JESSEL, JOHN (aka J.J.)
John Jessel was David Paich's personal assistant on tour. David on J.J. in an interview with Frank Achmann in 1999:
Now what JJ's doing, JJ's not playing really keys, what he's doing is certain sound effects
and certain horn things that we try and cover for the record, so he sits playing
a couple of horn samples here and there, and by singing - he's also singing -
and playing some samples.
Since Steve Porcaro left the band, David can't play all the keyboard-parts
and that's where J.J. is the helping hand. His task during the
concerts:
- checking set-up David (before the show)
- third hand keyboardplaying when necessary (complex songs as
Rosanna or the normal parts during solo's)
- singing backgroundvocals
- triggering recorded background-vocals (start in time and keeping
the measure so they don't play the exact rhythm every night)
- doing the pre-mix of the keyboards
He is played behind David Paich on the stage, surrounded by David's
soundmodules, two keyboards (Yamaha KX88 and Clavinova (Paich
uses that pianosound on stage)), a lesliebox (model 147) and some
more technical stuff.
During the "vacation-concert" july '96 in the Paradiso theater (Amsterdam), the Netherlands, Toto asked
for requests. David en Steve could not sing the old ones, from
Isolation or Turn Back, and they were looking "Who knows
the lyrics and can sing this song ?". After a few looks J.J.
came on stage, grabbed a mike and sang old favorites like "Manuela
run" and "White sister" perfectly, just like Bobby.
(Thanks to Cor van 't Woudt)
Since 2003 JJ is no longer touring with TOTO