sort.
Eric Clapton immortalized him on MTV Unplugged
Leavell already had a hall-of-fame career as a sought-after sideman by the time he appeared on Eric Clapton’s episode of MTV Unplugged in 1992. But Clapton, perhaps inspired by the tasteful piano lines Leavell played on the traditional blues track “Alberta,” proudly announced Leavell’s name to the studio audience at the song’s conclusion. That moment became enshrined in music history as Clapton’s subsequent Unplugged album became the best-selling live album of all time and won a trio of Grammys, including the coveted Album of the Year award.
“I couldn’t believe they left it on the record,” Leavell says of the shout-out. “The other part of that, of course, is that version of ‘Layla’ on Unplugged was a real joy to do, and then probably my favorite is ‘Old Love’ [written by Clapton with Robert Cray and originally on 1989’s Journeyman]. We did the show and went through the whole set and played an encore too, and the audience still wanted more. And I don’t know why Eric turned to me, but he did, and he said, ‘What can we do?’ I said, ‘Eric, do “Old Love,” man.’”
He was the unsung hero of the Black Crowes’ debut
Leavell’s piano and B3 organ parts were essential to the Black Crowes’ 1990 debut album, Shake Your Money Maker, including to the hits “Hard to Handle” and “She Talks to Angels.” They added so much swagger, in fact, that the band soon added keys player Eddie Harsch as a full sixth member. But the collaboration came about through what Leavell calls “a happy accident.”
“George Drakoulias, the producer, reached out to me out of the blue,” Leavell recalls, “and he said, ‘Listen, we signed this band’—they were actually called Mr. Crowe’s Garden at the time—and he said, ‘They’re from Georgia, and they would love to have you play.’ So we had lunch together, and he played me this recording. It was one microphone in the middle of a rehearsal room, but there was no doubt, you could hear the energy and passion.”
The rest is music history: “We convened in Atlanta, and it started out with, ‘Hey, can you play on this song? Oh man, that was good. Can you put organ on it? Well, we got this other song…’ And this went on until I was on the majority of the record.”
Step aside, Bulldogs, he’s a Tide man
Although he’s lived in central Georgia for many years now, Leavell is an Alabamian by birth and carries all the duties and privileges of a native son—namely, cheering for the Crimson Tide on whichever field or court of play they appear. He’s also befriended other ’Bama royalty and discovered he shares a mutual appreciation with the school’s recently retired football coach, Nick Saban.
“I’ve become friends with Coach Saban,” he says. “He’s a big Stones fan, and when he came to our show in Atlanta, I got to hang with him a little bit there. When we first met, he said, ‘You know, after every game, whether I’m going back to the hotel or going home, can you imagine what song I play?’ And I said, ‘No, coach, what do you play?’ He says, ‘I play “Gimme Shelter” at a very loud volume.’”
New episodes of America’s Forest with Chuck Leavell will air on PBS in September.
