Danny Federici

Daniel Paul Federici (January 23, 1950 – April 17, 2008) was an American musician, best known as a founding member of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, where he was its organist, accordionist and glockenspiel player. Federici appeared on ten of Springsteen's studio albums.

In 2014, Federici was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the E Street Band.

Federici started to play accordion when he was seven years old, which he learned from watching The Lawrence Welk Show. When he mastered classical music and polka, his mother booked him at parties, clubs and on radio. While he continued his studies in classical accordion, he gained an interest in jazz and blues, after he heard a professor at the Neupauer Conservatory of Music in Philadelphia play those styles on accordion.

During in-concert band intros, Springsteen often referred to him as "Phantom", sometimes said to be because of an incident in Asbury Park in the 1960s where Federici evaded a police crackdown that resulted in the arrest of numerous others. Federici attended Hunterdon Central High School in New Jersey. When he, along with Vini Lopez, started the band Child at the end of the 1960s, their choice for a singer was Springsteen; Federici also joined Springsteen in other early efforts such as Steel Mill.

Federici's organ fills are a key component in the E Street sound, and sometimes take on a more prominent role, such as on the hit "Hungry Heart". He pioneered the trademark E Street glockenspiel sound with a rare keyboard glockenspiel known as a Jenco Celestette, which Danny would perch atop his Hammond B3 Organ. The design is unique in that there are resonator tubes similar to those of vibes protruding vertically from the top in staggered lengths resembling calliope or organ pipes, amplifying the horizontal xylophone-like bell bars below which were struck by keyboard actuated hammers much like that of a piano. He subsequently used electronic keyboards to simulate the glockenspiel sound. Another notable performance is his accordion solo on "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)". It was reported in an interview in Backstreets Magazine that Federici did not have the best working relationship while playing with pianist David Sancious in the early days of the E Street Band, because Sancious would comment on Federici's parts and constantly tell him what to play and what not to play. Keyboard Magazine published an article in 2008 detailing the instrumentation Danny used.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.