Famous musician, keyboardist Mike Finnigan, who Wichita claimed as its own, has died
A famous musician Wichita claimed as its own has died, and he’s being mourned not only by locals but by many well-known music stars across the country.
Mike Finnigan, a famous keyboardist and session musician who was also a former KU basketball player and onetime Wichita resident, died Wednesday in Los Angeles, friends are reporting. Finnigan, who was 76, had been hospitalized and was fighting kidney cancer in recent weeks. Finnigan and the Phantom Blues Band had been scheduled to perform on Sept. 3 at Knuckleheads in Kansas City, Missouri. His son Kelly is performing with them instead.
“There are great players and then there are people who are just touched,” said Drake Macy, a local musician whose father, Ed Macy Sr., was one of Finnigan’s early Wichita band mates. “Mike was definitely one of those. He just had an approach that no one else did. I’ve loved a lot of great singers in my day, but Mike Finnigan, in my opinion, is the best singer to this point who has ever walked the planet.”
Social media lit up with posts about Finnigan’s death on Wednesday evening, and by Thursday morning, tributes were popping up from around the country.
The official Facebook account for Bonnie Raitt, with whom Finnigan toured and recorded, posted on Thursday morning that Raitt was “rocked to the core” by news of Finnigan’s dealth.
“Mike was one of the most powerful, virtuosic soul/gospel/blues singers and Hammond B3 players you’ll ever be blessed to hear,” the post read. “Respected and emulated by musicians the world over, his legacy of staggering performances across his 60+ years career will stand the test of time. He stopped our show nearly every night. There was simply no one like him.”
Finnigan, who was born in Ohio, was a 6-foot-3 basketball star who was recruited in 1963 to play at KU. But he gave up hoops and moved to Wichita, where he became a regular performer on the club scene. Soon, he was renowned for his skill on the Hammond B-3 Organ.
In the 1960s, he joined a Wichita band called The Serfs, and in 1968, at a New York recording studio, The Serfs met Jimi Hendrix and recorded on the “Electric Ladyland” album.
In the 1970s, Finnigan moved Los Angeles and became one of the most revered session players on the music scene. Throughout his career, he toured or recorded with such acts as Dave Mason; Taj Mahal; Big Brother and the Holding Company; Jerry Hahn; Maria Muldaur; Rod Stewart; Dan Fogelberg; Etta James; Blood, Sweat and Tears; Peter Frampton; and Joe Cocker.
In the early 2000s, Finnigan joined the Grammy-winning Phantom Blues Band, which was formed as a studio band to back up Taj Mahal, as keyboardist and vocalist. The group went on to win many awards.
Finnigan frequently returned to Wichita, where his wife, Candy — a well-known alcohol and drug addiction specialist who appeared on TV’s “Intervention” — was raised. He and the Phantom Blues Band opened for Joe Cocker during a 2008 concert at the Kansas Coliseum and returned to perform at the Wichita Riverfest in 2013. The last time Finnigan performed in Wichita was in 2017, when he was on stage at The Cotillion with the Phantom Blues Band.
Finnigan was also a popular musical figure in Kansas City. In 2004, he told The Kansas City Star about his brief career as a KU basketball player.
“I started getting interested in the music scene right away, which no one in the basketball program was too thrilled with. Their philosophy was: You show another interest and you’re out.
“My dad, ever the realist, said, “They hired you to do something; you’re supposed to concentrate on that.” I was 18 and thought that was terribly unfair. There was talk about redshirting me, and I thought, “Maybe this wasn’t what I was supposed to do.” My heart wasn’t in it. So I dropped out. KU had always had a great program and there was no point in someone keeping a scholarship if I wasn’t 100 percent devoted to it.”
After joining The Serfs and playing in Wichita, he appeared at a number of Kansas City venues. “Back in those days, if you were good and you wanted to work, you could find live gigs,” he told The Star. “In Kansas City there were scads of places to play. Every other joint had a live band, at least a trio.”
Soon they began playing around the country and got a deal with Capitol Records. Jimi Hendrix heard them and invited them to join him in a long jam that became “Still Raining, Still Dreaming.”
Finnigan is survived by his wife, Candy Finnigan, daughter Bridget and son Kelly, who is also a musician.
This story was originally published August 12, 2021 at 1:04 PM.
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