Why Jazz Matters- Track 5
by Norm Provizer
This month, drummer Ginger Baker celebrates his 75th birthday. From the perspective of the 1960s, when Baker propelled Cream (the first rock super group with Baker, Eric Clapton and Jack Bruce) and Blind Faith (with Steve Winwood and Clapton), the very idea that the drummer, who had a lot of habits, would have made it out of that decade alive never mind to the age of 75 might have seemed like an exercise in wishful thinking. But survive he did despite all the bridges he burned in the process.
Looking back at Baker’s career, it’s not at all difficult to say that, in many ways, he was the founding father of modern rock drumming and one of, if not the most influential drummer in rock history who essentially created the drum solo in the music (listen to “Toad” on the 1966 album Fresh Cream). Yet from his early days until today, the British-born Baker has always seen himself as a jazz player. In the striking 2012 documentary Beware of Mr. Baker, Ginger recalls how, as member of a school gang, he listened to records as a decoy while his schoolmates stole albums from the store. That’s when he heard the album Quintet of the Year, a live recording of a famed 1953 concert at Toronto’s Massey Hall that featured alto saxophonist Charlie Parker, trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, pianist Bud Powell, bassist Charles Mingus and drummer Max Roach – a virtual be-bop hall of fame. When he heard Roach, the 14-year old knew that was it.
Ginger was 17 when got his first paid gig as a member of the New Orleans-style Storyville Jazz Men; and before too long he replaced Charlie Watts with Alex Korner’s Blues Incorporated group. Then it was on to the Graham Bond Organization before the creation of Cream that turned the rock world upside down during its two-year run from 1966 to 1968. After that, there was Blind Faith, followed by the large Ginger Baker’s Air Force ensemble (“air force” being the name used by insiders to describe the heavy drug users in the Duke Ellington Orchestra).
Over the years, Ginger’s drumming heroes were the British player Phil Seaman (who introduced him to the power of African drumming), Max Roach, Art Blakey and Elvin Jones. In fact, he would do drum battles not only with Seaman, but also with Blakey (whose Jazz Messengers nurtured a long list of jazz greats) and Jones (who drove the classic John Coltrane Quartet). On the surface, the idea of a rock drummer dueling with the improvising giants of jazz drumming may seem a bit ludicrous (no offence to the singer Ludicris), unless that “rock” drummer is Ginger Baker.
After an extended stay in Nigeria (where he developed a strong connection with Fela Kuti) and time in Italy and Los Angeles, Baker, by now a devoted supporter of polo, ended up in Colorado for much of the 1990s where he combined polo matches in Parker with jazz performances. During his Colorado years (1993-1999), Baker released two discs (Going Back Home and Falling Off the Roof) by a trio that contained jazz greats Charlie Haden on bass and Bill Frisell (who grew up in Denver) on guitar. Then in 1999, Atlantic released Coward of the Country by Baker’s Denver jazz group that included at its core trumpeter Ron Miles (who wrote much of the music played by the band), tenor saxophonist Fred Hess, pianist Eric Gunnison and bassist Artie Moore.
For Baker, it was returning from the music he came from and he would refer to his Denver group as “probably the best band I had.” A judgment he reiterated in a 2013 interview in Rolling Stone in which he commented that, “The DJQ (the Denver Jazz Quintet) was really a great band.” As writer Chip Stern put it, Ginger’s DJQ was a group that could “go toe-to-toe with any band in New York or on the planet.”
Most recently, Baker has returned to England and has been touring with a quartet called Jazz Confusion that has Pee Wee Ellis (who was a key figure in the James Brown band) on saxophone. That group has a new CD out called Why? on Motema Music. And if you wonder why jazz matters, just ask the drummer whose autobiography Ginger Baker: Hellraiser was published in 2010.
Speaking of Ron Miles, the trumpeter is among the players performing at the free “Jazz on 2nd Avenue” event in Niwot on August 16 that also features Liquid Soul, Jeff Coffin and singer Dee Alexander. The month starts with the Telluride Jazz Festival on August 1-3 with guest of honor Poncho Sanchez, Monty Alexander, Lettuce, Snarky Puppy, Dragon Smoke and others. It ends with the Vail Jazz Festival that has the Clayton Brothers, Jeff Hamilton, Curtis Stigers, Eric Reed and Monty Alexander along with a host of other players.
In between festivals, the Jamaican-born pianist Alexander and his Harlem-Kingston Express are at Dazzle in Denver on August 2-3. Italian-born singer Roberta Gambarini is at Dazzle on August 15-17, followed by guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel’s New Quartet (with Denver-raised Colin Stranahan on drums) on August 28-29. Additionally, the annual KUVO “Live at the Vineyards” event takes place on August 9 with New Orleans saxophonist Donald Harrison, the master of the Crescent City piano Henry Butler and Meters’ guitarist Leo Nocentelli at the Balistreri Vineyards in Denver. There’s also Japanese keyboardist Keiko Matsui at the Soiled Dove Underground in Denver on August 1 and a tribute to Herbie Hancock at the Fox Theater in Boulder on August 13.
Category: Buzzworthy
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