Roy Haynes - A Appreciation

 © Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

“Any Boston drummer couldn't help being influenced by Roy. I must hâve been eight or ten, something like that, when we first met. Roy always was a topic around thé neighborhood. One thing that stands out in my mind about this guy. He always had great confidence in his ability. You never heard any tentativeness in his playing. My late brother said to me one day: "Roy Haynes sounded the same years and years back. Even then he was a monster! He came to the music and drums ready and capable of dealing with both. Unlike most other musicians, he didn't have to go through a difficult learning phase."

Roy always has been adventurous—absolutely fearless. He plays whatever he thinks is right, regardless of the context. Only in recent years have people come to realize how important and talented he is. For a long time, only musicians, and a few writers close to the music, knew what he could do and how original he was.

Many felt Roy's playing was too far "out there"—beyond understanding— the same thing they used to say about Bird. Roy's breaks sometimes could puzzle listeners. As you said, they don't always start on "1." And sometimes they might be short or go beyond "1," whether he was playing a four-bar break or a chorus. He does that purposely. He feels so secure in dealing with the beat and time that he never thinks: "Well, I really have to get this four bars just right." Roy finishes his idea, wherever it takes him. What he does works for him and for the music.”

- Alan Dawson, Drummer and educator

“If you watch Roy and listen, you know that his early inspiration had to he Papa Jo Jones. The way Roy sits at the drums, the way he touches the cymbal. The whole thing comes out of his approaching the instrument as if it's fine china — and respecting it.”

- Dick Katz, Pianist and educator

“Roy and I worked together in Stan Getz's band. But I first heard him when I was in the Army at Fort Meade, near Baltimore. Pres and his group were appearing in a local club. Roy gave every indication he was a very talented young guy. I had never before experienced anyone who played quite that way. He was so light with sticks. His sound was bright but not loud. Roy had his own way of doing things. Even then, he could do pretty much what he wanted on the instrument.”

- Bill Crow, Bassist

“Roy was the first guy to come along and do something after Max. By 1948, Max had his approach to the instrument perfected. At about that time, Roy was introducing his way. It was totally different from what Max had established and, as far as I'm concerned, far more attractive, hipper, more stimulating.

He had his own language, techniques, and ideas. His breaks were completely different. He played all kinds of intricate things between the beats — ideas that other guys didn't play because their heads didn't work that way.

I heard him every chance I got — at the Savoy with Pres in '47, with Bird and other musicians. He completely gassed me. I bought a drum set just like his — with the three-by-thirteen snare. Roy was using Ludwig drums, so I had a set made up by Ludwig. Roy used green sparkle. I had my set made up in blue sparkle.

A situation came up regarding the "tiny" snare drum when I went to work for Roy Eldridge. He said: "What are you doing with that? It sounds like a toy!" It didn't have enough guts for the music that the Eldridge band was playing. I had to get another drum. But it was right for Roy because he played all these inside, fast things. He got a lot out of the drum.

Later he began using tom-toms much more, and he was all over the set. He has done so many interesting things: playing the ride rhythm differently by stretching it out, approximating straight eighths; turning the beat around; abstracting the time. What he does not only gives the music a fresh sense of unity but forces everyone to pay attention.

Roy Haynes is a school of one. You've had countless Max, Blakey, and Kenny Clarke clones. But there's no one who can play like Roy. He's to the drums what Erroll Garner is to the piano. A school unto himself.”

- Phil Brown, Drummer

“This guy was sitting in and playing the greatest "fours" that I had ever heard — incredible commentaries in four bars. It was Roy Haynes. His breaks, solos, the general feeling of his time all were unusual. His personality came through in what he played.”

- Ira Gitler, Jazz author, producer and critic

“I loved Roy Haynes. He was different than Max, myself, and others. Roy was clean. He had these beautiful suits; he looked so sharp, man. He was a real good player — real good. He had nice time and technique and a beautiful drum set. We used to look at him and say: "How the hell did he do that?" We all knew. Simple. He wasn't a f**kup.”

- Stan Levey, drummer

“Half of Bird's [Charlie Parker’s] band was kind of crazy. But Roy always was cool. Clean-living, healthy. We depended on him a great deal. He was like a Rock of Gibraltar. Roy didn't have a bad night in the almost three years we worked with Bird.”

- Red Rodney, trumpet player and bandleader

“He's the perfect guy for trying new stuff. He's a free soul with extraordinary instincts— much less tied to the traditional drummer's role than almost anyone. He's a great model for how we all should be. There's this tendency to go stale musically, to kind of get stuck at some point. And he never does.

We've been together since the 1960s in a variety of situations — with Stan Getz and in my bands. Roy takes chances if he's attracted by the possibilities of anything. When he first played in my band, with Larry Coryell [guitar] and Steve Swallow [bass], we were young guys with long hair and beads, involved in the jazz/rock thing. Roy dug what we were trying to do, though he must have been given grief by people of his own age. They must have said: "Man, what are you doing playing that weird music with those kids?" But it "happened," because Roy can play anything with anybody and make it right for everyone.”

- Gary Burton, vibraphonist and bandleader

“I feel instantly comfortable with Roy Haynes. He's so easy to play with, so fun, because everything is so perfectly subdivided and perfectly enunciated. He's so fluent rhythmically with every little thing he does that you can fit right inside it.

To play effectively with Roy, you have to be confident and secure as a

musician. You have to know where you are in the song and where you are in the bar — because his whole thing is displacement. The people who seem to enjoy playing with Roy the most are those who are pretty advanced rhythmically.”

His stuff is very complex, but at the same time, it sounds simple and inviting. The way he makes the subdivision between the hands and feet is the essence of his style.”

- Pat Metheny, guitarist and bandleader

“Roy plays like a man on a tightrope. Even when you think he's going to fall, he gets it together. The sound of the instrument and how he plays it is always in my ear. I'm fascinated by the way he handles time, the way he shuffles the beat around, the way he manipulates it—instead of playing "2" and "4" on the hi-hat, he might play "1" and "3."

He can bring you to the edge of your seat. You say: "Wait a minute!" But then he'll do something else and come out on "1" and you'll say: "Oh, okay." You can't typecast Roy Haynes, He does everything. Tony [Williams], Elvin [Jones], Clifford Jarvis—all those guys come from Roy. Within a few beats, in 4/4 time, he can take a listener around the world.”

- Kenny Washington, drummer

As all of the above accolades attest, Roy Haynes holds a special place in the history of Jazz drumming.

In his Une Histoire de la Batterie de Jazz [2000], George Paczynski calls him “Le père de la batterie contemporaine’ - the father of contemporary drums. He goes on to say that “Certains musiciens patientent de très nombreuses années avant d'être reconnus.” Some musicians wait many years before being recognized. Such is the case of Roy Haynes.

But it’s never been that complicated for Roy: “I am a natural drummer first and foremost. Some people are born with a gift from God, and whatever that gift is, it's natural. As far back as I can remember, I've always played rhythms."

If truth be told, many of the drummers associated with the advent of Bebop in the 1940s were largely self taught and had a natural gift for rhythm among them Stan Levey, Shelly Manne, Art Blakey, Philly Joe Jones; even some of those who came along later - Art Taylor, Jimmy Cobb and Albert “Tootie” Heath - all were largely “natural drummers.”

In a way, this lack of technical training is what helped give them their individual styles: one press roll and you knew it was Art Blakey; aggressive, rat-a-tat-tat assertive and active accompaniment was Philly Joe Jones’ trademark; melodically blending drums into any setting was a chief characteristic of Shelly Manne’s approach to the instrument [he used timpani mallets!]. 

While the unsurpassed, highly technical drumming of Buddy Rich, Louis Bellson and Joe Morello was something to be admired, it was not something these self-taught guys aspired to. Lengthy, complicated, and challenging drum solos impressed them as much as they did many Jazz fans, but they had little interest in playing them.

Haynes received his first major shot in the jazz press in the December 1, 1950, issue of Down Beat. Pat Harris, a discerning writer, profiled the drummer. Harris said: "Musicians, drummers included, agree that Haynes, a 25 year-old Boston boy, is one of the most rhythmically exact, musically meticulous men working over a snare and cymbal today."

That same year, Haynes began playing with tenor saxophonist Stan Getz, a subtle, lyrical player who recast the Lester Young style, emerging with a stimulating, identifiable, communicative manner of expression. A large listening public embraced Getz almost from the beginning of his career as a bandleader.

Getz had several excellent drummers in his band over the years. But the saxophonist had special feelings for Haynes because the drummer brought quiet intensity and an ongoing sense of creativity to the music.

Haynes's records with Getz tell a story of discretion, swing, and rhythmic surprise that, in sum, raised the level of everyone involved. His best recording with Getz, according to the drummer, is "I'm Late, I'm Late," which opens Getz's extraordinary 1961 Verve set Focus, composed and arranged by Eddie Sauter.

The work comprises seven sections. Getz improvised over, through, and around what was written. The nature of the music and the performances themselves made it impossible to splice takes. On the Haynes feature, the takes were so good and so different one from the other that recording director Creed Taylor decided to use both, tacking them together.

Haynes's spontaneity and ability as a brush player bring to the music an unusual, underlying spirit. He acts out what he feels, activating Getz and responding to him and the strings (ten violins, four violas, two cellos, a bass, and a harp). He brought to the session only a minimal set: snare and an open bass drum. The hi-hat is used essentially as a color source.

Haynes's buoyant patterns behind Getz and the strings draw you into the piece. Often he breaks into conversations with Getz and the supporting musicians or speaks for himself. It's a matter of pure instinct guiding Haynes's hands and feet. The piece moves swiftly. Veteran critic Dom Cerulli, the writer of the liner essay, noted: "The pace immediately calls to mind the rush hour or the flight of the ‘Mad Hatter to the Tea Party in Alice in Wonderland.’"

As Haynes played more and more in diverse contexts (did you know he played with Lennie Tristano and George Shearing?), he grew as an artist and had an increasing impact on other drummers. Though a major presence within the jazz community, for a number of years he was comparatively unknown to the public. Despite Haynes's declarations to the contrary, this implicit rejection hurt him — all the more so because he had a continuing effect on how the instrument was played in a jazz sense.

Haynes is not formally trained. He relies completely on what he feels and hears. Many of the things he articulates are technically breathtaking — some on several levels at once, suggesting a variety of feelings and more than one time signature. You hear the history and progression of jazz and elements from allied idioms, notably Latin, mixing and mingling. He takes full advantage of the sound and color possibilities of each drum in the kit.

Unlike those who have undergone years of training, he doesn't readily realize that what he plays is particularly difficult. Naturally talented drummers like Chick Webb, Shadow Wilson, Jo Jones, Buddy Rich, and Haynes hear the music and that's all they need to proceed. What comes out is often as surprising to them as it is to colleagues and listeners. It's a partially controlled happening, couched in their instantly identifiable language. These crafty, deeply gifted percussionists introduce new functions and concepts and puzzles for others to solve. Not always understood at the outset, these innovators and their work are ultimately vindicated.

For Roy Haynes, playing drums never has been just a matter of "ding-ding-a-ding"—straight time on the hi-hat or the top cymbal and symmetrical, supportive strokes on the snare and four beats to the bar on the bass drum. Even in the early days in Boston, Haynes had a tendency to break things up, making the rhythms more interesting to him and to those who worked with him.

Haynes performances, taken as a whole, are a major departure from what listeners expect, The techniques that bring reality to his thoughts - except in the very early days — are of his own making. His performances often take the form of a story: sharply honed sentences, melding into brisk paragraphs and chapters, building to conclusions. All of this is made possible by his talent for time and improvisation. Haynes makes fresh and provoking music on an instrument where music, as such, is uncommon,

Duke Ellington, whose range of interests always was admirable, had to replace Louie Bellson in 1953 when the virtuoso drummer wanted to form his own band and join wife Pearl Bailey on the road. Bellson suggested that Ellington call Roy Haynes. The Maestro called and offered him the job. The drummer was flattered and appreciative, but he felt many of the Ellington veterans might not feel as strongly about an "experimental drummer" as Ellington obviously did. Haynes politely turned the offer down. Though he subbed with the Maestro, and with Basie later on, he never worked with them on a full-time basis.

The diminutive, self-contained drummer was crucial to establishing what the late drummer-teacher-percussion historian Charlie Perry called "the new thing in jazz drumming." Haynes did this by coming up with so many things first. As an accompanist relating to other instruments and as a soloist, he paved the way for Elvin Jones, Tony Williams, Jack DeJohnette, and others who bear collective responsibility for moving the instrument into relatively unexplored regions — musical areas that generally tax your sense of comfort and understanding until an almost inevitable epiphany makes sensible and exciting and edifying what previously seemed without rhyme or reason.

Though Haynes actively has been a part of change in the Jazz idiom for most of his career, there is the existing reality of making a living. At some point, there's the pressing need for a steady job that pays well — hopefully, one that doesn't demean the musician's art and provides opportunities to be expressive.

Haynes was fortunate. He caught on with Ella Fitzgerald in the summer of 1952,. The following year, he joined singer Sarah Vaughan and remained with her until 1958. Listening to their records together on Mercury, I was reminded how gifted Vaughan was. Comparable to a great jazz horn player in her investigative treatment of songs, she offered performances that rarely, if ever, were pat, redundant, boring, or excessively show business oriented

Generally more restrained with Vaughan, the drummer served the concerns of the singer quietly, yet remained Roy Haynes, a distinct presence

As Haynes explained it: “I've learned so much more about life and music—met and played with so many people [since the years with Charlie Parker]. It's all there in what and how I play. Tell you one thing: I'm only happy when I'm moving forward. Some musicians play the same songs the same way every night. That's impossible for me. My fundamental style may not really be different. But there have been so many things added.

I'm always thinking about playing and what I want to do—and how to do it. I work things out in my mind when I'm traveling, sitting around the house, even while I'm eating. It's constant. I don't practice; it's not my thing. I didn't practice even when I was a kid. I just wanted to accompany someone. I wanted to be able to play with someone. I did it to the ultimate with ‘Trane. To the ultimate, man! When we were together, there was that very special freedom. We had an equal partnership. I could play all the things I dreamed of playing. You can't do that with too many people.”

Haynes felt the same connection to the playing and writing of Thelonious Monk. He was challenged to get inside the music, be a part of it, move beyond what he had done before. How the drummer responded to Monk is well illustrated on Thelonious in Action (Riverside), the 1958 live session at New York's Five Spot, co-featuring Johnny Griffin (tenor) and Ahmed Abdul-Malik (bass). On another set, The Thelonious Monk Quartet Featuring John Coltrane—Live at the Five Spot—Discovery! (Blue Note), he is strongly motivated to act creatively both by Monk and Coltrane. Haynes allows Monk's compounding of rhythm, melody, and harmony to guide him. He doesn't turn to preconceived modes of rhythmic behavior. Haynes frames and extends what the thematic material and soloists say, infiltrating the music with his personality, building to bursts of energy.

The time is always implicit, no matter where Haynes goes. The cymbal rings. The hi-hat breathes in tempo. His left hand chatters on the snare. The bass drum serves multiple functions in development of the rhythmic line.

Haynes is a discerning, controlling presence in the music, condensing, expanding, balancing what's being said. He places comments, asides, punctuations, and accents in places that enhance interest for the players and listeners. Basics of the Haynes language include flams, rolls, quarter-note and broken triplets, and ruffs of various lengths. How they're used adds to the potency of each performance.

Haynes takes an educational multilevel solo on Blue Monk (Thelonious in Action), moving into double time, slowing and speeding up for expressive effect, putting a variety of thoughts together with flair and concision. He is equally effective as a solo voice on Evidence — a little over a chorus based on a five-stroke idea that grows, varies, and keeps you nailed. 

Throughout these recordings, the drummer's connective tissue — the ideas and techniques that tie things together — often is so imaginative and fitting that it makes you smile broadly. His associates on the Monk recordings have no problem because, no matter how chatty Haynes becomes, he seldom gets in the way of the other players' thoughts — particularly after they've become acclimated to his style.

His range of dynamics is incredible. He gives you the feeling of floating out in space. He is the perfect foil for Monk's relatively heavy-handed approach. They complement each other. A lesser artist would have sounded feeble.

Haynes's work with Coltrane is clearly a matter of great compatibility, passion, love, and understanding. You hear it throughout the Five Spot CD with Monk and on Coltrane Impulse CDs, particularly the one done live in Newport in 1963. The two take flight, brothers on intimate terms with the same muse. John Coltrane — Newport '63 has to be listened to. It provides a great lesson in mutual creation. They push each other to the edge; one boldly acts on the other. The performances — try Impressions — achieve an almost hysterical heat.

Listening to Haynes records, you can't help being impressed by the

drummer's extraordinary ability to play for the circumstances. With Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis's big band on Prestige, he lays down the time; the band

and soloists have an appropriate foundation on which to lean. With Bud

Powell and Fats Navarro (Blue Note), he's the personification of bebop,

bringing his own modifications of the style to the fore. With Eric Dolphy

(Prestige), he allows the experimental alto saxophonist freedom to do what

he will and, simultaneously, is accommodating, understanding, musically

encouraging. With pianist-composer Andrew Hill, on Black Fire (Blue Note), Haynes adeptly immerses himself in this very personal music. He

works compatibly  with  both  the  ensemble  and  the  soloists.  Every

instrument in Hill compositions has a role. The player is expected to serve

the music and be an individual. Haynes does exactly what is expected of

him—and more.

The well-recorded early 1960s set on Impulse Out of the Afternoon, with Haynes as leader and featuring Rahsaan Roland Kirk (reeds), Tommy Flanagan (piano), and Henry Grimes (bass), is another must-have recording. The reasons soon become apparent: Haynes's wonderful time; his sound and articulation over the entire instrument; typical Haynes rhythmic counterpoint, which feeds the flow of the other instruments; his ideas, expressed with an almost defiant buoyancy: his patient, colorful ballad performances— and the Haynes solos.

Pianist-composer Chick Corea has been a very important musician in the middle phases of the drummer's career. Haynes first worked with him in the Stan Getz band. One of the most influential Haynes records, Now He Sings, Now He Sobs, was made with Corea in 1968 on Blue Note. It presents Corea, who often mirrors his Latin background in his writing, the musically literate, firm yet free bassist Miroslav Vitous, and Haynes, enhancing the music and the work of his associates, very much in a give-and-take mode. He plays the role of the percussionist. He concentrates on communicating with colleagues, color, and his own view of time.

The three men engage in meaningful exchanges There are frequent suggestions of a Latin base in this music. Haynes—a longtime devotee of timbale drumming—more than suggests the Latin tinge, the underlying reference in the music. Freedom, time signature variety, and some abstraction are notable in the Corea pieces. But it's the physicality and swing of the performances and their thoughtfulness that catch hold of you. Try "Steps." What Haynes does is a matter of true improvisation. His work here tells you a lot about his techniques and how very potent they can be.

Two other continuing associations, with Gary Burton and Pat Metheny, also have been very meaningful to Haynes for a number of years. The music of both, like that of Corea, is adventurous yet never so far afield that it loses connection with the central rhythmic root feelings of music.

Roy Haynes has lost nothing with the passage of time—a rare situation indeed. The drummer's records of the 1990s (on Dreyfus, a French label) with his own band, featuring Dave Kikoski, a fine young pianist, document his continuing capacity to be better and better.

Now that the world has found Roy Haynes at last, it's making up for lost time and perhaps a sense of guilt. Awards and honors, large and small, frequently come his way. The press salutes his "startling" talent and his capacity to survive and grow. This is somewhat reassuring to all of those who have admired him for so long. That talent can ultimately lessen cynicism.

His palette is larger; his technique has grown. His talent is well cared for and lustrous. Always sage and sensitive in his management of drums and cymbals, he makes each experience pay its way. Every part of the kit — from the unknown corners of the snare to the tom-toms and cymbals to the rims of all the drums — plays a role in his classy offerings. Drums have revealed their special secrets to him. 

Roy Haynes has the fancy cars, the great clothes, the bread, the fine ladies, the home, the comforts — all the trappings of success. Why not? You should get what you deserve.

[The editorial staff at JazzProfiles is indebted to the following source for information about Art: [1] the drummer world website, [2] Modern Drummer magazine, [3] Kenny Mathieson, Cookin’: Hard Bop and Soul Jazz, 1954-1965, [4] Burt Korall, Drummin’ Men: The Heartbeat of Jazz – The Bebop Years, [5] Georges Paczynski Une Histoire De La Batterie De Jazz Les Années Bebop, La Voie Royale et Les Chemins de Traverse and Downbeat magazine.