Billy Cobham at Atlanta City Winery (photo by Ralph A. Miriello) |
In celebration of his seventy-fifth year, the phenomenal
drummer Billy Cobham formed a band to celebrate the music from his famous album
Crosswinds. I was fortunate to catch Cobham and his friend and
cohort, guest trumpeter Randy Brecker at Atlanta’s City Winery of September 25,
2019.
It was a special occasion for me as I first saw both Cobham and Brecker
back in 1969, now fifty years ago, when they were original members of the then
supergroup Dreams, in New York City. The recording group was at the genesis
of the rock/jazz era that also sprouted horn-centered bands like Blood, Sweat
and Tears, Ten Wheel Drive and Chicago. Besides Cobham, Dreams included trumpeter
Randy and his saxophonist brother Michael Brecker, trombonist Barry Rodgers, guitarist
John Abercrombie, lead vocalist Eddie Vernon and founders/songwriters bassist Doug
Lubahn and keyboardist/guitarist Jeff Kent.
Dreams Billy Cobham Jr., John ABercrombie, Barry Rogers, Eddie Vernon, Doug Lubahn, Michael Brecker, Jeff Kent and Randy Brecker 1970 |
William Emanuel Cobham Jr, was born in Panama but was raised
in Brooklyn, New York from the age of three. Cobham’s love of music started him
playing drums at the age of four. He had inherent rhythmic gifts and improved quickly
accompanying his piano playing father on drums at the age of eight. He received
his first drum set at age fourteen and was accepted by and attended the High
School of Music and Art in NYC. At twenty-one, Cobham was drafted into the Army
where he played for three years in the US Army Band. By 1968, he joined pianist
Horace Silver’s quintet where he met and played with trumpeter Randy Brecker, saxophonist
Bennie Maupin and bassist John Williams.
Cobham’s influential drumming became a
sought-after commodity and he became the house drummer for Atlantic Records adding
his drumming talents to CTI albums by Milt Jackson, George Benson and Grover
Washington Jr. By nineteen-seventy, Cobham had been tapped by Miles Davis as
one of the drummers he used for the albums Bitches Brew and A
Tribute to Jack Johnson. It was at
these sessions that Cobham met English guitarist John McLaughlin. By 1971 McLaughlin
would leave Davis and pursue his muse to explore, write and play a supercharged
style of music that joined elements of rock, funk and jazz-fusion. The band
would become the legendary fusion band The Mahavishnu Orchestra, with
McLaughlin on guitar, Cobham on drums, keyboardist Jan Hammer, violinist Jerry
Goodman and, bassist Rick Laird.
My first “live” exposure to the Mahavishnu Orchestra was
back in the early seventies at Fairleigh Dickinson University in Rutherford, NJ
on September 22, 1972. There my friends and I were treated to a jaw dropping performance
by this group that in no small part was enhanced immeasurably by the dynamic rhythmic
explosion of Billy Cobham’s drums. Cobham, then twenty-eight years old, played
a clear Fibes set of drums with his signature double bass drum, and what seemed
like an endless array of snare, toms and cymbals. We simply had never seen a
drummer like him who could erupt like a volcano and literally dance over the skins
of his drums. His physical power and cat-like agility was astounding, a cross
between a weightlifter and a ballerina. His performance and that band was simply
mind blowing and I would never forget it.
Fast forward to today and Cobham is now seventy-five years
old, having long ago codified his reputation as one of the most influential and revered drummers of the jazz fusion era. Modern Drummer has called him “… a musician’s musician.”
To celebrate his birthday year Cobham assembled a formidable band for his Cross
Winds Tour. The touring band included guitarist Fareed Haque, Bassoon/Saxophone
player Paul Hansen, bassist Tim Landers, keyboard artist Osam Elelwy. Cobham was quoted as saying "It's been an adventure, these seventy-four years that I have been blessed to experience so much in my life." As a leader/composer, Cobham has recorded an astounding thirty-seven albums including
his impressive debut Spectrum from 1973 through Red Baron
from 2017.
Billy Cobham's Crosswinds
|
Crosswinds was his second release from 1974 and included an impressive
cover photo taken by Cobham of a blustery cloud formation over the beach at Carmel,
California. The tour is the forty-fifth-year anniversary for the album. Getting
to see Billy Cobham and Randy Brecker reunited after so many years was a treat
I couldn’t miss. The set included songs like “Spectrum,” “Spanish Moss,” “The
Pleasant Pheasant,” Crosswind” and” Red Baron.”
The band was exemplary with
special note to the interesting use of Paul Henson’s electrically augmented bassoon
and soprano work. Fareed Haque’s guitar work was intriguing, with
improvisations that borrowed qualities from Latin jazz and at times crossed
into Middle Eastern influence. Bassist Landers was solid and instep with Cobham
throughout and keyboardist Elelwy added contemporaneous improvisations that
were swift and agile.
Fareed Haque and Randy Brecker |
For me the highlight of
the show was listening to Randy Brecker’s trumpet work, which took flight,
soaring over Cobham’s incendiary drum work. These two masters feed off each
other symbiotically and still impress and amaze. Cobham’s continuously whirling
motion is mesmerizing. His timing, vigor and intensity still evoke awe. Brecker’s’
fluidity, clarity and register range are still impressive and his
extemporaneous ideas are always surprising.
Cobham, no matter how
muscular his playing gets, always remains acutely sensitive to the musicality as
well as the inherent timing of his drums. Even at 75, Cobham exudes the power and
dexterity of a man half his age. On a drum solo in the set that I attended, he featured
his two bass drums keeping a punishing alternating pace as his hands rapidly floated
his sticks over his array of toms, cymbals and snare. The explosive rhythm that
he generated percolated out of the man like oil erupts out of a freshly tapped
rig. His playing flowed freely and filled the room with inherent energy that could be
barely be contained.To say it simply Billy Cobham is a drumming force of
nature, a whirlwind of rhythm that should not be missed.
The remaining Billy Cobham Cross Wind tour (check it here) will be continuing
around this country through the end of October with dates in Buffalo and
Albany,NY; Natick Mass and Roslyn NY. If you have never witnessed this man
play "live" it is an experience that you certainly should not miss.
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