Happy Birthday Oteil Burbridge: RB&B Makes Debut At 2016 Peach Music Festival

Legendary bassist Oteil Burbridge turns 57 today. “Oteil From Egypt,” as Col. Bruce Hampton liked to call him, was actually born in Washington, D.C. He first garnered attention for his role as a founding member of Hampton’s The Aquarium Rescue Unit. ARU’s music gave Burbridge plenty of chances to display his unparalleled chops and ability to fit scat-singing into his bass solos. Oteil went on to join The Allman Brothers Band in 1997 and was a fixture of the group through their final shows in 2014. Unsurprisingly, Burbridge wasn’t unemployed for long. In 2015, Grateful Dead members Bob Weir, Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann tapped Oteil for their Dead & Company project along with John Mayer and Jeff Chimenti.

The bassist still finds time to front his own band and participate in other projects. Organizers of The Peach Music Festival called upon Oteil, drummer Joe Russo and keyboardist Marco Benevento to perform at the 2016 installment of the event after Gregg Allman pulled out due to illness. Sadly, Gregg would pass away the following May. Burbridge, Russo and Benevento – or “RB&B” – treated Peach Fest ’16 attendees to an otherworldly 75-minute, fully-improvised set.

While Marco and Joe had been performing together for well over a decade, Burbridge fit in perfectly with The Duo. RB&B showed off their skills with very few stops in the action throughout the entire set. The trio explored a handful of themes over the course of their performance with a strong leaning towards jazz-fusion. Celebrate Oteil’s birthday by listening to a recording of RB&B’s August 14, 2016 set at The Peach Music Festival captured by Ted Gakidis and shared by Jam.Buzz:

RB&B performed one additional time at the 2016 Suwannee Hulaween music festival.

[Originally Published: August 24, 2018]