An original member of the Mar-Keys, Don Nix went on to become a music producer; an influential force behind the sound that changed popular music forever.

Lesson One - Guitars Get Girls
Born in Memphis in 1941, Don Nix (photo right © The Don Nix Collection) met Steve Cropper and Donald “Duck” Dunn in elementary school and all attended Messick High School together in the mid 1950's. According to Nix, “We started to think seriously about wanting to get into music after discovering the music in roadhouses around Memphis, and, learning that in order to get girls we needed guitars, and we needed them quick.” Becoming fans of local black singers and musicians like Willie Mitchell, Al Jackson, Del Rois and “Sissy” Charles Turner, the teens would sneak into clubs, taking in all they could of the rich blues and R&B in their own back yard.

Willie Mitchell Was Cool. We Wanted to Be Just Like Him
Nix joined the Royal Spades, the high school band Dunn and Cropper had formed, in 1960, when it was one of the “hottest bands around.” He played alto saxophone with “Packy” Axton, who played tenor sax, and they had a regular job in a roadhouse called Neil’s Hideaway. Don and “Packy” would work out riffs they picked up from the black bands they watched, especially Willie Mitchell. “Willie had the tightest five-piece band I have ever seen, to this day. Besides Willie on trumpet, he had James Lupor on tenor sax, Joe Hall on piano, Lewis Steinberg on bass, and the great Al Jackson on drums. They were awe-inspiring and we couldn’t get enough.”

“Last Night”
As the playing engagements got bigger and better, the Royal Spades decided to change their name to the Marquis, but since no one ever pronounced it correctly, they simplified it to the Mar-Keys. The forces of what would become the Stax legend then began to swirl around the unknowing youngsters, for it was about this time that “Packy” Axton talked his mother, Estelle, co-owner of the fledgling record company Satellite Records, into letting the band record what would become “Last Night.” Estelle Axton then pushed every DJ in Memphis to play the unlikely instrumental and “Last Night” quickly went to number one on the local charts, then rapidly became the first big hit from what would soon become Stax Records.

Musician To Producer
Nix went on the road with the Mar-Keys on the first Stax tour, which included Carla Thomas, and Mrs. Axton as Carla’s chaperone. He continued to play with the Mar-Keys as they toured for the next two years and then broke off as the band was morphing. He then moved to California, where he met and teamed with Leon Russell and found his niche, learning the art of music creation and record production from Russell. Nix followed a path closer to blues and rock, and took Southern roots music-gospel, soul, blues-along with him. He refined his production skills at Stax and Ardent Studios in Memphis, and at Leon Russell and Denny Cordell’s Shelter label. Nix produced such artists as Albert King, Delany and Bonnie, Joe Cocker, Sid Selvidge and Tracy Nelson. With Russell, he produced Gary Lewis and wrote one of the group’s greatest hits, “The Loser.”

From Beale Street
Always harkening back to the blues, he produced childhood hero Freddie King, and while working with King penned “Goin’ Down,” which became a blues standard for the likes of Jeff Beck, Joe Walsh, Led Zepplin and Pearl Jam. He released several of his own albums, some of which remain Memphis music classics. Charting new ground by merging genres when his guitarist left unexpectedly, he convinced old friend and legendary Beale Street bluesman “Furry” Lewis to overcome his fear of flying and join his band on tour in California. Unexpected to 70’s rock audiences, Nix and Lewis brought a fresh authenticity to the stage as the old bluesman meshed with the younger musicians.

Concert For Bangladesh
In 1971, when George Harrison, a confirmed fan of Southern soul, was organizing charity concerts for the Bangladesh Children’s Relief Fund, Don Nix was the person he asked to gather a “soul choir” to appear at the Madison Square Garden concerts. Nix assembled a brilliant group of vocalists including “Brown Sugar” Claudia Lennear (of the Shelter People and Ike and Tina Turner Review), Jeannie Green (sang back-up for Elvis), Marlin Greene (produced Percy Sledge’s “When A Man Loves A Woman”), and Don Preston (Frank Zappa’s band). Before going on stage Harrison told Nix he should also join the choir, and as Nix explained, “You don’t say no to a Beatle.”

In Good Company
Author of many blues classics, this former member of the band that set the wheels in motion for Stax spread his Southern “soul” far and wide during his career, working with the likes of Albert King, John Mayall, Delaney and Bonnie and Jeff Beck, to name a few. Don Nix was most recently recognized at the 2005 Blues Ball for his contribution to Memphis music with a Producers Award, along with a host of Memphis legends that included Alex Chilton, Jim Dickenson, Steve Cropper, Isaac Hayes and David Porter, Booker T. Jones, Chips Moman, Robert Palmer, Dan Penn, Sam Phillips and Willie Mitchell.