Garth Hudson wove a musical spell on listeners

Hudson was the last surviving member of the influential rock group The Band

- Agencies

Garth Hudson, the Band's virtuoso keyboardist and all-around musician who drew from a unique palette of sounds and styles to add a conversational touch to such rock standards as Up on Cripple Creek and The Weight, has died at age 87. Hudson was the eldest and last surviving member of the influential group that once backed Bob Dylan and helped deepen and reshape modern American music.

A rustic figure with an expansive forehead and sprawling beard, Hudson was a classically trained performer and self-educated Greek chorus who spoke through piano, synthesizers, horns and his favored Lowrey organ. No matter the song, Hudson summoned just the right feeling or shading, whether the tipsy clavinet and wah-wah pedal on Up on Cripple Creek, the galloping piano on Rag Mama Rag or the melancholy saxophone on It Makes No Difference.