Unsung heroes get credit at last

Session musicians are to the recording industry as screenwriters are to Hollywood: the backbone of a huge artistic and commercial enterprise who never get the attention they deserve. But the Musicians Hall of Fame, which has opened in Nashville, may change that.

Unlike other musical halls of fame, this one is about the people who do the magical guitar licks that turn a workmanlike tune into a number one hit.

Ever wondered who did those choo-bop-bop-bop-bops behind Joni Mitchell on Big Yellow Taxi, or the guitarist who gave a transcendent quality to Bob Dylan's Lay Lady Lay? The museum has the answers

One immediate inductee is Albert Lee, the 62-year-old British session musician known as the guitar player's guitar player for his technical virtuosity and his ability to enrich any genre, from country to rock'n'roll.

Lee has worked with Eric Clapton, Bill Wyman and Emmylou Harris but his solo career has never taken off the way many of his peers expected.

Some session musicians have their identities revealed, especially if they succeed as singers and songwriters in their own right.

It is now widely known, for example, that Clapton was responsible for the guitar work on his friend George Harrison's song While My Guitar Gently Weeps, and that Ry Cooder played the opening riff on the Rolling Stones' Honky Tonk Woman.

But many others have to be content with the adulation of their peers. Peter Drake, the guitarist on Lay Lady Lay, and Floyd "Lightnin" Chance, who played bass for Hank Williams on Your Cheatin' Heart, are perfect examples.

Nashville is an ideal location for the museum because the city is a session musicians' haven. Joe Chambers, the composer and guitar-store owner who set up the museum, can count on many of his friends to fill the place - either as honourees or visitors.

Neil Young participated in a promotional video, commenting: "You can see the hood ornament on the car if you go to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but if you want to look at the engine and see what's making it go, then you go to the Musicians Hall of Fame & Museum."

- INDEPENDENT