Fast forward to December ’08. Since SXSW, the Welsh singer has invaded the States, appearing on Saturday Night Live and landing huge radio hits with “Mercy” and “Stepping Stone.” Anchoring the Duffy collective from behind the keys is Ayo Oyerinde, a monster player who fuels the band’s groove, whether the singer is crooning like Al Green or rocking with fury. “SXSW was actually my first time in the States,” says Ayo. “It’s been crazy! There’s been a lot of hype about Duffy over the water. She’s the number-one selling artist in England and the fifth in the world in 2008. She’s massive in England. She got picked up by some big names over here [in the U.S.] and we’ve done a lot of big TV programs,” he continues, laughing. “We’ve been on everything bar Oprah!”
FINDING DUFFY
Duffy’s band is a family, both figuratively and literally. “My younger brother Tobi is the MD,” says Ayo. “It’s a family thing. I remember him talking about her to me, before I joined the band. He had known her through a friend and he played me the stuff. Back then, it was all acoustic.”
When it came time to find a keyboard player, Ayo was not the first to try for the prize. “There was no headhunting,” he says. “They had auditions and all the top names came. They tried out 25 players on each instrument and within that were a lot of people I know, really good musicians, but I don’t think they were feeling that. They didn’t want a total session musician vibe.” What they did want was the musical familiarity and communication that a pair of brothers could provide. “They ended up getting in touch with me and the rest is history. They wanted a great dynamic between the players, something between a session musician vibe and a band thing.”
Though Ayo was well prepared for the Duffy opportunity when it came along, his path to that point was a circuitous one. “I didn’t start playing music until I was 15,” he says. “Really, quite late. I used to play basketball before I got into music. I excelled quite far in that, but when I made the switch, I started playing instruments in church. I started on clarinet and I wasn’t great, so one day I sat down at the keyboards and pieced together what I could. One lady in church was a classically trained pianist and I took lessons from her. But then she had a child, and we stopped working together. I took what I learned and ran with it.” For more of Ayo’s musical background, see “Ayo Details” on page 30.
GEAR ON THE ROAD
When Ayo plays in the States, he doesn’t bring his own keyboards. Rather, he rents similar instruments to the ones he plays in the U.K. and loads his sounds onto them pre-gig; “On the Triton, I’ve got some sounds saved on a floppy, and for the RD-700SX I’ve got all my patches saved as well,” he says. While this strategy may save major cartage bucks, it also led to the worst disaster Ayo has had on stage. “We do lots of festivals in the summer,” he says. “My sounds get loaded from disks and some careless technician decided to unplug my whole rig and plug it back in. I’m fiddling around like crazy to get my sounds loaded up — and I’m playing throughout the whole gig! It’s literally just playing with one hand and pressing loads of buttons on other keyboards with the other hand at the same time!”
While the band plays most of its parts live, some sonic elements come from backing tracks, triggered live off-stage by the group’s guitar tech. “Some of the stuff is sequenced,” says Ayo. “I used to play string sounds live, but we chose to put them in tracks. I only have two hands!”
CREATIVITY AND THE FUTURE
When performing live, Ayo keeps close to the songs’ recorded versions. “The album was recorded before I got there,” he says. “Sometimes, you get gigs where you can put your spin on the album, and Duffy is 75%/25%. She really wants to hear the parts from the album. There’s not that much creation to do, but I’ve been able to put my stamp on it. For our song ‘Stepping Stone,’ I’ve added an atmospheric solo when I play it live. But otherwise, I’m basically playing the part from the recorded song pretty much exact.” Will Ayo’s creative contributions to the band continue into the future? “A new recording is in the cards,” he says.
Stylistically, Ayo must stay mindful as well. “There’s a small difference between soulful and rock-y,” he continues. “Our sound toes the line between Al Green and a lot of Brit rock bands. I need to stay very aware of which times she wants to go more soulful, and which times she wants to have the rock vibe.” For Ayo, the challenges have been well worth the effort. “Playing and touring with this group is a great experience,” he says. “It’s been wild!”
Ayo Details
Duffy webpage: www.iamduffy.com
Keyboard’s video interview with Ayo at South by Southwest ’08: livefrom.musicplayer.com and search “Ayo.”
Tweaking the Duffy piano sound for live performance: It doesn’t have a lot of bottom end and it’s compressed heavily with loads of reverb, so I have to tamper with it to make it fit each room. On-board EQ on the Roland RD- 700SX helps me get it quite quickly.
Organ sound on “Mercy”: Since I didn’t play that sound on the album, I had to recreate it. I used the Roland SRX expansion card “Keyboards of the ’60s and ’70s.” I had to mix and match several organs and do a bit of EQ. It’s an organ with no Leslie at all, like an old theater organ without vibrato.
How playing keyboards helped Ayo find love: When I was in school, one of my friends from the basketball club — we had never known that each other played music. We would leave training early, and discovered that we both were leaving to go to rehearsal. He played drums, I played keys. I went to his rehearsal once and played for his sister who was a singer — and married her this year.
Ayo’s other big gig: I joined the London Community Gospel Choir, and I became the music director. It’s the most notorious choir in Great Britain. Even though I’m the MD, it doesn’t fall apart when I’m touring with Duffy. The choir is constantly touring, and plays big gigs like Live 8. They also have a session agency — they send out singers and keyboard players on gigs.
London Community Gospel Choir webpage: www.lcgc.org.uk