joey935
Tiger Talk Pro
Reged: Feb 03 2005
Posts: 159
Loc: Oklahoma
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Jazz musician Max Roach dies at 83
12 minutes ago
NEW YORK - Max Roach, a master percussionist whose rhythmic innovations and improvisations provided the dislocated beats that defined bebop jazz, has died after a long illness. He was 83.
The self-taught musical prodigy died Wednesday night at an undisclosed hospital in Manhattan, said Cem Kurosman, spokesman for Blue Note Records, one of Roach's labels. No additional details were available, he said.
Roach received his first musical break at age 16, filling in for three nights in 1940 when Duke Ellington's drummer fell ill.
Roach's performance led him to the legendary Minton's Playhouse in Harlem, where he joined luminaries Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie in the burgeoning bebop movement. In 1944, Roach joined Gillespie and Coleman Hawkins in one of the first bebop recording sessions.
What distinguished Roach from other drummers were his fast hands and his ability to simultaneously maintain several rhythms. By layering different beats and varying the meter, Roach pushed jazz beyond the boundaries of standard 4/4 time.
Roach's innovative use of cymbals for melodic lines, and tom-toms and bass drums for accents, helped elevate the percussionist from mere timekeeper to featured performer — on a par with the trumpeter and saxophonist.
"One of the grand masters of our music," Gillespie once observed.
In a 1988 essay in The New York Times, Wynton Marsalis wrote of Roach: "All great instrumentalists have a superior quality of sound, and his is one of the marvels of contemporary music. ... The roundness and nobility of sound on the drums and the clarity and precision of the cymbals distinguishes Max Roach as a peerless master."
Throughout the jazz upheaval of the 1940s and '50s, Roach played bebop with the Charlie Parker Quintet and cool bop with the Miles Davis Capitol Orchestra. He joined trumpeter Clifford Brown in playing hard bop, a jazz form that maintained bebop's rhythmic drive while incorporating the blues and gospel.
He was survived by five children: sons Daryl and Raoul, and daughters Maxine, Ayl and Dara. Yahoo news
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Rock is dead... Long live paper and scissors!!!!
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compa
Tiger Talk Pro
Reged: Aug 26 2004
Posts: 384
Loc: Southern Sweden
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Bless his soul. He's walking among the greatest.
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I'm loosing the grip..
/compa
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TigerBill
Tiger Talk Pro
Reged: Mar 11 2002
Posts: 1660
Loc: NJ
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Yes, we have lost another jazz drumming legend but heaven has just gained another great player! Listen closely, you'll hear Max playing along with the rest of the best in that great jazz band in the sky!
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Tiger Bill Meligari
Tension Free Drumming
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lmr80
Tiger Talk Pro
Reged: Aug 28 2005
Posts: 1553
Loc: CA
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WOW. What new's. He will be missed. His playing was legendary. What a master musician he was. I'll be listening to plenty of Max Roach and Clifford Brown today in homage. Bless his soul.
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It's about expression, not impression
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roger strange
Tiger Talk Pro
Reged: Dec 09 2003
Posts: 1650
Loc: Nova Scotia Canada
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I just get more lonely as my original idols pass on. Max was probably the most influencial of them all for me when I was a kid. His playing made perfect sense. I used to collect anything that Max was recorded on as they came out. Still have them all somewhere in the trunks. Started collecting him when I was twelve in 1952. I hope you all have that first issue of Traps Magazine with Max as the feature.
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