Pretty Purdie
Posted by SpikeMar 31
I think it was around 1968. There was this thing at the New York Coliseum, a rock & roll exhibition thingie selling musical instruments, records, posters, and a few live performances. I saw the Al Kooper Big Band. Kooper had just left Blood Sweat & Tears and was getting to release his first solo album. But the stand-out in his band was the drummer, Bernard “Pretty” Purdie.
Purdie has gone on to be one of the most influential drummers in rock and r&b history, appearing on more than 4,000 recordings, from Aretha Franklin to Steely Dan. Now he’s playing drums for the Broadway revival of Hair. Here’s a good NY Times profile on him.
During a concert with Ray Charles in Chicago, when Mr. Purdie started playing a few bars too soon, Charles barked, “Don’t play, drummer,” into the microphone, a rather public embarrassment before a huge crowd.“He would turn around and look at you — I always thought the guy could see,” Mr. Purdie said. “And he’d say, ‘What is your problem?’ Now, what are you supposed to say to that?”
“You’d do a first take, and he’d put on his overcoat as if he was about to leave,” said Donald Fagen, the Steely Dan keyboardist. “The problem was that some of the other musicians had just become comfortable with the chords. You had to cajole him to do some other takes so everyone else could polish up their parts a bit.”
Which led me to this YouTube video of Purdie explaining his technique:
Which then led me to this fucking incredible video by Israeli artist Kutiman, who made a music/video mash-up from various music videos all over YouTube. This one’s called The Mother of All Funk Chords and it rocks the house. More of these at his web site.
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