Anthony Jackson

Jackson played piano before starting guitar in his teens. When he turned to bass guitar, he was inspired by James Jamerson and Jack Casady. Jackson worked as a session musician, in the Billy Paul band, and with Philadelphia International Records. Paul’s 1972 hit "Me and Mrs. Jones" was Jackson’s first No. 1 record. His performance on "For the Love of Money" by The O'Jays helped move the song to No. 9 on the pop chart and No. 3 on the R&B chart in 1974.

In 2016 Jackson had to miss some performances with Hiromi, due to ill health.

From 1982 onwards Jackson exclusively played a contrabass. Prior to 1982 his main instruments included a 1973 Fender Precision Bass, a 1973 Fender Jazz bass fitted with a 1975 Precision neck, and a Gibson EB-2D bass. In 1984 Fodera introduced their first Anthony Jackson Signature Model contrabass, followed in 1989 with a single cutaway model, the “Anthony Jackson Presentation Contrabass Guitar”.

Danelectro (1956), Fender (1961) and other manufacturers had produced six-string basses tuned one octave below a guitar (EADGBE), and Jackson had briefly played a Fender five-string bass tuned EADGC. Jackson first approached various luthiers in 1974 about the construction of his idea for a “contrabass guitar” tuned in fourths BEADGC, and Carl Thompson built the first six-string for Jackson in 1975. He first performed on the Thompson-built bass in 1975, recording with Carlos Garnett and touring with Roberta Flack. He later approached luthier Ken Smith to build him a six string bass before finally playing instruments made by New York-based bass makers, Fodera.

Anthony Jackson (June 23, 1952) is an American bassist known for his many session recordings, live performances, and his role in developing a new design of the six-string bass guitar, which he called a contrabass guitar. He has been described as “one of the masters of the instrument”.