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DRUM.DOG are pleased to introduce Talking to the Big Dogs. On Monday, October the 9th at 1pm EST (6pm BST) we will be interviewing the most recorded drummer of all time, a true legend, Mr Bernard ‘Pretty’ Purdie live on-stream. Watch Live on YouTube, Facebook and X.
Bernard “Pretty” Purdie is known as the world’s most recorded drummer and has a legendary recording career that nobody can match. A drummer, musician, producer, arranger and musical director, Bernard Purdie can be proud of a discography of over 4,000 recordings with artists such as Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Miles Davis, Isaac Hayes, The Rolling Stones, Roy Ayers, Herbie Hancock, Steely Dan and BB King.
Purdie is considered an influential and innovative funk musician. His precise musical time keeping and his signature use of triplets against a half-time backbeat led to the “Purdie Shuffle”. Variations on this shuffle can be heard on songs such as Led Zeppelin’s “Fool in the Rain”, the Police’s “Walking on the Moon”, and Toto’s “Rosanna” (Rosanna shuffle). Purdie plays the shuffle on Steely Dan’s “Babylon Sisters” and “Home At Last”.
Purdie was born in 1942 in Elkton, Maryland one of fifteen children. He started his stellar career by hitting cans with sticks at an early age and learned the elements of drumming techniques from overhearing lessons being given by Leonard Heywood. He later took lessons from him and played in Heywood’s big band. Purdie’s other influences at that time were Papa Jo Jones, Buddy Rich, Gene Krupa, Joe Marshall and Art Blakey.
Aged 20, he moved from his home town in Maryland, to New York City. There he played sessions with Mickey and Sylvia and regularly visited the Turf Club where musicians, agents, and promoters met and touted for business. Playing with Mickey and Sylvia led to his 25- year association with Aretha Franklin. Purdie started working with Aretha Franklin as musical director in 1970 and held that position for five years, as well as drumming for Franklin’s opening act, King Curtis and The King Pins. His best known track with Franklin was “Rock Steady”, on which he played what he described as “a funky and low down beat”. Of his time with Franklin he once commented that “backing her was like floating in seventh heaven”.
Purdie was contracted by arranger Sammy Lowe to play a session with James Brown in 1965 and recording session records also show that Purdie played on “Ain’t That A Groove” at the same session. Purdie is credited on the James Brown’s albums “Say It Loud – I’m Black” and “I’m Proud” and “Get on the Good Foot”.
Purdie’s grooves have been sampled, cut and pasted on dance tracks and his groove is sought after in all genres of jazz, soul and funk. He is now a reference point in the basics of modern drumming with the innovation of the “Purdie Shuffle”. His definitive style has anchored sessions on some of the greatest songs of the modern era.
In 2013 Purdie was inducted in to the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame.
Learn more: HERE
