The Band gets lifetime Grammy

The Band is on a list of recipients of Lifetime Achievement Grammys announced Tuesday by the U.S.-based Recording Academy.

The members of the Band first worked together as The Hawks, the backing band of rockabilly singer Ronnie Hawkins from 1959 until 1963; they were also known as Levon and the Hawks. (In about 1966, they released a single on Ware Records under the name the Canadian Squires). Afterwards, Bob Dylan recruited the group for his 1965–1966 world tour. They also joined him on the informal recordings that later became The Basement Tapes.

Dubbed "The Band" by their record company (a name derived from how they were referred to during their tenure with Dylan), the group left Woodstock, New York to begin recording their own material. They recorded two of the most acclaimed albums of the late 1960s; their 1968 debut Music from Big Pink (featuring the single "The Weight") and 1969's The Band. They broke up in 1976, but reformed in 1983 without founding guitarist Robbie Robertson.

The Band, more than any other group, put rock and roll back in touch with its roots. With their ageless songs and solid grasp of musical idioms, the Band reached across the decades, making connections for a generation that was, as an era of violent cultural schisms wound down, in desperate search of them. They projected a sense of community in the turbulent late Sixties and early Seventies - a time when the fabric of community in the United States was fraying.

With its rock-ribbed, austerely precise arrangements and a catalogue of songs that linked American folklore to primal myths, the Band - four Canadians and a Southerner - made music that was both earthy and mystical, still unsurpassed in its depth and originality.