On an early May afternoon, Chuck Leavell was preparing for a sound check at Eddie’s Attic, where that night he would play a benefit concert for Westchester Elementary School in Decatur, which his grandsons, Miles and Rocco, attend.
Leavell was helping the school raise funds for musical instruments and field trips to explore music and nature — two things that are embedded in his soul.
For more than four decades, Leavell, an Alabaman-turned-Georgian, has played piano and keyboards with some of the grandest names in music — Dr. John, the Allman Brothers Band, Eric Clapton, his own Sea Level, John Mayer.