Al Kooper Justin Knight

"Professor Al" is how guitarist Jimmy Vivino, obviously relishing the irony, referred to the black-frocked figure seated at the Hammond B3 organ next to him at the Berklee Performance Center last November. The Rekooperators were on stage to provide an evening of blues and rock 'n' roll, all to benefit a new scholarship fund established by one of Berklee's newest faculty members: rock legend Al Kooper.

Even more than the average Berklee faculty member, Kooper looks like nobody's idea of a tweedy academician. His hair is an unruly mane of steely gray, and a wispy strand of whiskers droops from lower lip to chin. Dark glasses barely mask the look of bemusement that seems permanently installed on the face of this self-described "rock 'n' roll survivor."

But since the fall of 1997, this veteran of rock—previously responsible for the electrification of Bob Dylan, the invention of rock with horns in Blood, Sweat & Tears, the groundbreaking blues-rock of Super Session with Mike Bloomfield and Stephen Stills—has taken on a new role as teacher and mentor to young musicians. He's taught some songwriting courses but principally has made his home in the Music Production and Engineering Department and at Berklee College of Music as a whole.

"The really nice thing is, not only did teaching work out for Al, but he also got really enthused about the whole Berklee thing," says Executive Vice President Gary Burton, who has known Kooper for years. "Al really liked the big picture. He wanted to get involved in a bigger way."

One big way Kooper has gotten involved is the concert—Kooper intends for it to become an annual event—by the Rekooperators, which kicked off his "It Can Happen Fund," a scholarship pool that will help students with disabilities enjoy the fruits of a Berklee education. The concert, which raised $10,000, was sponsored by Newbury Comics and Risky Records. "It was awesome," says Scott Benson, software entrepreneur and Risky Records founder. "The guy's a rock legend. I was delighted to be involved."

Kooper's fund will provide adaptive equipment and other assistance for students who otherwise would be unable to pursue a music education. "I didn't want there to be any stumbling block for someone who is talented to take the curriculum here," says Kooper. The idea, Kooper explains, is simply this: "If you have the talent to come here, we can make it happen."

The new fund will supplement the college's continuing efforts to accommodate the special needs of students with physical disabilities. Campus facilities are wheelchair accessible. For blind students, of which Berklee has had more than a few, the library has a reading machine, which scans text and converts it to audio. The audiotaping of texts for courses such as music theory and ear training, which is done in-house by the Music Production and Engineering Department and the Learning Center, is "an ongoing project," says Bob Mulvey, special services coordinator and counselor. But more can be done, he says, such as exploring technologies for producing music texts in Braille.

Taking on the cause of disabled students as his "signature charity," as he calls it, is just one way Kooper has immersed himself in the Berklee community.

Kooper regularly plays his B3 and his mandolin at the Encore Gala as part of faculty guitarist Bob Doezema's group Blues after Dark. "Having Al Kooper here is a real plus for the college, for the students—and for me, to have the opportunity to play with him," says Doezema. "How he coaxes those unusual, totally Al Kooper sounds out of a B3—you find yourself recognizing lines from your favorite records growing up."

"I love to play. I'd play for the opening of a men's room," says Kooper. "I don't get to play enough. I have a great band, and they can't tour. It's the irony of my life."

With his Rekooperators colleagues tied down in steady gigs on late-night television—drummer Anton Fig on The Late Show with David Letterman, Vivino and bassist Mike Merritt on Late Night with Conan O'Brien—the 55-year-old Kooper has found a new love: teaching. "It's the light of my life now," says Kooper.

"Al is not just an academic; he's an enthusiast," says Chair of Music Production and Engineering William Scheniman. "He's very low-key in presentation and demeanor, but he's dead serious about this. If he has a problem, it's with a student who's not inflamed with passion. He's appalled at the concept of a slacker."

Kooper has particularly thrown himself into his course on the history of music production, for which he spent last semester writing a textbook to be published by Berklee Press.

"It's important to know where everything came from," says Kooper. "It bothers me, as a person, to have people walking around who don't know who the Isley Brothers are." For students who are 18 to 21 years old, he says, "In their world, all of a sudden there's Van Halen."

And no one can tell them where it all came from with more authority than Al Kooper.

"He is the history of production," says Scheniman. "He has a wealth of stories, and they're all told in the first person. It's not something he read in Musician magazine."

What Kooper has to teach is not all about gear and technique. "I teach a lot of real-worldism," says Kooper. Indeed, Berklee students take their notes from a guy who bluffed his way onto the B3, an instrument he'd never played before, for the recording session of Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone," talked his way into a producer job at Columbia Records at age 24, wrote "This Diamond Ring" in the '60s, and discovered Lynyrd Skynyrd in the '70s.

Kooper admits that his formula for success was "90 percent ambition and 10 percent talent," a recipe he thinks would work just as well today. But Berklee graduates, he says, will be able to mix in another ingredient: knowledge.

"Many of the people in the decision-making process [in the music business] don't know anything about the things I'm teaching," says Kooper. "Berklee students, after four years of intense preparation, are so overqualified they'll wipe out the competition. I'm impressed by the seniors. I don't know if I could make it through four years here."