On this date, March 3, 2003, Ray Jackson who found fame with British folk-rock band Lindisfarne threatened legal action against Rod Stewart over his 1970s hit song “Maggie May.” Jackson claimed he came up with the worldwide hit’s classic mandolin melody and claimed he may have lost at least £1m because he was not credited for the track’s distinctive hook. Jackson was paid just £15 for the recording session by Stewart in 1971. He began wondering about royalties in 1995 when he heard his mandolin solo used in a television commercial for a bank. Jackson developed the Maggie mandolin licks impromptu in the recording studio.
His mandolin contribution is often credited with being the most famous mandolin part in pop music.
Jackson played the mandolin solo on “Maggie May,” as well as on “Mandolin Wind,” both songs on Stewart’s 1971 “Every Picture Tells A Story” album. A very big reason he’s been a mystery player all these years is that Stewart didn’t care enough about the mandolin player to let the world know who he was. Even though it was likely Jackson’s extended mandolin solo at the end that gave the song a distinctive lilt and lifted it to Number One on the pop charts in both the U.K. and the U.S. The liner notes by Stewart on the LP album cover say: “The mandolin was played by the mandolin player in Lindisfarne. The name slips my mind.” In the intervening years some people have come to think Stewart played the mandolin on the track in the absence of Jackson’s name in the minds of the public.
“I was hardly 21 years of age and had very little experience of session work apart from with my band Lindisfarne, and one session for Long John Baldry,” Jackson said. “I was very nervous, as I was the only guy on the session. All the other musicians had completed their parts and had left the studio. I was the last player to overdub on the album before it was mixed. There was only Rod and the engineer behind the glass and I was out on the studio floor”
His ax was a Japanese-made “Columbus” acoustic-electric mandolin. Engineers put two AKG microphones on it and got a studio sound from it that Jackson says he hasn’t been able to repeat. “The track I was asked to play on was Mandolin Wind which I listened through to a few times,” Jackson said. “Once I had completed the solo. I was asked if I could come up with something on another track (Maggie May) which may or may not be included on the album. I was played the end a few times which is where Rod wanted ‘that something’ to be. I came up with the part on the spot, double tracked it a few times and was invited to listen back in the control room. He seemed pleased with the result and I left the studio. I was paid the standard musicians union three-hour session rate for the time, which now wouldn’t buy more than a few beers.” Jackson’s mandolin gave the song a punchy, pretty, melodic line.