Guest post by Nathan Arizona
Mention Gerry Rafferty’s “Baker Street” to somebody and there’s good chance a saxophone solo starts playing in their head. The one Billboard called “the most recognizable sax riff in pop music history.”
A lot of listeners think “Baker Street” was one of the best songs of the 1970s. The sales figures, continuing radio play and warm memories support that. Rafferty wrote it. Rafferty sang it. But he didn’t play the saxophone solo the song is known for. That was Raphael Ravenscroft, a session player hired for the gig. He was paid £27.5 for it.
Rafferty was peeved that Ravenscroft sometimes got credit for writing the riff. “It was my line. I sang it to him,” the Scottish singer said before his death in 2011. Ravenscroft said he based it on an old blues riff and that Rafferty did not “hand me a piece of music to play.” But a key piece of evidence might clinch it for Rafferty. Apparently he can be heard on a demo playing the famous riff on his guitar.
Rafferty had scored another big hit in 1973 with “Stuck in the Middle With You” by Stealers Wheel. Rafferty co-founded that band and was its lead singer and guitarist. The critically acclaimed song was featured on Quentin Tarantino’s “Reservoir Dogs” soundtrack. Rafferty left Stealers Wheel just as “Stuck in the Middle” was hitting big and the band soon dissolved. Wrangling with the record company over his contract followed and he was legally forbidden to release music before that was settled three years later.
He then formed a band under his own name and recorded the album “City to City,” which included “Baker Street” and another hit, “Right Down the Line.” The “new dawning” in the “Baker Street” lyrics referenced the end of his legal battle with the record company.
Rafferty continued to record after “Baker Street” and remained critically well-respected. But he never duplicated his success with that song, in part because of his distaste for the music business and his discomfort with the public.
Here’s Rafferty with “Baker Street.” This and other songs on the album hearkened back to a mellow sound that preceded the emerging punk mood. Interestingly, this “official” video shows little of Ravenscroft as he plays his solo.
Rafferty continued to record after “Baker Street” and remained critically well-respected. But he never duplicated his success with that song in part because of his distaste for the music business, his discomfort with the public and the increasing effects of his long-term alcoholism. He died from failure of his liver and other organs shortly after being taken off of life support. He was 63.
“Stuck in the Middle” was a scathing indictment of the music business (aren’t all indictments scathing?). Some people thought it was a new Bob Dylan song. It was, in fact, written as a Dylan parody.
Maybe a beloved cartoon character should get credit for the famous solo.
