Duane Allman

Howard Duane Allman (November 20, 1946 – October 29, 1971) was an American rock and blues guitarist and the founder and original leader of the Allman Brothers Band, for which he was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995.

Born in Nashville, Tennessee, Allman began playing the guitar at age 14. He formed the Allman Brothers Band with his brother Gregg in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1969. The group achieved its greatest success in the early 1970s. Allman is best remembered for his brief but influential tenure in the band and in particular for his expressive slide guitar playing and inventive improvisational skills. A sought-after session musician both before and during his tenure with the band, Duane Allman performed with King Curtis, Aretha Franklin, Herbie Mann, Wilson Pickett, and Boz Scaggs. He also contributed to the only studio album by Derek and the Dominos, Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs (1970).

In 2003, he was ranked number 2 in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time, second only to Jimi Hendrix. In 2011, he was ranked number 9 and in 2023 he was ranked 10th. His guitar tone (achieved with a Gibson Les Paul and two 50-watt bass Marshall amplifiers) was named one of the greatest of all time by Guitar Player.

Duane Allman was born on November 20, 1946, in Nashville, Tennessee. He was the elder son of Willis Allman (1918–1949) who, at the time of his death, was a second lieutenant on active duty in the United States Army, having served as an Army non-commissioned officer during World War II; and Geraldine Allman (née Robbins) (1917–2015). His brother, Gregg, was born on December 8, 1947.

On December 26, 1949, when the family was living near Norfolk, Virginia, where he was stationed, Willis Allman was murdered during an armed robbery by Michael Robert "Buddy" Green (1923–2024), an Army veteran that Allman and another recruiting officer had befriended earlier that day. Green was captured, convicted, sentenced and paroled in 1972. So that she could retrain as an accountant, Geraldine "Mama A" Allman sent Duane and Gregg to Castle Heights Military Academy in Lebanon, Tennessee, which they both disliked intensely. In 1957, the family moved to Daytona Beach, Florida, where the boys attended Seabreeze High School.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.