Drum legend Max Roach dies age 83
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Drummer, composer and bandleader Max Roach died peacefully in hospital at 1am today, Thursday 16 August, surrounded by members of his family. Max was one of the last living greats from the earliest days of bebop where, as the house drummer at Monroe’s Uptown House in 1942, and at Minton’s Playhouse, he first played with Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. He went on to play with Parker’s Quintet from 1947 until 1949 and contributed to Miles Davis first breakthrough album, Birth Of The Cool, recorded during 1949-50.
Always an innovator, Roach, along with drummer Kenny Clarke, changed the way jazz was played by moving the pulse from the bass drum to the ride cymbal, allowing greater flexibility, creativity and a more polyrhythmic approach to the drum kit. In 1953 he began leading his own groups that included greats such as Sonny Rollins, with whom he recorded the classic Saxophone Colossus in 1956, Kenny Dorham, Booker Little, Hank Mobley and George Coleman, and recorded many acclaimed albums as a leader, including At Basin Street (1956); Max Roach Plus 4 at Newport (1958); Deeds Not Words (1958); We Insist! Freedom Now Suite (1960); Percussion Bitter Suite (1961); Lift Every Voice and Sing (1971); Easy Winners (1985); To The Max (1991).
Roach never stopped growing as a player and composer, contributing to the birth of the free scene in the early 1960s, forming the large percussion ensemble M’Boom in 1970 and going on to play with Anthony Braxton, Archie Shepp and Cecil Taylor. Though he was beginning to show signs of illness he played a highly memorable duo concert with Cecil Taylor at The Barbican in January 1999. In the words of fellow Sonny Rollins’ drummer, Adam Nussbaum,who gave me the sad news : “God Bless his soul. He will be missed, but what he gave us all is eternal.”
By Jon Newey