FIRST POST: Max Roach-One of the best Jazz Drummers of All Time

“Max, hands down, is one of the greatest soloists of all time…Max plays musical lines with dynamics and space. What he doesn’t play is just as important as what he does play.” ~ Kenny Washington, drummer. Max Roach was a unique drummer and is considered a very important figure for jazz drummers. He played many different kinds of music and had the opportunity to play with numerous famous jazz artists such as Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, and Clifford Brown. He was one of the first drummers to be introduced to the bebop on Fifty-second Street and Harlem. He was born in Pasquotank County, North Carolina, on January 10^th, 1924. His family moved to New York when he was four and he picked up the bugle. When he turned 12, he was given his first drum set. He started touring with some big name jazz groups after he graduated from high school. He created his own quartet in 1954, which was lead by Clifford Brown along with Sonny Rollins, Richie Powell, and George Morrow. There were many composers and arrangers who helped the quartet write music, but Roach wrote the majority of the compositions for his quartet. Some people say that every time he plays the drums, he’s creating a new composition. In 1995 he recorded with Dinah Washington and traveled with her to the Newport Jazz Festival in 1958. Roach had two kids with one wife, one kid with another, twins with another wife.

In 1960, Max recorded an album called We Insist! Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite with singer Abbey Lincoln, who was currently his wife. Lyricist Oscar Brown Jr. wrote the lyrics. He recorded the album as he was becoming a rights activist for African-Americans. The lyrics for the songs in the album reflect on black rights and African culture. They talk about struggles in Africa and about slavery and being mistreated in America. He was the drummer for the album along with a singer Abbey Lincoln, trumpeter Booker Little, trombonist Julian Priester, and Coleman Hawkins. The album was produced when the American civil rights movement began. Roach came out with yet another album in 1966 called Drums Unlimited. He had many songs that were only made up of long drum solos and the album made him famous for proving that drums sound good by themselves as a solo instrument. He formed an all percussion ensemble in 1970 called M’Boom with Fred King, Joe Chambers, Warren Smith, Roy Brooks, Freddie Waits, Eli Fountain, Francisco Mora, Ray Mantilla, and Omar Clay. For a short amount of time Max was a professor at the University of Massachusetts and taught master drumming classes.

In the 1980’s, Max decided to become the coolest drummer ever and perform concerts with nothing but his drum set. He would improvise at the concerts and somehow he was able to keep the attention of the audience members. Bay State recorded one of his infamous solo concerts and one of his concerts is on youtube. To make some extra money on the side he wrote compositions for plays. Surprisingly he even performed in a hip-hop concert because he felt that the black musicians felt the same way he did when he was younger.

Sadly, Max died in 2007 in Manhattan. Around two thousand people were at his funeral and he now rests in the Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx of New York. “No one ever wrote a bad thing about Max Roach’s music or his aura until 1960, when he and Charlie Mingus protested the practices of the Newport Jazz Festival.” ~ Lieutenant Governor of New York David Paterson, at a funeral tribute for Roach.

Just from listening to Max’s music myself, I can say that he is definitely not overrated for his skills. Although the waltz music he plays is not exactly my type of music, I know that he is amazing at drumming. I watched some of his full concert solos on youtube, and they’re absolutely fascinating to me. He can take such a simple little beat or fill and suddenly change it into something that sounds ridiculously good. His use of dynamics and accents makes his solos suspenseful and interesting. He knows exactly when to hit the drums hard or soft and is always on the beat. It’s unbelievable how much skill Roach had. He could play a twenty minute simple solo and easily keep an audience intrigued.

I listened to a few songs from various jazz groups Max was in, and my favorite song by far was a song called Joy Spring by Clifford Brown and the Max Roach Quintet. Roach played the entire song with brushes did a great job of keeping the song together and keeping the rhythm. At the beginning of the song, a saxophonist and trumpeter took mind-boggling solos. During this time, Max’s drumming is really tight and he sticks to the beat while occasionally adding some cool off-beat licks to add to add a little bit of spice to the music. At around four minutes and twenty seconds, he starts trading fours with the trumpeter. His fills are pretty basic, but he makes them seem like they’re really complex. Then, the saxophonist takes a four bar solo before Max breaks into a crazy cool thirty-two bar brush solo. To wrap up the song, he plays some tight fourth beat rim shots in the background while the rest of the instruments play a melody.