Jazz drum historians I need your help!

cantstoplt021

Senior Member
I'm doing a presentation for my jazz history class that is focusing on the development of jazz drumming. I want to focus on how jazz drumming styles have evolved over time and I'd like to incorporate some playing into it as well as recordings of players. I was planning on starting with early drummers and transitioning to later players (nothing too modern though). Who are some highly influential players I should reference? For example as I understand it Kenny Clarke was one of the first to start using the bass drum as a comping device rather than as a time keeping (four on the floor) device. I was also planning on playing some comping figures from Art of Bop drumming to show how drumming became more triplet based and complex overtime. As you know the book starts off with simple phrases (which I'm guessing corresponds to early drummers) and gradually gets more complex, (later drummers?).

Also curious why jazz is one of the only styles of American music without a backbeat? I guess the hi hat could be one, but It's far different than any other style I can think of.
 
Google Mel Lewis's history of jazz drumming series of interviews. Also read this-- about Kenny Clarke's innovations. Tracking down Wilcoxon's drum method and reading this might help for comparing bop drumming with swing/earlier drumming. The players I would be checking out to get the historical progression are Baby Dodds > Jo Jones > Kenny Clarke > Max Roach/Art Blakey. Maybe check out Danny Gottlieb's Evolution of Jazz Drumming, and Jim Chapin's Advanced Techniques, too. Don't know how much time you have to invest in your research for this presentation.

Be aware that the mature bop "style" as presented in Riley's book really wasn't fully happening and standardized until the 50s. You rarely hear people playing with that level of independence before Elvin Jones, actually.

re: backbeat: There is a backbeat in bop, it's just usually stated more subtly than by playing accents on the snare drum-- it's expressed in the cymbal rhythm and in the hihat, sometimes on the snare drum.
 
The back beat is one of the defining features of jazz. The thing that made r&b different was that it introduced the heavy back beat for the entire song. Modern pop styles derive from the r&b side of things that's all
 
I'm doing a presentation for my jazz history class that is focusing on the development of jazz drumming. I want to focus on how jazz drumming styles have evolved over time and I'd like to incorporate some playing into it as well as recordings of players. I was planning on starting with early drummers and transitioning to later players (nothing too modern though). Who are some highly influential players I should reference? For example as I understand it Kenny Clarke was one of the first to start using the bass drum as a comping device rather than as a time keeping (four on the floor) device. I was also planning on playing some comping figures from Art of Bop drumming to show how drumming became more triplet based and complex overtime. As you know the book starts off with simple phrases (which I'm guessing corresponds to early drummers) and gradually gets more complex, (later drummers?).

Also curious why jazz is one of the only styles of American music without a backbeat? I guess the hi hat could be one, but It's far different than any other style I can think of.

As a college professor, I'm inclined to ask if you've considered going to the library? Somehow, I think you will get more detailed information that way.
 
Watch Steve Smith's DVD History of the US Beat. Peace and goodwill.
 
His entire presentation is in these two things. They're not available in any library.

Yes, those are great sources, but there's plenty more out there. And by try the library what I meant, which admittedly wasn't very clear, is do the work. You learn a lot more that way.

I'm not sure what level of school he's in, but in college a two-source presentation wouldn't cut it.
 
Back
Top