Max Roach
Max Roach (born January 10, 1924-) is an American jazz drummer and composer.
Born in New-York, he grew up in a musical context with her mother being a gospel singer, and started to play bugle in parade orchestras very young. At the age of 10, he already play drums in some gospel bands. He leaves the Manhattan School of Music in 1942 with a diploma in percussion, and then start to go out in the clubs of the 52th street. He was one of the first drummers (along with Kenny Clarke) to play in the bebop style, and performed in bands led by Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, Coleman Hawkins, Bud Powell, and Miles Davis. Roach played on many of Parker's most important records, including the Savoy 1945 sessions, one of the three or four turning points in recorded jazz.
In 1952 Roach co-founded Debut Records with bassist Charles Mingus.
In 1954, he formed a quintet featuring trumpeter Clifford Brown, tenor saxophonist Harold Land, pianist Richie Powell (brother of Bud Powell), and bassist George Morrow, though Land left the following year and Sonny Rollins replaced him. The group was a prime example of the hard bop style also played by Art Blakey and Horace Silver. Tragically, this group was to be short-lived; Brown and Powell were killed in a car accident on the Pennsylvania turnpike in June 1956. After Brown and Powell's deaths, Roach continued leading a similarly configured group, with Kenny Dorham (and later the short-lived Booker Little) on trumpet, George Coleman on tenor and pianist Ray Bryant. Roach pushed the standard form of hard-bop using 3/4 waltz rhythms and modality in 1957 with his album "Jazz in 3/4 time". During this period, Roach recorded a series of other albums for the EmArcy label.
In 1960 he composed (and recorded most of) the We Insist! - Freedom Now suite, after being invited to contribute to commemorations of the hundredth anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. Using his musical abilities to comment on the African-American experience would be a significant part of his career. Unfortunately, Roach suffered from being blacklisted by the American recording industry for a period in the 1960s. In 1966 with his album "Drums Unlimited" (composed almost only with drums solos) he proves that drums can be a soli instrument able to play theme, variations and even melodies. During the period 1962-70, Roach was married to the singer Abbey Lincoln, who had performed on several of Roach's albums.
Among the many important records Roach has made is the classic Money Jungle 1962, with Mingus and Duke Ellington. This is generally regarded as one of the very finest trio albums ever made.
Long involved in jazz education, in 1972 he joined the faculty of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
In the early years of the twenty-first century, Roach became less active owing to the onset of Alzheimer's Disease.