John Coltrane, April 1966 © Chuck Stewart Photography, LLC
Chuck Stewart’s photography provided by Fireball Entertainment Group, courtesy of Chuck Stewart Photographs of John Coltrane, Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution
Dave Prater played a quietly essential role in Sam & Dave, and it takes only a slightly closer listen to their discography to hear the vital contributions of the duo’s soft-spoken half.
From the beginning of Sam & Dave’s career, Sam’s otherworldly high tenor overshadowed Dave’s low harmony, and for a variety of reasons—some personal, some practical, some musical—the history of the duo has been rewritten in the nearly thirty years since Prater’s death so as to diminish Dave’s contributions.