Tweet
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/8998947
100 years of Don D!
Don Drummond
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/8998947
Don 'D
Don Drummond, aka Don Cosmic, was born in 1943, Kingston, Jamaica. To state anything more than that, would be a travesty. Apart from the fact that like all legends, nothing seems to known about his early days, men like Don D are just here for a short while, then gone…
Don Drummond was a part-time music teacher at Alpha School, a rather strict Catholic school for boys who were nearly all from poor, underprivileged backgrounds. The school, which was situated on South Camp Road, in West Kingston, was (and probably still is!) almost penal in its discipline, with beatings a regular occurrence.
Alpha veered towards the European musical tradition of marching and classical music. At the time Drummond attended Alpha, so were many other internationally known musicians, including: Wilton Gaynair, Owen Grey, Roy Harper and Herman Marquis. Don D graduated from being one of the schools top seniors, to its supreme tutor.
Amongst his influences stood such greats as Kai Winding and JJ Johnson, and Drummond was to influence many others himself. In his wake came such luminaries as Rico Rodriguez, Rupie Anderson, Vernon Muller, Carlos Malcolm, Carl Masters, Tommy McCook, Eric Clarke, Vincent Gordon, Joe Harriot and Bobby Ellis.
Scrap Iron
In 1940's Jamaica, big band swing and jazz ruled, and the starting place for musicians like Tommy McCook (1943) and Roland Alphonso (1948), was the Eric Dean Orchestra. Drummond joined them in 1955 having been voted Best Trombonist in 1954, and then formed The Don Drummond Four.
He was also cutting specials for sound systems before being spotted by Clement 'Coxone' Dodd, performing at the Majestic Theatre
Drummond had just completed one of his many short visits to one of the local mental hospitals, and didn’t even own a trombone, but Coxone was impressed enough to take Drummond on him as a solo artist and session player. In the meantime, the specials Drummond had previously cut were starting to be released commercially in Jamaica and England to critical acclaim. Drummond started his recording career sometime around 1956, with his first record being "On the Beach" with Owen Grey on vocals.
In 1962, Chris Blackwell started releasing recordings in England, and many of Drummond’s compositions first saw the light of day on the Island and Black Swan labels. Drummond recorded over 300 songs before he died at the age of just 27.
In 1964, under Coxsone's supervision, keyboardist and musical director Jackie Mittoo began to assemble the best musicians in Jamaica to create a sound that would dominate the music scene for years to come. The seeds for the Skatalites were sown while Mittoo played in the Sheiks, alongside Johnny Moore (trumpet) and Lloyd Knibbs on drums. After guitarist Lynn Taitt and Tommy McCook declined to join the band (though McCook later claimed it was his idea to form the band), Drummond was the man Mittoo turned to, and he quickly became the most prolific composer and musician in the band.
No mean feat when you consider the rest of the Skatalites later consisted of such names as Roland Alphonso &Tommy McCook on tenor saxes, Lester Sterling on alto sax, Leonard Dillon on trumpet, Lloyd Brevette on bass, Jah Jerry on guitar, Ernest Ranglin on guitar, Rico Rodriguez on trombone, Arkland 'Drumbago' Parks and Cluett Johnson on bass. These names would soon become legends, and the band is still playing today, although the fairly recent deaths of Tommy McCook and Roland Alphonso have saddened events.
left to right Rico Rodriguez, Don Drummond, Carlos Malcolm and Rupert Anderson.
Drummond’s first solo single, "Don Cosmic" was followed by such timeless magnificence as
"Confuscious", "Ringo", "Treasure Isle", "Eastern Standard Time", "Heavenless", "Occupation", "Meloncolly Baby", "Snowboy", "Elevation Rock", "Schooling the Duke", "Valley Princess", "The Reburial of Marcus Garvey", "Addis Ababa", "African Beat", and my own personal favorite, "Further East".
Sometime in 1964, "Man in the Street" entered the UK top 10, and later, in 1967 Drummond’s adaptation of the theme to the film "The Guns Of Navarone" gives him his second UK Top 10. These events confirm Drummond’s rise to the top and he is named by both George Shearing and Sarah Vaughan as one of the five top trombonists in the world. Vaughan came to this conclusion after seeing Drummond just once. Tommy McCook recalls;
“Don came on the scene initially about ’52. He became very popular and was playing with good bands at the time.
He was a member of the band that backed Sarah Vaughan when she came to Jamaica and performed at the Glass Bucket club. She heard him for the first time and told the Jamaican public that she figured that he was rated in the first five in the world. From then on Don lived up to what Sarah said – he was even thought of at one time as being the best in the world. His tone on the trombone, his approach, everything was so perfect. I considered him a genius on his instrument. Even other players of the instrument expressed this, and they should know.”
100 years of Don D!
Don Drummond
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/8998947
Don 'D
Don Drummond, aka Don Cosmic, was born in 1943, Kingston, Jamaica. To state anything more than that, would be a travesty. Apart from the fact that like all legends, nothing seems to known about his early days, men like Don D are just here for a short while, then gone…
Don Drummond was a part-time music teacher at Alpha School, a rather strict Catholic school for boys who were nearly all from poor, underprivileged backgrounds. The school, which was situated on South Camp Road, in West Kingston, was (and probably still is!) almost penal in its discipline, with beatings a regular occurrence.
Alpha veered towards the European musical tradition of marching and classical music. At the time Drummond attended Alpha, so were many other internationally known musicians, including: Wilton Gaynair, Owen Grey, Roy Harper and Herman Marquis. Don D graduated from being one of the schools top seniors, to its supreme tutor.
Amongst his influences stood such greats as Kai Winding and JJ Johnson, and Drummond was to influence many others himself. In his wake came such luminaries as Rico Rodriguez, Rupie Anderson, Vernon Muller, Carlos Malcolm, Carl Masters, Tommy McCook, Eric Clarke, Vincent Gordon, Joe Harriot and Bobby Ellis.
Scrap Iron
In 1940's Jamaica, big band swing and jazz ruled, and the starting place for musicians like Tommy McCook (1943) and Roland Alphonso (1948), was the Eric Dean Orchestra. Drummond joined them in 1955 having been voted Best Trombonist in 1954, and then formed The Don Drummond Four.
He was also cutting specials for sound systems before being spotted by Clement 'Coxone' Dodd, performing at the Majestic Theatre
Drummond had just completed one of his many short visits to one of the local mental hospitals, and didn’t even own a trombone, but Coxone was impressed enough to take Drummond on him as a solo artist and session player. In the meantime, the specials Drummond had previously cut were starting to be released commercially in Jamaica and England to critical acclaim. Drummond started his recording career sometime around 1956, with his first record being "On the Beach" with Owen Grey on vocals.
In 1962, Chris Blackwell started releasing recordings in England, and many of Drummond’s compositions first saw the light of day on the Island and Black Swan labels. Drummond recorded over 300 songs before he died at the age of just 27.
In 1964, under Coxsone's supervision, keyboardist and musical director Jackie Mittoo began to assemble the best musicians in Jamaica to create a sound that would dominate the music scene for years to come. The seeds for the Skatalites were sown while Mittoo played in the Sheiks, alongside Johnny Moore (trumpet) and Lloyd Knibbs on drums. After guitarist Lynn Taitt and Tommy McCook declined to join the band (though McCook later claimed it was his idea to form the band), Drummond was the man Mittoo turned to, and he quickly became the most prolific composer and musician in the band.
No mean feat when you consider the rest of the Skatalites later consisted of such names as Roland Alphonso &Tommy McCook on tenor saxes, Lester Sterling on alto sax, Leonard Dillon on trumpet, Lloyd Brevette on bass, Jah Jerry on guitar, Ernest Ranglin on guitar, Rico Rodriguez on trombone, Arkland 'Drumbago' Parks and Cluett Johnson on bass. These names would soon become legends, and the band is still playing today, although the fairly recent deaths of Tommy McCook and Roland Alphonso have saddened events.
left to right Rico Rodriguez, Don Drummond, Carlos Malcolm and Rupert Anderson.
Drummond’s first solo single, "Don Cosmic" was followed by such timeless magnificence as
"Confuscious", "Ringo", "Treasure Isle", "Eastern Standard Time", "Heavenless", "Occupation", "Meloncolly Baby", "Snowboy", "Elevation Rock", "Schooling the Duke", "Valley Princess", "The Reburial of Marcus Garvey", "Addis Ababa", "African Beat", and my own personal favorite, "Further East".
Sometime in 1964, "Man in the Street" entered the UK top 10, and later, in 1967 Drummond’s adaptation of the theme to the film "The Guns Of Navarone" gives him his second UK Top 10. These events confirm Drummond’s rise to the top and he is named by both George Shearing and Sarah Vaughan as one of the five top trombonists in the world. Vaughan came to this conclusion after seeing Drummond just once. Tommy McCook recalls;
“Don came on the scene initially about ’52. He became very popular and was playing with good bands at the time.
He was a member of the band that backed Sarah Vaughan when she came to Jamaica and performed at the Glass Bucket club. She heard him for the first time and told the Jamaican public that she figured that he was rated in the first five in the world. From then on Don lived up to what Sarah said – he was even thought of at one time as being the best in the world. His tone on the trombone, his approach, everything was so perfect. I considered him a genius on his instrument. Even other players of the instrument expressed this, and they should know.”
Comment