Levon's voice was like a distillation of all the voices of American roots music, an original primal thing like the voices of Johnny Cash or Robert Johnson or Bill Monroe or Maybelle Carter. Like them it seemed to have always been, and it seemed that it would always go on. There was no mistaking that voice or the great backbeat he played, and no possible reaction except joy and wonder at his ability to combine both at once (how do drummers play and sing at the same time, anyway?).
The simplicity and deep groove of his drumming, a signature of the Band as surely as Robbie Robertson's Tele twang, is not as often discussed as his singing, but it's impossible to imagine The Weight or Rag Mama Rag or Up On Cripple Creek with any other drummer.
Even with his health problems in recent years, it was hard to think about this voice ever being gone, but we've lost him as surely as we've lost Johnson and all the rest. At least we have high-quality recordings of Helm singing and playing with the Band and elsewhere. Listen and remember. This was a giant.