Otis Spann was born as one of five children – three boys and two girls – to Frank Houston Spann, a preacher, and Josephine Erby in Jackson, Mississippi on March 21, 1930. His father played piano, although not professionally, while his mother had played guitar with blues legend Memphis Minnie. Inspired by local pianist Friday Ford, Otis began playing piano by the age of eight, at first performing in his father’s church. By the age of fourteen, influenced by his favorite 78s by ‘Big’ Maceo Merriweather, Spann was performing in local bands in and around Jackson.
While working various jobs as a semi-professional football player and a professional boxer in the early 1940s, Spann performed the usual circuit of Mississippi juke-joints and house rent parties. His sports career was interrupted when Spann sometimes joined the Army during the late-1940s. Spann is said to have relocated to Chicago in 1946 or '47, after the death of his mother, finding a mentor in ‘Big’ Maceo Merriweather, who smartened him to the local blues scene. While working a day job as a plasterer, Spann performed at nightly house parties, often accompanied by guitarist Morris Pejoe.
 

 

Discharged from the service, he took a job at the Tick Tock Lounge where he performed steadily between 1950 and 1952.
Spann was invited to play with Muddy Waters at the legendary Blues record label Chess Records in 1952, adding his unique piano sound to Waters' music for more than 16 years. The undisputed King of Chicago blues was so fond of the young piano player that he called him his ‘half-brother’. His piano backings can be heard in several Muddy Waters hits, including the chart-toppers Hoochie Coochie Man, I Just Want to Make Love to You and I'm Ready, among others.

   

Muddy Waters with Otis Spann

Although he recorded periodically as a solo artist, Spann was a full-time member of the Muddy Waters band until 1968. He quickly became a staple in the Chess family. In that period he also did session work with a number of Chess artists, including Howlin' Wolf (1954 - No Place to Go, Forty-Four and How Long), Little Walter and Bo Diddley.

Muddy Waters Band at the Club Zanzibar, Chicago IL, 1954:

left to right: Muddy Waters, Henry Armstrong, Otis Spann, Henry “Pot” Strong, Elga “Elgin” Edmonds & Jimmy Rogers

Muddy Waters, Otis Spann, Elga “Elgin" Edmonds & Jimmy Rogers

In April 1954, Spann and Muddy Waters took part in Junior Wells’ second session for the States label. Spann also made several J.O.B label recordings with saxophonist J. T. Brown and a side for Checker (It Must Have Been The Devil). In February of 1955, Spann appeared on Bo Diddley’s famous Chess sides Bo Diddley and I’m A Man. A few month later, Spann recorded on Chuck Berry’s Chess hit You Can’t Catch Me and Sonny Boy Williamson’s Don’t Start Me to Talkin.

Muddy Waters accepted an invitation to tour England in October of 1958. Without funds to bring his entire group, Waters took along Spann as his only accompanist. English critics and writers voiced negative about Waters’ “screaming guitar” and Spann’s “howling piano” …
Back in Chicago Waters and Spann produced such Chess sides as the 1959 cut "Mean Mistreater". But it wasn’t until 1960 that Spann, accompanied by guitarist Robert Lockwood Jr., recorded his first major solo work, “Otis Spann Is The Blues”, on the Candid label, which included the classic Otis In The Dark. This album brought him widespread exposure, and he played festivals, recorded and toured extensively. Also in 1960 LP “Conversation With the Blues” appeared on Decca. Spann’s performance on his 1960 cut This Is The Blues was described as the ultimate development of the boogie-woogie piano.

     

During the same year, Spann including a rare vocal turn displayed his talents with the Muddy Waters band at the 1960 Newport Jazz Festival, released as Waters' “Live At Newport 1960” album, that, with his inspired piano playing, helped launch Spann’s solo career.

  

In 1962 Spann provided the piano accompaniment for several of Buddy Guy’s Chess sides including First Time I Met The Blues and Stone Crazy. In the following year, while on tour in London with the Muddy Waters band, he recorded with Waters’ unit and several guest horn players for the solo effort “The Blues of Otis Spann”. In 1963 he followed up with a largely session for the Storyville Record label (“Piano Blues”) recorded in Copenhagen with Sonny Boy Williamson and a set for UK Decca Records found him in company of Muddy Waters and Eric Clapton in the same year.

Muddy Waters and Otis Spann jamming with Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee backstage 1964

  

Then Spann released the 1965 Prestige solo album which featured Waters under the alias "Dirty Rivers”. The prominence of Spann’s talent in the Chicago scene was celebrated on the Vanguard label’s 1966 blues series, “Chicago / The Blues / Today !” (Vol. I & II). With the Muddy Waters band, Spann backed John Lee Hooker for the 1966 LP “Live At The Cafe Au-Go-Go”. Backed by the Muddy Waters band Spann's 1966 album for ABC-Bluesway, “The Blues Is Where It's At”, sounded like a live recording. It was a recording studio date, enlivened by enthusiastic onlookers that applauded every song. This album captured many fine moments, especially the opening number, Popcorn Man, written by Waters.

  

In 1967 Spann’s second merriage. He married singer Lucille Jenkins and featured her, along with the Muddy Waters band, on the Bluesway LP “The Bottom of the Blues”.

   

That same year, he recorded with the Waters’ band for the Muse album “Muddy Waters / Mud In Your Ear” and Buddy Guy’s Vanguard release, “A Man And The Blues”. In 1969 Spann performed on Muddy Waters’s half-studio and half-live double-album, “Fathers and Sons”.

      

Spann left the Waters band in 1969 and released his Vanguard solo album “Cryin’ Time”, backed by Chicago blues guitarist Luther Tucker. Spann also guested on the 1969 all star blues LP “Super Black Blues” and toured the college circuit and various nightclub venues with his wife Lucille. That same year saw the release of his album “Cracked Spanner Head”. In early spring 1970 Spann took part in his last recording session for Junior Wells’ Delmark LP “South Side Blues Jam”, perhaps the best Blues piano recordings ever made, played with the likes of Robert Lockwood Jr., James Cotton, and even Buddy Guy.

     

Otis Spann and James Cotton

Tragically, as his solo career was still on the rise and demand for his musical skills at their peak, Spann was diagnosed with cancer. In the spring 1970 Spann entered Cook County Hospital in Chicago, Illinois where he died far too young on April 24, 1970 at the age of 40.
Spann’s thundering piano style, with its vibrant expression and articulate attack, represents a vital contribution in the shaping of postwar Chicago blues. Otis Spann is widely considered to be the greatest of the Chicago blues pianists. With a tempered sound that seamlessly melded boogie-woogie with a more soulful blues style, Spann's contributions as part of Muddy Waters' band are inestimable. As a solo artist, he was a solid songwriter, a dynamic performer, and an underrated singer. He was posthumously elected to the Blues Hall of Fame in 1980.