Blues Traveler Still Giving the Run-Around
John Popper can sing the complicated jazz tune “Whiplash” practically in his sleep. The song, featured prominently in the Oscar-winning movie of the same name, is burned into Popper’s brain because of the same man who inspired the devilish bandleader in the film: Anthony Biancosino. “Dr. B,” as he was affectionately known, was an award-winning high school band teacher at Princeton High School in Princeton, N.J. (where Popper and Whiplash director Damien Chazelle both attended, decades apart). And while he wasn’t nearly the authoritarian as he’s exaggerated to be in the 2014 movie, Dr. B did help Popper — the frontman and harmonica player for the Grammy-winning band Blues Traveler — flourish as a musician.