Willard "Pop" Jones

Willard Jones (at the piano) with Ronny Hawkins, 1958.

Piano player Will "Pop" Jones was one of the original Hawks, recruited to the group in 1957 by his cousins Ray and George Paulman, just before the first member of what later should become the Band, Levon Helm, took the drummer's seat in the Hawks. Jones' style of piano playing, labeled "kamikaze rockabilly piano" by Helm and often causing piano hammers to come popping out, became one the Hawks' trademarks both live, on TV shows, and on their recordings. When Jones, and a little later keyboardist Stan Szelest, finally left Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks in 1961, Hawkins instead talked Garth Hudson into joining the group.