How Philly jazz pianist ....

DAVID MAIALETTI / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

How Philly jazz pianist got his dream gig touring with Adele

Updated: SEPTEMBER 7, 2016 — 12:58 PM EDT
by Dan DeLuca, MUSIC CRITIC

As a boy, Eric Wortham II - the Philadelphia pianist who has spent 2016 touring the world in Adele's backing band - went to a church convention in Baltimore.

Singing in the choir, he happened to be standing with a view of an organ player who was working the keys and pedals of a Hammond B-3.

"I was looking at his hands, and was just mesmerized watching him," recalled Wortham, 33, sitting by a Yamaha grand piano at Chris' Jazz Café ("My favorite jazz club in the city") before his two weekend gigs with the British pop superstar at the sold-out Wells Fargo Center. "Pressing buttons and changing sounds. And when he changed configurations of the rhythm, it changed everyone's attitude in the room.

"Even at 6 years old, I found that fascinating. I thought, 'Man, I could do that.' It had that beautiful, churchy sound. People would stand, or cry, or start dancing, depending on what he would do. It was beautiful to watch someone who understood people, and who would assist with their emotions. It was almost as if he were a magician."

Back home in West Philadelphia, where the family lived before moving to Mount Airy when Wortham was in second grade, social life revolved around the activities at a Pentecostal church in Olney where his namesake father preached. Wortham broke out the family's cheap Casio keyboard and found that, with practice, he could make those sounds, and affect how people felt.


And so began the musical journey that took him first to the High School for the Creative and Performing Arts in South Philadelphia, where he would regularly cut school and spend days educating himself via the vinyl jazz collection at the Free Library. Shows with his own ensemble, as well as jobs backing up Philly vocalists such as Laurin Talese, Bilal, and Jill Scott eventually led to his current enviable gig, which he auditioned for via Skype from Turtle Studios in South Philadelphia. Adele watched from London.

read more: http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/20160908_Philly_pianist_in_Adele_s_touring_band_talks_about_his_enviable_gig.html