My buddy Don Jesse was a couple of years older than me, a better drummer and played in the "rival" band.
He could tune drums really well and before I learned how, he would come to my gigs and say "let me tune your tubs"
Mostly they sounded great but sometimes they'd sound really weird and he'd be watching from the audience and laughing at me.
Our bands often gigged together and we'd do a 'drum battle' which we worked on ahead of time, leaving the last part unscripted, and that's when he would blow me away on chops. It took me half a century to finally be able to kick his butt a little, but I did.
Don played in one 3 piece group, Guitar front man , Don on drums and playing trumpet with one hand, the B3 player on keys and trumpet too. Later in life, Don, a master brush player, worked with sax man Tommy Wills almost exclusively.
In high school I played with a popular band and we got 'taken under the wing' of a drummer who led his own band, He got us to join the union, helped us with getting gigs and looking and being professional. His band Keetie and the Kats, put out a record in '62 that I think, really displays Keetie's talent. The drums are tuned and recorded great, his parts significantly contribute to the arrangement and I feel his band was ahead of the curve at that time.
Later the band was Keetie and the Kasuals
My other mentor was and older drummer in my town named Mike Brown. I didn't know him at all but had heard of him.
He calls me up one day and asks if I would help him take his drums to a gig. Happy to, I went with him to Franklin College about 20 miles from our town. We talked drums on the ride and it was really informative to watch him play from behind the concert band.
The concert was nearly over when he motioned for me to come to the drums, handed me the sticks and said "play the jazz beat"
I was a little startled, but did as I was told and played that spang-a-lang, nothing else, (that is no fills,played snare and kick and hats) til the tune ended. The audience applauded, everybody in the band was smiling at me, I didn't know what to think. We packed up his drums, he took me home. I had never spoken to him before, I have never seen or spoken to him since but, feel like I should look him up and say Thanks for throwing me in the water, guess he knew I could swim.
He could tune drums really well and before I learned how, he would come to my gigs and say "let me tune your tubs"
Mostly they sounded great but sometimes they'd sound really weird and he'd be watching from the audience and laughing at me.
Our bands often gigged together and we'd do a 'drum battle' which we worked on ahead of time, leaving the last part unscripted, and that's when he would blow me away on chops. It took me half a century to finally be able to kick his butt a little, but I did.
Don played in one 3 piece group, Guitar front man , Don on drums and playing trumpet with one hand, the B3 player on keys and trumpet too. Later in life, Don, a master brush player, worked with sax man Tommy Wills almost exclusively.
In high school I played with a popular band and we got 'taken under the wing' of a drummer who led his own band, He got us to join the union, helped us with getting gigs and looking and being professional. His band Keetie and the Kats, put out a record in '62 that I think, really displays Keetie's talent. The drums are tuned and recorded great, his parts significantly contribute to the arrangement and I feel his band was ahead of the curve at that time.
My other mentor was and older drummer in my town named Mike Brown. I didn't know him at all but had heard of him.
He calls me up one day and asks if I would help him take his drums to a gig. Happy to, I went with him to Franklin College about 20 miles from our town. We talked drums on the ride and it was really informative to watch him play from behind the concert band.
The concert was nearly over when he motioned for me to come to the drums, handed me the sticks and said "play the jazz beat"
I was a little startled, but did as I was told and played that spang-a-lang, nothing else, (that is no fills,played snare and kick and hats) til the tune ended. The audience applauded, everybody in the band was smiling at me, I didn't know what to think. We packed up his drums, he took me home. I had never spoken to him before, I have never seen or spoken to him since but, feel like I should look him up and say Thanks for throwing me in the water, guess he knew I could swim.
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