|
Have The Article Read To You Here: Brought To You By Drumming News Network
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Latest Drumming News
Geoff Nicholls of Musicradar.com write about the influence Gene Krupa had on drumming, below is an excerpt of the article, there will be a link below to the full article.
Geoff writes:For a young John Bonham, in thrall to The Benny Goodman Story, an influential 1956 biopic in which jazz drum legend Gene Krupa starred, the king of swing was “a god”. Fellow drum legend Buddy Rich said simply, “This is my man. This is the President.” And this is his story…
https://www.youtube.com/embed/HsLmg4tfO1U Carnegie Hall, New York City, 16 January 1938. An eager audience is keyed up with excitement, awaiting the first jazz concert at this prestigious classical music venue. The Benny Goodman Band launch into their opening number, ‘Don’t Be That Way’. The drummer pushes the beat with urgent press rolls, but the band are edgy, afraid of cutting loose.
Then comes a split-second drum break, a dazzling blitzkrieg of cymbal and snare drum violence, hotly pursued by a battering offbeat. The audience immediately goes wild. Even the musicians yell encouragement. Gene Krupa has broken the ice and worked his percussive magic. Swing is here!
The man who electrified that celebrated Benny Goodman concert became the most famous drummer in the world. As well as being an innovative soloist, armed with tremendous speed and stamina, Gene Krupa was a charismatic figure. Fans were thrilled by the tousle-haired, gum-chewing drummin’ man with movie star good looks. Gene was always an extrovert who hit hard and played loud. As a teenager, he insisted on his bass drum being recorded, even when engineers thought it was impossible SWING MASTERS Gene was always an extrovert who hit hard and played loud. As a teenager, he insisted on his bass drum being recorded, even when engineers thought it was impossible. When he played ‘Sing, Sing, Sing’ with the Benny Goodman Band, his roaring tom-toms rekindled the African spirit of jazz. Drummers from Buddy Rich to John Bonham idolised Krupa, and his influence was felt well beyond the swing era.
Gene’s playing career spanned five decades of jazz history, but it wasn’t until he joined Benny Goodman’s band in late 1934 that his fame began to spread. The Krupa story became an explosive mix of ego clashes and dramatic incidents.
Frequent onstage rows with Goodman and a heavily publicised drugs bust were just some of the incidents that put him in the headlines. Yet Krupa was far from being the ‘drug crazed jazz fiend’ the press tried to portray. He was dignified, quietly religious, proud of his achievements and sensitive to criticism.
The early years
Gene Krupa was born in Chicago on 15 January, 1909, the youngest of six children. Brought up a Catholic, Gene’s mother wanted him to become a priest. However, at the age of 10 he took a part-time job as an errand boy in a local music store. Growing up on Chicago’s notoriously tough South Side, he could have got caught up in the local street gangs.
Instead, he listened to all the latest jazz records in the store, took up the alto sax and began playing with The Frivolians, a high school junior band. One night, after a rehearsal, he tried out the band’s drum kit. It was then that he decided he’d much sooner play the drums than the saxophone. He showed such ability that his older brother Pete bought him a set of traps.
Gene grew up listening to the New Orleans drummers and the enthusiastic young local musicians playing Chicago-style jazz, like sax player Bud Freeman and drummer Dave Tough. When Tough left his band, The Blue Friars, Gene was offered the gig. At last he could play regularly with a real jazz band. Although self-taught, he took advice from Dave Tough on tuning the drums, choosing the right cymbals and playing them tonally to complement the instruments in the band.
Read The Full Story: HERE
