Transcription: Charli Persip blues

Charli Persip playing a medium blues with Oliver Nelson: J&B, from Nelson's 1961 record Main Stem. Persip is really enjoyable to listen to, and has a little bit of Roy Haynes's edgy, modern thing happening. Good example of someone playing pretty modern in groove environment— he heard Idris Muhammad doing that before. If you swing and play good time you can get away with some stuff, you don't always have to slam pure context groove. 

The transcription covers his playing behind all the solos, starting at 1:25. Tempo is 106.  

Comping with the snare drum is fairly sparse; it seems like there's a little more activity there than is audible on the recording. He feathers the bass drum throughout, fairly audibly. He does a Roy Haynes-like thing of unisons in the hand vs. bass drum, like you see in measure 12. Hihat is consistently on 2/4 all the way, except he hits some accents on it, and sometimes drops it out when he's doing something complicated.

In the third chorus there's a double time 2 feel happening. Swing the 16ths there. Otherwise the 16ths are played evenly. 

He's using a small (18"?) bright, rather tinny ride cymbal— light with short decay. Not anybody's dream cymbal, but it sounds fine. You could get the same sound out of one of those old Ludwig/Paiste or Ludwig Standard cymbals.  

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Groove o' the day: Charli Latin

One more item from that tune Fuss Budget, by Curtis Fuller, from the album Two Bones: there is a few bars of a Latin groove on the head of the tune, during which Charli Persip plays this:

That should look very familiar— there's barely even cause to share it, except to say haha, look, another example of someone using that same Mozambique-type bell rhythm. It's a very useful, hip rhythm for a lot of different Latin styles in jazz. It just flows nicely from the middle of the first bar to the ending 1:

Persip seemingly plays the bass drum on the first 1 only; 1 and the & of 2 is another good possibility for jazz applications— though not correct for clave-based music. A good generic bass drum rhythm for occasions when clave is being observed is & of 2 of both measures. That would work here, since the bassist is playing a quasi-Cuban rhythm on that section.

Transcription: Charli Persip comping

There are a few drummers who I really, really love despite having not heard them on that many records. I have a relatively few albums I listen to all the time, and some people are just underrepresented. Charli Persip is one. He's on a ton of stuff, just mostly not the records I listen to— with a few notable exceptions. But he's basically the perfect high bebop drummer, with a perfect balance of intelligence, groove, assertiveness, hipness and taste.

This is him playing behind Curtis Fuller's solo on Fuss Budget, from Fuller's album Two Bones. It's super hip, economical, modern bebop drumming— somewhat like Roy Haynes, but less flamboyant. The transcription starts at 0:43, at the beginning of the solos:

A bebop groove, with the repeating cymbal rhythm, can begin to feel somewhat static if the comping is too predictable— and this a good example of not-that. He's mostly comping in single notes, but they're not always in the same place in the measure; some of what he's doing suggests 3/4 within 4/4 (like in the first four bars) but he's not obvious about that either. He picks his spots for the more assertive punctuations.

Here he plays his cymbal beat with all the notes basically at an even volume. It's an interpretation I associate with Billy Higgins, but where Higgins has a very relaxed vibe, Persip is emphatic and grooving. He's got quite pocket with it— it's worth listening all the way through just focusing on the cymbal.

He is feathering the bass drum for much of this, but I've only notated it in a couple of spots where he plays it pretty strongly, and it sets up something different.

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Note: the album cover in the video credits Al Harewood on drums, but that was a mistake. Persip is credited for this track on the Blue Note box set. And it sounds like Persip. 

Transcription: Charli Persip solo break

This is a little solo break by Charli Persip, near the end of So Sorry Please, from Red Garland's album Bright and Breezy. The tune is by Bud Powell. We're just looking at the drum break, but listen to the whole track. Charli Persip has one of the more appealing time interpretations in jazz. Very front-of-the-beat in a very pleasant way. The transcription starts after 3:30.

Note the phrasing in the first four measures: 3+3+2 beats, two times. There are some mixed stickings happening— obviously he's playing paradiddles in bar 4; on the triplets in the last three bars you can figure out your own stickings. There will be some left hand doubles in there. Print the page out and mark them in with a pencil. In the third measure there are some tenuto marks; he stretches the rhythm there almost to make a quarter note triplet. There are also a couple of different articulations on the snare drum. Rolls indicated with a z are more crushed singles— or in the fifth bar a crushed 5-stroke roll; the roll indicated with regular slash marks is a more normal closed 5-stroke roll.

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Rothman book recommendations

While the interview is fresh, I want to give my recommendations for Joel Rothman book purchases. God knows I haven't seen his entire catalog, but these are very strong books:

Basic Drumming - An everything classic. See my review for more information.

Mini Monster Book of Rock Drumming - Embrace the goofy cover. The best overview of rock/pop/funk/backbeat-oriented drumming I've seen. Review coming soon. You may also be interested Rothman's newest book, which I have not seen, Son of the Mini Monster for Rock Drumming: "...concentrates on developing simple to complex-sounding bass drum patterns against a variety of rock cymbal beats in various time signatures."

Drumming And All That Jazz - An excellent overview of primarily triplet-based jazz concepts.

Basic Drum Technique and Beyond - Contains a lot of material further developing things found in Stick Control. Particularly interesting are the parts dealing with stickings of mixed rhythms, and the dynamics section.

Rock with Hand-Foot Drum Breaks - Primarily a book of drum fills including the bass drum, much of this is more like Stick Control for three voices. Very valuable.

Swingin' in 3/4 Time - One of his earlier books, this first came out when the jazz waltz was still a fairly exotic style- Elvin Jones had just joined John Coltrane's band, and was expressing (I think to Charlie Persip?) what a difficult time he was having playing in 3/4. This is still a solid introduction to playing in three, and an excellent companion to Joe Morello's later New Directions in Rhythm. [Note: Mr. Rothman informs me that this book has been out of print for some time, and most of the content has been included in Drumming And All That Jazz above; there do seem to be a few copies of Swingin' in... available through Steve Weiss Music. I think it's worth the purchase price just for the cover.]

The Compleat Jazz Drummer - The big one, 500 pages of materials, with some very unique stuff. Review coming soon. I personally think every student of jazz should own this book.

The John Lewis Show

I'm hoping to finish up an ed piece and fire it off to Drum! Magazine before some afternoon lessons, so until I can post something more substantive, enjoy these clips of the John Lewis Show (apparently a public access show), featuring Lewis hanging with some great musicians, and, from Lewis' co-host, the best opening line this side of Ali G.

The person who posted them has disabled embedding, so you'll have to hit the links to watch:

Roy Haynes | Vernell Fournier and Mal Waldron | Charlie Persip | Charlie Rouse