Johnny Jenkins

The guitarist, singer and songwriter Johnny Jenkins, who has died aged 67 of a stroke, proved a massive influence on acts from his home town, Macon, Georgia, such as Otis Redding and the Allman Brothers, and also those from further afield such as Jimi Hendrix. On a visit to Macon, Hendrix had noted the flamboyance of Jenkins' left-handed, upside-down guitar playing and realised that showmanship, like playing the guitar behind the head, was a very good gimmick.

A lifelong stalwart of the Macon scene, Jenkins played in local venues such as Mann's Drive-In and Club 15. He played "battle of the band" gigs and developed an astonishing stage act. Charles Davis, the drummer with Jenkins' early group, the Pinetoppers, said: "Johnny was Prince before there was a Prince. He was a real hippie. He was really laid-back until he got on stage, and then he was a wild man."

His 1962 regional hit was Love Twist which sold 25,000 copies. But his big break came when he was invited to play in Memphis with the newest R&B dream team, Booker T & The MGs. Joe Galkin, the local rep for Atlantic Records, had talked up Jenkins' talents with Jerry Wexler, vice-president of Atlantic Records, and it was Galkin's idea to team Jenkins and Booker T & The MGs.

At that time, Jenkins had no driving licence so his friend Otis Redding, then an unknown singer, had driven him from Macon to Memphis for the session. When it was over, Jenkins suggested cutting something with Redding in the remaining studio time.

As Steve Cropper, the band's guitarist, says in Scott Freeman's biography, Otis!: "I thought Otis Redding was Johnny Jenkins's driver. He was just helping out, unloading the amps and stuff... He just kind of sat around all day long... Otis sat down at the piano and said, 'I don't play anything. Can you just play me some triplets?' So I started playing and he came out [singing], These Arms of Mine." Jenkins played guitar alongside Cropper on piano in a spontaneous arrangement. It was the start of Redding's career. (That is the accepted story although Robb Bowman in his extensive notes to The Otis Redding Story (1987) quotes Phil Walden, Redding's manager, as saying that everything was not quite as casual as the historical record might seem.)

In fact, Walden chose Jenkins as his first signing - before Redding or the Allmans. Walden's Capricorn label released Jenkins' best-known album Ton Ton Macoute! (1970) with members of the Allmans, including Duane Allman on guitar. It included Walk On Gilded Splinters, a song already made popular in the US by Dr John the Night Tripper and, in Britain, by Marsha Hunt.

More than 25 years later Jenkins released Blessed Blues (1996) for the same label. It is arguably Jenkins' most rounded album, though he also went on to record Handle With Care (2001) and All In Good Time (2003).

However much he shaped popular music history in the wider sense, he was pre-eminently a local musician with an international following. His wife Janet predeceased him in 2001. He is survived by his children, Johnny, Kelvin and Stacy and eight grandchildren.

· Johnny Jenkins, guitarist, singer and songwriter, born March 5 1939; died June 26 2006

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