Joey DeFrancesco sings a little and has been known to tinker with the trumpet. But he found his voice on the organ -- the old Hammond B-3.

In fact, the Hammond company had stopped manufacturing the B-3 until a 17-year-old DeFrancesco came along with "All of Me," his debut recording for Columbia Records.

		Pittsburgh Jazz Festival 2006 The Labor Day jazz fest, free to the public, begins at 1 p.m. Monday on Flagstaff Hill in Schenley Park. The schedule is as follows: 1 p.m.: Dwayne Dolphin. 2 p.m.: Salsamba. 3 p.m.: The Three Rivers Jazz Orchestra with special guests Sheryl Bailey and Dave Samuels. 4 p.m.: The Maureen & Dave Budway Quartet. 5 p.m.: The Joey DeFrancesco Trio.

The recording not only elevated DeFrancesco, who is now 35, into stardom, but helped to increase the visibility of old pioneers of the ponderous instrument.

"With my release of an album on a major label and me being so young, that really sparked a renewed interest in the instrument," said DeFrancesco from his home in Phoenix. "The Hammond had faded away because of the synthesizers. Hammond stopped producing the B-3 in 1975. Many of the guys who played it were still out there playing. I guess when I came out, it rejuvenated that whole thing.

"Some people thought it was a new sound. But then there were others who said, 'Wow. I remember that sound and love that sound.' The people who thought it was new later discovered it had been there for years. Then Hammond started making them again. It was just an evolution thing."

DeFrancesco's evolution began in Philadelphia, where he started playing the organ at 4. His father, Papa John DeFrancesco, an organist as well, introduced the young DeFrancesco to the instrument.

"We had an organ in the house, so I was always playing it," said DeFrancesco, who will perform here Monday in the inaugural Pittsburgh Jazz Festival. "I was also lucky enough to meet a lot of the great players like Jimmy Smith, Jimmy McGriff and Groove Holmes. They were all coming through Philadelphia or lived in the area. My dad introduced me to those guys."

By the time he was 10, DeFrancesco was working around Philadelphia with drummer Philly Joe Jones and saxophonist Hank Mobley.

After recording his first album for Columbia Records, he was hired by Mile Davis to join his band.

"He heard me play, liked it and asked me to join his band," said DeFrancesco. "I was with him about a half of a year. I left Miles to pursue my own thing. He understood, but looking back, I should have stayed with him longer. I wish I would have. I got to spend a lot of time with him on a personal level.

"It was incredible working with him. He was one of the masters of modern music. I learned a lot from Miles. Some things I didn't understand then, I understand now."

DeFrancesco also got to spend a great deal of time with organist Jimmy Smith.

"He kind of passed the torch over to me," said DeFrancesco. "I first met Jimmy when I was 7, but we really became close when he moved to Arizona. We were always together, and we talked about a lot of different things."

Smith died in February 2005 of natural causes. He was 76. But before his death, the two organists recorded "Legacy."

"Jimmy had the biggest influence on me musically," said DeFrancesco. "When we recorded together, we had no idea" his life was drawing to a close. "His death was all of a sudden. I guess I was lucky enough to play with him on his last recording."

DeFrancesco said Smith's impact on the music industry and the organ was far-reaching.

"The Hammond B-3 before Jimmy was used in church for gospel music," said DeFrancesco. "Wild Bill Davis kind of liberated the organ. He was the first to play the instrument with the bass line. But he approached it more like a big band.

"Jimmy took that style of playing the bass line on the organ rather than using a bass player, and he used more single note lines with the right hand to sound like a horn player. That was what drove everyone crazy. That really changed the way the instrument was played, and the sounds he came up with were incredible. He used simple, easy settings that no one had thought to use. He set the standard for everyone."

And now, DeFrancesco is setting his own standards.

"I'm 35 and I try not to think about how fast time has passed," he said. "It's been great, though. I've played with some of the greatest musicians in the world. All these years I've done nothing but played the organ. I'm making a decent living and I feel blessed."