Ray Paczkowski

jam band · rock

Ray Paczkowski is an American keyboardist based in Burlington, Vermont, known for Hammond B3 organ, clavinet and Wurlitzer electric piano and for a percussive style that sits inside a groove rather than on top of it. He worked as a milkman before music became his full-time occupation and came up through the Burlington scene, playing in the group Viperhouse from 1996 to 2000 and in the jazz trio Vorcza. He has been the keyboardist in the Trey Anastasio Band since 2001, and also played in Anastasio's larger Octet and Dectet configurations and in 70 Volt Parade; between 2003 and 2006 he performed with Dave Matthews and Friends. Since 2011 he has recorded and toured as half of Soule Monde, an organ-and-drums duo with Trey Anastasio Band drummer Russ Lawton whose avant-funk improvisations rest on the pair's long rapport; the duo cut Mimi Digs It at Sugarhouse Studios in Waitsfield, Vermont in early 2021. In 2020 he and Lawton added guitarist Scott Metzger of Joe Russo's Almost Dead to form the instrumental trio LaMP, a group that came together at Nectar's in Burlington. LaMP released a self-titled debut in 2020, the double live album Live at Nectar's in 2024, and the ten-track One of Us in 2025 on Royal Potato Family, recorded at Tank Recording Studio in Burlington. Paczkowski recovered from brain surgery in 2018 and returned to touring. Across his projects he works as a supporting rather than a fronting musician, anchoring grooves and supplying counter-melody, and the LaMP and Soule Monde sets in particular are built on open-ended improvisation between longtime collaborators rather than on a fixed arrangement.

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