BILLY COBHAM

William C. Cobham, born May 16, 1944 in Panama, is a Panamanian American jazz drummer, composer and bandleader.

Coming to prominence in the late 1960s and early '70s with trumpeter Miles Davis and then with Mahavishnu Orchestra, Cobham is, in the words of critic Steve Huey, "generally acclaimed as fusion's greatest drummer, "and one of the best in the world" with an influential style that combines explosive power and exacting precision.

Biography

Early life and career

Born in Panama, Cobham's family moved to New York City during his early childhood. A drummer from his youth, Cobham attended New York's High School of Music and Art, graduating in 1962.

He played in a U.S. Army Band from 1965 to 1968. Following his discharge, Cobham joined the group of pianist Horace Silver for about a year, also playing or recording with saxophonist Stanley Turrentine, organist Shirley Scott, and guitarist George Benson.

Jazz fusion work
 
Billy Cobham in 1973

Cobham branched out to jazz fusion, which blended elements of jazz, rock and roll and funk, playing with the Brecker Brothers and guitarist John Abercrombie before recording and touring extensively with trumpeter Miles Davis. Cobham's work with Davis appears on Live-Evil and A Tribute to Jack Johnson, among other recordings. Cobham is also one of the first drummers to play open handed lead: a drummer that can lead (or ride) with either hand and begin or end a beat or fill with either hand (most drummers lead with 1 hand). He was also one of the first drummers to play with 3 or more snare and/or bass drums and multiple hi-hats.

The preface to his work with the Mahavishnu Orchestra was his work on guitarist John McLaughlin's album My Goal's Beyond.

In 1971, with fellow Davis alumnus McLaughlin , Cobham co-founded Mahavishnu Orchestra, a definitive jazz fusion ensemble. Cobham toured extensively from 1971 to 1973 with the Mahavishnu Orchestra, who released two studio albums and one live album. The original studio versions of tunes on the live album were later released as The Lost Trident Sessions in 1999.

In May 1973, while still with the Mahavishnu Orchestra, Cobham recorded his first solo album Spectrum, one of the finest fusion albums of all time, with musicians including keyboardist Jan Hammer, from the Mahavishnu Orchestra, and guitarist Tommy Bolin, who later played with heavy rock band Deep Purple. Just before the Mahavishnu Orchestra's last touring leg, in late 1973, Cobham recorded and toured with guitarists Carlos Santana and John McLaughlin, in concerts which featured material from their album Love Devotion Surrender, and Cobham's own material.

In the 1970s, Cobham recorded extensively for the fusion-oriented CTI Records, founded by producer Creed Taylor.

1980s work and later
 
Baku Jazz Festival 2007

In 1980, he worked with Jack Bruce, in a band called Jack Bruce & Friends. In 1994, he joined an all-star cast at the Greek Theatre (in LA) and the results appeared on Stanley Clarke, Larry Carlton, Billy Cobham, Najee and Deron Johnson LIVE AT THE GREEK. The concert was predominantly Clarke's music but all the musicians contributed material.

A number of solo albums followed (as of July 2005, Cobham has released over 30 recordings under his own name), and continues to record, perform and teach.

In 2006, Cobham released Drum n voice 2. This was a return to the 1970s jazz-funk sound, with guests such as: Jan Hammer, Buddy Miles, John Patitucci, Jeff Berlin, Dominic Miller, Mike Lindup, Airto Moreira, Frank Gambale, Brian Auger, Guy Barker and the band Novecento. The CD was produced and arranged by Pino and Lino Nicolosi for Nicolosi productions.[2][3]

Billy was announced as a patron and visiting artist of top London drum college 'Drumtech' in June 2008.
 
Billy Cobham performing on Réunion in October 2006

Sampling

He has been sampled by Massive Attack in their tune "Safe from Harm", centered on the beat and bassline of Cobham's "Stratus", from his debut album Spectrum; by Souls of Mischief's "93 Til' Infinity", based on the bassline and keyboards of "Heather", from 1974's Crosswinds, and by DJ Shadow on "Napalm Brain/Scatter Brain", which uses elements of "A Funky Kind of Thing" from 1975's A Funky Thide of Sings.

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Biography by Steve Huey

Generally acclaimed as fusion's greatest drummer, Billy Cobham's explosive technique powered some of the genre's most important early recordings -- including groundbreaking efforts by Miles Davis and the Mahavishnu Orchestra -- before he became an accomplished bandleader in his own right. At his best, Cobham harnessed his amazing dexterity into thundering, high-octane hybrids of jazz complexity and rock & roll aggression. He was capable of subtler, funkier grooves on the one hand, and awe-inspiring solo improvisations on the other; in fact, his technical virtuosity was such that his flash could sometimes overwhelm his music. After debuting as a leader with the classic Spectrum in 1973, Cobham spent most of fusion's glory days recording for Atlantic; briefer stints on CBS, Elektra, and GRP followed, and by the mid-'80s, Cobham was de-emphasizing his own bands in favor of session and sideman work. Even so, he continued to record for various small labels with some regularity.

William C. Cobham was born May 16, 1944, in Panama, where as a very young child he became fascinated with the percussion instruments his cousins played. When Cobham was three, his family moved to New York City, and at age eight he made his performance debut with his father. He honed his percussion skills in a drum-and-bugle corps outfit called the St. Catherine's Queensmen, and attended New York's prestigious High School of Music and Art, graduating in 1962. From 1965 to 1968, he served as a percussionist in the U.S. Army Band, and after his release, he was hired as the new drummer in hard bop pianist Horace Silver's band. Cobham toured the U.S. and Europe with Silver in 1968, and also moonlighted with Stanley Turrentine, Shirley Scott, and George Benson. After eight months with Silver, Cobham departed to join the early jazz-rock combo Dreams in 1969, which also featured the Brecker brothers and guitarist John Abercrombie. From there, he landed a job in Miles Davis' new fusion ensemble, and played a small part in the seminal Bitches Brew sessions; he also appeared more prominently on several other Davis albums of the time, including more aggressive classics like Live-Evil and A Tribute to Jack Johnson.

Cobham and guitarist John McLaughlin split off from Davis' group to pursue a harder rocking brand of fusion in the Mahavishnu Orchestra, which debuted in 1971 with the seminal The Inner Mounting Flame. With Mahavishnu, Cobham's fiery intensity was given its fullest airing yet, and his extraordinary technique influenced not only countless fusioneers in his wake, but also quite a few prog rock drummers who were aiming for similarly challenging musical territory. The 1972 follow-up Birds of Fire cemented his reputation, and by this time he had also become something of an unofficial in-house drummer for Creed Taylor's CTI label, known for a smoother, more polished style of fusion; here Cobham backed musicians like George Benson, Stanley Turrentine, Freddie Hubbard, Hubert Laws, and Grover Washington, Jr. Unfortunately, the volatile group chemistry that made Mahavishnu's recordings so exciting also carried over into real life and the original lineup disbanded in 1973.

Deciding to make a go of it on his own, Cobham formed his own band, Spectrum (which initially featured ex-Mahavishnu cohort Jan Hammer on keyboards), and signed with Atlantic. His debut as a leader, also called Spectrum, was released in 1973, showcasing an exciting blend of jazz, funk, and rock that benefited from the presence of guitarists John Scofield and Tommy Bolin (the latter better known for his rock recordings); it also found Cobham experimenting a bit with electronic percussion. Spectrum is still generally acknowledged as the high point of Cobham's solo career, and holds up quite well today. Cobham followed Spectrum with a series of LPs on Atlantic that, like fusion itself, grew increasingly smoother and more commercial as the '70s wore on. For his second album, 1974's Crosswinds, ex-Dreams mate John Abercrombie joined the band, as did keyboardist George Duke, who would become a frequent Cobham collaborator over the years; that same year's performance at Montreux produced the live Shabazz. After Total Eclipse, Cobham moved more explicitly into commercial jazz-funk with 1975's A Funky Thide of Sings, which featured an expanded horn section. He pared the group back down for the improved Life and Times in 1976, and also played Montreux again, in tandem with Duke.

In 1977, Cobham switched to the CBS label, which set him firmly on the path of commercial accessibility. In addition to his records as a leader, he'd remained highly active as a session drummer, and began to focus on that side of his career even more in the late '70s. By 1980, he was done with CBS and began pursuing side opportunities, playing live with the Grateful Dead and Jack Bruce, as well as the Saturday Night Live band. He drummed for the Grateful Dead side project Bobby & the Midnites in 1982, and recorded three albums for Elektra in the early '80s with his new quartet the Glass Menagerie. During the mid-'80s, he cut three commercially oriented LPs for GRP, and spent the next few years stepping up his international touring and absorbing a healthy dose of world music. He played Peter Gabriel's 1992 WOMAD Festival, and the following year recorded The Traveler, inspired by a sojourn in Brazil. In 1996, he formed a more acoustic-oriented quartet called Nordic with three Norwegian musicians; the following year, he also started a German-based fusion outfit called Paradox. In 1998, Cobham began playing with a group called Jazz Is Dead, which devoted itself to jazz reinterpretations of Grateful Dead material; their album Blue Light Rain proved fairly popular among Deadheads. As Cobham maintained his touring, session, and bandleading activities, Rhino released the excellent two-CD retrospective Rudiments: The Billy Cobham Anthology in 2001.