Jack DeJohnette, acclaimed jazz drummer who worked with Miles Davis, dies at 83

Jack DeJohnette, a celebrated jazz drummer who worked with Miles Davis on his landmark 1970 fusion album and collaborated with Keith Jarrett and a vast array of other jazz greats, has died at 83.

Musician Jack DeJohnette passes away

The acclaimed drummer, bandleader and composer died Sunday in Kingston, New York, of congestive heart failure, surrounded by his wife, family and close friends, his assistant, Joan Clancy, told a news agency.

A winner of two Grammy awards, the Chicago-born Jack began his musical life as a classical pianist, starting training at age 4, before taking up the drums with his high school band. He was in demand in his early years as both a pianist and a drummer.

Over the years he collaborated not only with Davis and Jarrett but also with names like John Coltrane, Sun Ra, Thelonious Monk, Stan Getz, Chet Baker, Sonny Rollins, Herbie Hancock, Betty Carter — “virtually every major jazz figure from the 1960s on,” wrote the National Endowment for the Arts, which honored him in 2012 with a Jazz Master Fellowship.

In an interview for the NEA at the time, Jack described what he felt was the nature of his talent. “The best gift that I have is the ability to listen, not only listen audibly but listen with my heart,” he said. “I've been fortunate enough to play with a lot of musicians and leaders who allowed me to have that freedom.”

He added, “I just never doubted that I would be successful at this because it just feels like something’s going through me and lifting me up, and carrying me. All I had to do was acknowledge this gift and put it to use.”

In 1968, Jack joined Davis and his group to work on music leading up to Davis' 1970 influential studio album, Bitches Brew. In a Sessions Panel interview, Jack spoke of how he he’d been freelancing in New York when the opportunity arose to join Davis in the studio, at a time when experimentation with genres had become “the new frontier, so to speak.”

“Miles was in a creative mood,” Jack said, “a process of utilising the studio to go in every day and experiment with grooves. A lot of the music is not that structured ... it was a matter of grooves, and sometimes a few notes or a few melodies. You’d turn the tape on and just let it roll.”

“Days and days and days of this would go on,” Jack added. “We never thought about how important these records would be, it was just we knew it was important because Miles was there and he was moving forward with something different.”

Rolling Stone, which listed Jack as one of the top 100 drummers of all time (at No. 40), cited the drummer’s “own innate knack for turning a memorable tune.”

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