John Paul Jones

John Richard Baldwin was born in Sidcup, Kent, on 3 January 1946.[3] He started playing piano at age six, learning from his father, Joe Baldwin, a pianist and arranger for big bands in the 1940s and 1950s, notably with Ambrose and his Orchestra. His mother was also in the music business which allowed the family to often perform together touring around England as a vaudeville comedy act.[4] His influences ranged from the blues of Big Bill Broonzy, the jazz of Charles Mingus, to the classical piano of Sergei Rachmaninoff.[5]

Because his parents often toured, Baldwin was sent to boarding school at a young age.[6] He was a student at Christ’s College, Blackheath, London where he studied music formally. At the age of 14, Baldwin became choirmaster and organist at a local church and during that year, he also bought his first bass guitar, a Dallas Tuxedo solid body electric followed by multiple basses which he part exchanged until he finally bought his 1962 Fender Jazz Bass which he used until 1976. The fluid playing of Chicago musician Phil Upchurch on his You Can’t Sit Down LP, which includes a memorable bass solo, is cited by Jones as being his inspiration to take up the instrument