Max Roach

Max Roach
Roach c. 1947
Roach c. 1947
Background information
Birth nameMaxwell Lemuel Roach
Born(1924-01-10)January 10, 1924
Newland Township, North Carolina, U.S.
DiedAugust 16, 2007(2007-08-16) (aged 83)
New York City, U.S.
Genres
Occupations
  • Musician
  • composer
  • educator
Instruments
  • Drums
  • percussion
  • piano
Years active1944–2002
Labels
Alma materManhattan School of Music

Maxwell Lemuel Roach (January 10, 1924[a] – August 16, 2007) was an American jazz drummer and composer. A pioneer of bebop, he worked in many other styles of music, and is generally considered one of the most important drummers in history.[2][3] He worked with many famous jazz musicians, including Clifford Brown, Coleman Hawkins, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Abbey Lincoln, Dinah Washington, Charles Mingus, Billy Eckstine, Stan Getz, Sonny Rollins, Eric Dolphy, and Booker Little. He also played with his daughter Maxine Roach, a Grammy nominated violist. He was inducted into the DownBeat Hall of Fame in 1980 and the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 1992.[4]

In the mid-1950s, Roach co-led a pioneering quintet along with trumpeter Clifford Brown. In 1970, he founded the percussion ensemble M'Boom.

  1. ^ MADISON magazine: "Max Roach and James Woods". Archived September 29, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference autogenerated1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ "Legendary Jazz Drummer Max Roach Dies at 83". Billboard. Retrieved March 21, 2011.
  4. ^ "Modern Drummer's Readers Poll Archive, 1979–2014". Modern Drummer. Retrieved August 10, 2015.


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