Kenny Clarke b y Nrorber't. G o l d b e r g

Kenny Clarke is considered to be a founder of the be-bop movement in jazz drumming. In tracing back his personal and profes- sional life, we can learn much about this innovator and recall one of the most fruit- ful and exciting periods in our musical history.

Born in Pittsburgh, Kenny Clarke started playing professionally in his late teens. "l took a friend's place in a cabaret in Pittsburgh. He went home to see his mother and never came back. 1 was trying to play like Zutty Singleton. Zutty was re- cording with Louis Armstrong. All my friends were imitating Louis, but I listened to the drums." When asked about that style of playing, Kenny explained, "It was called 'digging coal on the snare drum' - a press roll, you know, on two and four, hardly hitting the cymbals, maybe in the introduction or at the end. This was about 1931 or '322'

From that point, Kenny's career focused on the big band. His mother, a pianist, taught Kenny how to read music at an early age and he was able to play with a big band at a supper club near his home. Kenny speaks of his playing during that time:

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"I learned to play better and better every day. My style was changing con- stantly, but I wasn't aware of it. My roll improved, my ideas became more modem, I started using more cymbals. The after- beat wasn't invented at that time."

I asked Clarke what kind of equipment he was using at that time and his answer provides quite a contrast to the large set- ups of today. "I was using a bass drum, snare drum and a couple of cymbals. 1 didn't have the money to buy the wood- blocks and those other things."

Soon after his first big band, Clarke joined another with which he travelled to the famous Cotton Club in Cincinnati. There he met many of the great musicians of that era.

"On weekends they would have big bands like Earl Hines, Duke Ellington, and Don Redmond, all the big bands. We just played the show. [ got to meet all the great musicians from New York: Ben Webster, Jimmy Monday and all the drummers like Walter Bishop, Big Sid Catlett - one of the best drummers that ever lived - and Jo Jones, who was later with Count Basle. They encouraged me to come to New York, so I went along with a pianist, a friend of mine."

Once in New York, Clarke started play- ing in various musical situations. He worked with a small band at the Blackcat, a cabaret in the Village, along with guitarist Freddie Green who later joined Basle. Shortly thereafter he travelled throughout Europe with Edgar Hayes' big band. In Europe, he encountered a musi- cian with whom he would share a long and close association. "Dizzy was already here in Paris playing with Teddy Hill at the Moulin Rouge; he was about seventeen or eighteen years old."

After returning from his European tour, Kenny joined various bands for a few months at a time. He played with Claude Hopkins, Sidney Bechet, and Teddy Hill's band at the Savoy along with Dizzy. It was there that Clarke started experimenting with a technique that would revolutionize jazz drumming. Relating this incident, Kenny said with some amusement:

"I was dropping bombs or something like that and I was fired from Teddy Hill's because of it. [ started it by accident. We

played up-tempo, tremendously fast, you know. To get out from under the strain of playing the bass drum that fast, I started accenting with it. The brass section liked it immediately since 1 was accenting with them. I thought it was a good way to save yourself." Unfortunately, Teddy Hill, the band leader, thought otherwise. "He was afraid that the customers wouldn't under- stand what I was doing. They wouldn't be able to dance to it. It turned out the other way; they were able to dance better, in fact."

Teddy Hill later changed his mind and, as manager of Minton's Playhouse, asked Kenny Clarke to form a group, assuring him that he wouldn't interfere with the music. Kenny recalled, "l took Thelonius Monk on piano, Nick Fenton on bass, and Joe Guy on trumpet. Joe Guy was from the same school of playing as Dizzy. So every- thing worked very well and we became the house band. We had a good rhythm sec- tion - all the musicians came to hear those bombs l was playing and would sit in. Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Benny Goodman, Harry James - they had never heard anything like that before. The so called be-bop movement was born there."

At this point, Kenny expounded on his philosophy of music and drums. He ex- pressed his opinion that all the different styles of playing were and are still based on the rhythm section. "It's all drums; if it weren't for the drums they wouldn't exist. 1 guess it will always be like that."

Like many other musicians of that era, Kenny Clarke went into the army during WW II. Although he entered as a musi- cian, he wound up in chemical warfare, dropping bombs of another sort, smoke screen and camouflage. Perhaps his ex- periences in the army changed his outlook on things since, after coming back in April, 1946, he decided to stop playing and enrolled in an electronics school in New York City. He said, "I was sick of the whole business, but that didn't last too long. Next thing I knew I was back where I started. 1 joined Dizzy's big band and stayed with him the year of forty-six and then I joined Tad Damerons' band, a small group of about seven pieces."

Clarke later rejoined Dizzy's band for a tour of Europe, culminating with the fam-

ous recorded concert at the Salle Pleyel in Paris which introduced Dizzy's now fam- ous combination of Latin jazz. It was with Dizzy that Kenny was nicknamed "Klook" or "Klook-mop," supposedly because it simulated his playing style. Of the concert in Paris, Clarke said, "That was the con- cert with Chano Pozo, the conga player. It was an integration with Cuban rhythms. Dizzy started the whole thing, 1 didn't ap- prove of it at first but then started to like it. I had never had the opportunity to play with a conga player. The first couple of weeks he got in my way, but then I got used to it."

Kenny then played the record of that concert which included a piece called Cubana Be-Cubana Bop, also call Afro- Cuban Suite. The integration of Latin rhythms was evident and I was particularly struck by Clarke's command of that idiom and his interpretation of it in a big band context. As we were listening, I noticed Kenny beaming with pleasure as if he were reliving a beautiful moment in his life.

Clarke stayed in Paris after that concert along with John Lewis, the piano player, with whom he later formed the Modem Jazz Quartet. After a few years of shuttling back and forth between New York and Paris, Clarke returned to New York in I951 and stayed for five years. It was dur-

ing that time that Clarke became very active in the recording scene.

"1 was doing mostly all the recording with Savoy records. 1 was also A & R man with them and recorded the good talent in New York - people like Tommy Flanagan, Cannonball Adderley, Pepper Adams, Donald Byrd, Lee Konirz and Lennie Wristano."

1 asked Kenny if he enjoyed working in the studios as opposed to playing live. He replied, "I didn't mind as long as I was picking the musicians. Most of the work was with Hank Jones, Wendell Marshall, Paul Chambers and Percy Heath. They were the rhythm section. Arista now has the whole Savoy catalog. At night, I would work with them in the clubs. I played with Lennie Tristano, George Shearing, Sara Vaughn and Billy Holiday."

In 1956, Clarke was invited to return to Paris by Michel Legrand and join the Jaques Helian big band, a very well known band of that time. Kenny also did some ar- ranging for that band, but after Helian be- came ill, the band broke up. Kenny Clarke remained in Paris and has been there ever since.

"I began to work for Barclay records with Quincy Jones, and trombonist Billy Byers, who also wrote many film scores. 1 also formed a rhythm section and worked

in a club playing with most any good musi- cian who came through Paris: J.J. Johnson, Miles Davis, Zoor Sims and Stan Getz. This lasted for seven years. [ was doing studio work for Barclay during the day, playing big band for people like Sarah Vaughan. Her famous Misty album was re- corded here. American record companies also recorded here and 1 did those sessions. Then l started using Lou Bennett, an organ player, and a guitar player, Jimmy Gourley, from Chicago; we've been play- ing together for about twenty years."

At this point, having brought Kenny Clarke's life into historical perspective, I asked him about his decision to live in France rather than the U.S. Although he still calls the U.S. home, and maintains his American citizenship, Clarke ex- pressed his feelings on the different life- styles between the two countries.

"I like it better here, to live. No one bothers you. [ can do everything I want to do. At home, there are too many hang- ups. Here you can lead a peaceful life. Every year [ said [ was going back, but I guess I just never made it."

Kenny Clarke was well-known and re- spected as an excellent big band drummer.

"Joining a big band was like going to school," he said of the big band era. "That was what we called 'the conservatory

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without walls.' That's nonexistent today." He shook his head, "It's a drag, really a drag. I think it's due mainly to economics. Clubs stopped hiring big bands. In the late twenties and thirties they had big bands all over the place. They began to fade in the late thirties, and by the early forties they didn't exist anymore."

In comparing today's drummers with those prominent in his time, Clarke feels that nothing has equalled what was and is being done by drummers like Art Blakey, Philly Joe Jones or Roy Haynes.

"Max Roach did everything you could do technically thirty years ago. To play like Art Blakey- the swing, that's where it is. That's the whole enjoyment of playing. You can't explain how it feels.., it's the most wonderful feeling you can get out of playing."

I mentioned that there are drummers who can play in many different styles - rock, jazz etc. but Clarke maintained that he hadn't heard any.

l asked Clarke how he felt about the electronic developments in percussion. "I'm an acoustic player," he said. "l don't approve so much of the electronic drums. For one thing, they're not dependable. Playing with an organist I've found that out. When you have electricity failures, the band has to stop. Out of all instruments the drums don't need amplification."

"[ see guys setting up with ten cymbals or tom-toms and only use one the whole night", he said of today's tendency to- wards multiple drum set-ups. I say take what you need! If you have all that stuff, 1 want to see you play it. I've been using two top cymbals all my life. In most of my re- cordings [ didn't use tom-toms. [ didn't have any need for them." During his studio days in New York; "I used to wheel my drums through the streets. Taxis wouldn't pick us up, so you took as little as possible."

Clarke expressed his opinions on the newer music, which he feels is lacking the

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vital element called "swing." "I don't get into it too much. It's too

monotonous. It's the freedom thing that I enjoy. If I sat down and played one of those rock beats, after a chorus I would go crazy! I think the be-bop era was the most fruitful for any instrument. I can't see Art Blakey or Philly Joe playing rock music. It's not for thinking or creating musicians. There's no room for improvement if you're playing a monotonous beat."

Clarke feels that musicians are concen- trating too much on the technical aspects of playing. "I don't think they're searching for beauty," he said. "The most simple things are the hardest to play anyway. When someone plays scales, they're play- ing things they've practiced. There's so much technique employed that you can't really get a feeling of what they're doing. Personally, 1 don't think they know what they're doing.

Still practicing in order to maintain his flexibility, Clarke feels that the best practice is actual playing.

"I set up my drums in the living room and play whatever [ feel like. Practice pads don't have the same touch as a snare drum. 1 have set routines, rudiments; I try to play all four drums and work out pat- terns where 1 can use all the drums, divid- ing up the rudiments till they don't sound like rudiments anymore. A lot of people practice, but they don't know how. l learned to put in six hours a day just to get my hands in shape. The rest came later by listening. It was a very hard road, learning to play."

Although not playing as much as he would like to, Clarke is still active doing concerts in Paris. Recently, he taught at

the University of Pittsburgh, also con- ducting the big band there. As far as his playing is concerned, he says, "If I played steadily for a week or a month, l 'm right back to where I was twenty years ago. I feel as if I could play just about anything."

Despite the fact that many of Clarke's counterparts didn't have much formal training, he believes that it is a worth- while undertaking. "It's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it." He recalled how some orchestral percussionists used to come and listen to him play and there would always be an ex- change of information on the various aspects of drumming.

Aside from formal training, Clarke be- lieves in the individuality of a drummer and the importance of finding one's own style. "I play like I play and I would hate to hear somebody who played just like me. If you like my style, take out of it what you can to make up your own style. One should find his own version of playing, his own way of doing things." He thinks that swing is the most important quality that a drummer should possess. "When you swing, everyone knows that's you playing because nobody else swings like that. It's not so much what you're playing but how you're playing it."

Clarke feels that he will never retire from playing. "[ was just talking to a doc- tor who's a jazz fanatic - has records piled up all over the place. He said he regretted the day he stopped playing. He wanted something secure, but if he were to do it all over again he would be a musician.

"Music is the queen of all professions and the musician is king. It's something that's instilled in you for life."

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