Tony Williams R.I.P.
Tony Williams R.I.P.
Reposted from the Miles Davis list:
From the San Francisco Chronicle, 2/25/97:
Tony Williams, one of the most brilliant and influential modern jazz drummers, died Sunday at Seton Medical Center in Daly City after suffering a heart attack. He was 51.
A longtime Bay Area resident who lived in Fairfax for many years before moving to Pacifica a few years ago, Mr. Williams had emergency gall bladder surgery at Seton on Friday, said his manager, Greg DiGiovine. Mr. Williams was preparing to go home on Sunday when he suffered a heart attack.
Mr. Williams was a dazzling percussionist whose mix of sensitivity, invention and power thrilled audiences around the world and influenced legions of young drummers.
He shot to stardom in the early 1960s as the 17-year-old prodigy who powered Miles Davis' landmark '60s quintet with Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter and Ron Carter.
His dramatic drumming was at the center of such classic Davis recordings
as E.S.P,''Nefertiti'' and ``Filles de Kilamanjaro,'' which often
seemed like drum concertos with the horns cast as accompaniment.
A wonderfully fluid player with an open approach to time and timbre, Mr. Williams was famous for his use of contrasting dynamics, colors and meters. He could create a thrashing symphony of sound with all four limbs playing independently of each other. He was a virtuoso soloist and an extraordinary accompanist, constantly listening and responding.
Born in Chicago and raised in Boston, he was introduced to the jazz scene at an early age by his father, saxophonist Tillmon Williams. By the age of 11, he was sitting in at clubs, sometimes playing with his early idols, the late Art Blakey and Max Roach. At 15, he was a busy free-lance musician.
He played with saxophonist Sam Rivers in 1959 and a few years later joined bebop saxophone legend Jackie McLean. Davis was knocked out by Mr. Williams after hearing him with McLean and hired him in 1963. Mr. Williams stayed with Davis until 1969, when he played on the pioneering jazz- rock album ``Bitches Brew.''
He left to form the seminal jazz- rock fusion trio Lifetime with guitarist John McLaughlin and organist Larry Young. His powerful style had a major impact on a generation of versatile drummers who played jazz, R&B and rock, among them Ndugu Chancellor and Lenny White.
During the late '70s, Mr. Williams returned to acoustic jazz, playing in a group with Shorter, Hancock and Carter and working with Sonny Rollins, Wynton Marsalis and others.
He led a series of bracing hard- bop bands in the 1980s. A skilled songwriter who appeared often at the San Francisco Jazz Festival and at Yoshi's in Oakland -- where his trio performed last month -- Mr. Williams began studying composition at U.C. Berkeley in the late '80s with Robert Greenberg.
His latest record, ``Wilderness,'' features his compositions performed by the all-star cast of Hancock, Michael Brecker, Pat Metheny and a string orchestra.
Mr. Williams is survived by his wife, Colleen, of Pacifica, and his mother, Alyse Janez, of Boston. Funeral services are pending.
and also posted to the Miles list:
From [Miles'] Autobiography, something that maybe Miles would be saying tonight if he were still around:
"I was learning something new every night with that group. One reason was that Tony Williams was such a progressive drummer. He would listen to a record and memorize the whole record, all the solos, the whole thing. He was the only guy in my band who ever told me, 'Man, why don't you practice!' I was missing notes and shit trying to keep up with his young ass. So he started me to practicing again because I had stopped and didn't even know it. "But man, I can tell you this: there ain't but one Tony Williams when it comes to playing the drums. There was nobody like him before or since. He's just a motherfucker. Tony played on top of the beat, just a fraction above, and it gave everything a little edge because it HAD a little edge. Tony played polyrhythms all the time. He was a cross between Art Blakey and Philly Joe Jones, Roy Haynes and Max Roach. Those were his idols, and he had a little bit of all their shit. But his shit was definitely his own."
----- End Included Message -----