Herbie Lovelle
Encyclopedia
Herbie or Herb Lovelle was a versatile American drummer
, who played Jazz
, R & B
, rock and folk. He was also a studio
musician
and an actor.
Lovelle's uncle was drummer Arthur Herbert
. Lovelle began his career with trumpeter, singer and band leader Hot Lips Page late in the 1940s, then played in the 1950s with saxophonist Hal Singer
, Johnny Moore
's Three Blazes, and pianist Earl Hines
. Through working for both Lucky Thompson
and Jimmy Rushing
of Count Basie's Orchestra, he became house drummer at the Savoy Ballroom
in New York City for much of the 1950s. He toured with tenor sax Arnett Cobb
and pianist Teddy Wilson
in 1954. In 1959 he contributed to the pianist Paul Curry's album 'Paul Curry presents the Friends of Fats' on the Golden Crest label.
He performed on earlier television with the King Guion orchestra on the Jerry Lester Show and the Ed Sullivan Show. In 1966, Herb was the Lead Drummer for the Sammy Davis, Jr.
TV Show out of NY.
He began playing more R&B
music later in the 1950s, and soon found himself working as a studio
musician
, often with Sam "The Man" Taylor
. He plays on recordings
by Bob Dylan
(The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
), Pearls Before Swine
, Eric Andersen
, David Blue, John Denver
, Tom Rush
, B. B. King
, and The Monkees
, working well into the 1980s in the studios.
In 1976, he produced the first Stuff
album, which went platinum in Japan. He also played drums in the 1976 revival of Guys and Dolls
.
From the 1980s on, he acted in film and television, including on Law & Order
(1995–2004). His film credits include Bella
(2006), Mitchellville (2004) (Sundance), The Rhythm of the Saints
(2003), Don't Explain (2002), The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001), in German, Im Bann des Jade Skorpions, Down to Earth (2001) in German Einmal Himmel und zurück, Girlfight
(2000), Maximum Risk (1996), Getting Away with Murder
(1996), White Lies (1996), Bleeding Hearts (1994), The Paper (1994), Running on Empty (1988), Death Wish III (1985), A Man Called Adam (1966).
His TV credits include Into the Fire (2005), How Do You Spell Belief? (2005), Kingpin Rising (2005), Third Watch
(2 episodes, 2005), and Law & Order
TV (1995–2004).
According to Janice Singleton, singer and actress, September, 2008:
… Hails from Brooklyn, New York and performed his first professional job as a musician with Hot Lips Page. Followed by one adventurous road tour after another with such pioneers as Lucky Millinder
, the Oscar and Johnny Moore Trio, Hal Singer
, Willis Jackson and Earl "Fatha" Hines
. These unforgettable events continued with Billy Graham, Dancer Paul Draper, The Billy Williams Quartet-plus 5, Nat "King" Cole
and Arnett Cobb
. Making the decision to settle near home for a short period earned him a coveted gig at the Savoy Ballroom
with both Lucky Thompson
and Jimmie Rushing.
As the word spread of his unique time-keeping abilities, the door of opportunity opened even wider and he stepped over into Gospel Music and began recording with Mahalia Jackson and the Drinkard Singers. This included a host of others that helped to plant the seeds for R&B Artists such as Laverne Baker, Ruth Brown, Willis Jackson and Hal Singer.
As a studio musician, Mr. Lovelle began by setting-up a groove for the original Pepsi-Cola jingle. Hey, somebody had to do it!... And major recording companies such as Capital, Columbia, and Warner/Electric/Atlantic began calling on his creative genius from which many a hit record was born. All this put Herb in demand and he started touring with some of the most important entertainers in the music industry many with whom he made recordings. Among them were Sammy Davis Jr., Lena Horne, BB King, Aretha Franklin, Tony Bennett, Jimmy Smith, Bob Dylan, Peter, Paul & Mary, Roberta Flack, Jon Lucien, Dinah Washington, Baby Washington, The McCoys, The Angels, The Main Ingredients, The Manhattans, Judy Garland, Connie Francis, Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masakela, Nina Simone, Shirley Horne, Gloria Lynne, Irene Reid, Gladys Knight & The Pips, The Isley Brothers, Leslie Uggams, Peaches & Herb, Inez Foxx, Chuck Jackson, Johnny Mathis, Vic Damone, Johnny Desmond, Jerry Vale, Astrud Gilberto, and Sam (The Man) Taylor. His seven year tour and recording dates with Rocky Mountain High Guy John Denver resulted in Platinum Selling, Grammy Award Winning Album, titled "An Evening with John Denver" which still hangs above the fireplace in the Lovelle living room.
Of course, the natural next step for Herb was his moving into the role of Record Producer. His knowledge and history earned him opportunities to work with cream-of-the–crop legends such as Blues Man BB King, for whom he produced two albums "Live and Well" and "Completely Well." He then founded, produced and recorded a group of East Coast Based musicians called "Stuff"
and released their first album by the same title on the Warner Bros. Label. Stuff contained such an excellent group of Musicians that Herb arranged for their extraordinary sound to be the background music on studio projects for every major record date created in New York City.
Always seeking more and newer ways to express his creativity, Herb moved into, and quickly conquered the Broadway circuit as a pit
musician. He worked in Tony Award winning show Don't Bother Me, I Can’t Cope, Guys and Dolls and The Wiz, all of which fueled his aspirations for becoming an actor. After several intense years of studying at the prestigious Sande Shurin Acting Studio located in New York City, Herb was then introduced to an agent and made his debut in the long-running soap opera The Guiding Light as a court auditor. He continued to return to primetime favorite Law & Order portraying different roles each time. He was a featured character named Richard Brooks in comedy skit "No One Called 911" on the Chris Rock Show. Herb is in a variety of television commercials shown on network and cable television. As an established film actor, his credits include: A Man Called Adam, The Paper, Getting Away With Murder, Red Merger, Death Wish III, Running On Empty, White Lies, Girl Fight, Down to Earth & Maximum Risk. His theater credits include King Lear, Driving Miss Daisy, I'm Not Rappaport, Miss Evers' Boys, Yesterdays (An Evening with Billie Holiday), Some Sweet Day, Song of Singapore, Ma Rose, Amen Corner, Conrack, Macbeth, Murder To Go, Inc.
Herb Lovelle is someone who is deeply concerned about the future of our children, for that reason, he along with world renowned Bassist Jerry Jemmott, are in the process of developing an exciting interactive learning program known as "Jamboree". In addition, Herb was a regular and welcomed speaker and Instructor at Pratt Institute for the Neighborhood Youth Corp of Brooklyn, New York.
According to Angele Dublin (Herb's granddaughter), November 2008:
After leaving the service, Herb was nagged into believing that the 9 to 5 rut was the sensible way for a family man to make a living. He accepted a position on the custodial staff at General Foods Co. in Hoboken, New Jersey, mopping the warehouse floors. In less than two years he had propelled himself into the most coveted job in the factory, mixing the flavors for JELL-O. The pulse of the mixing machines drove Herb crazy. All he heard was drum beats and patterns. His co-workers, his wife at the time, and his dad were very upset with his decision to quit and pursue the dubious career of a musician. As his marriage ended, his life in music began with his first "professional" job for Hot Lips Page
. THE DRUMS FELL APART AGAIN (the first time being his music debut in the service). This led to adventurous road tours with others such as, Lucky Millinder
, Oscar and Johnny Moore trio, Hal Singer
, Willis Jackson, Earl "Fatha" Hines, Billie Graham, Dancer Paul Draper, The Billie Williams Quartet-plus 5, Nat "King" Cole and Arnett Cobb. It should be noted at this point that the information in this document is in no way chronological.
Herb left the road tours to stay closer to home. Being employed by both Lucky Thompson
and Jimmie Rushing, Herb held a coveted gig at the Savoy Ballroom. As the word of his abilities spread, Herb was exposed to the recording studio of Apollo Records and a list of "Gospel" groups that planted the seeds for R&B artists he later recorded with like Laverne Baker, Ruth Brown, Willis Jackson, Hal Singer and others. Herb got a good dose of the "Blues" playing with Lightnin’ Hopkins, Muddy Waters
, Big Joe Turner
and Jimmy Witherspoon. "JAZZ" finds him with its distribution warehouse. He recorded with Mahalia Jackson
, the Drinkard Singers, Sonny Stitt
, Ike Quebec
, Wynton Kelly
, Art Farmer
, King Pleasure
, Buddy Tate, Buck Clayton
, Nat Adderley
, Illinois Jacquet
, Johnny Hodges
, Budd Johnson
, Kenny Burrell
, Mongo Santamaría
, Willie Bobo
, Slim Gaillard
, Clark Terry
, and Errol Garner.
He performed on earlier television with the King Guion orchestra on the Jerry Lester Show and the Ed Sullivan Show. Herb was the lead drummer for the Sammy Davis, Jr.
TV show originating in NY.
Herb's contribution to the "DANCE" world began with Sophie Maszlo to Paul Draper to Alvin Ailey's "Revelations". The earlier Days at the Apollo Theater and the subsequent Black circuit tours plus Allen Freed and Murray the "K" prepared Herb for BROADWAY’S Don’t Bother Me I Can't Cope, Cindy (o.b.) Guys and Dolls and The Wiz. Herb thanks GOD for blessing him with gifts that helped to create and be a part of the "NEW YORK STUDIO MUSICIAN" era, included is, BLUES, R&B, POP,ROCK AND ROLL, AND JAZZ. Jimmie Smith, Bob Dylan, Peter, Paul and Mary, John Denver, B.B. King, Roberta Flack
, Aretha Franklin
, Jon Lucien, Dinah Washington, Baby Washington, The McCoys, The Angels, Main Ingredient, Manhattans, Judy Garland, Connie Francis
, Lena Horne, Miriam Makeba
, Hugh Masakela, Nina Simone
, Shirley Home, Gloria Lynne, Irene Reid, Gladys Knight & Pips, Isley Bros, Leslie Uggams, Peaches and Herb, Inez Foxx, Chuck Jackson, Johnny Mathis, Vie Damone, Johnny Desmond, Jerry Vale, Tony Bennett, Astrud Gilberto, Sam (the man) Taylor. Just to name a few!
The Formative Years of Herb Lovelle, 1997, by Paula Lockheart, vocalist, songwriter, and interpreter of classic blues and jazz
The name "Herb Lovelle" has been mentioned in various books and periodicals on jazz history, African-American music, rhythm and blues, American popular music and drumming. He is probably best known as a New York "studio" (recording) drummer in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s-— with major recording credits covering everything from mainstream jazz and bebop to folk, mainstream pop, country, "bubblegum," rock, R&B, "funk" and more. Herb also played the gamut of major performers’ tours, Broadway shows, television and live radio. It is possible that there has never existed a more versatile American drummer.
Before this interview of April 18, 1997, I already knew a lot about Herb. Therefore, it was a challenge for me to see if I could uncover new information and themes about his musical career and his contributions to American music. In fact, I got so much new input that I am limiting this report to a few of the early influences that shaped this highly successful musician, whose career was itself a big chunk of the American history of popular music and jazz.
Herb was born sometime in the late 1920s and was raised in Brooklyn. His parents were from Barbados and Trinidad, and came to the U.S. as children. His father was a Baptist preacher. The first music Herb heard and saw being played was most likely church music. There was the singing and handclapping, of course, but no tambourines, and, although he saw the organist, he was not close enough to see how the instrument was played.
One of Herb's strongest and most influential early recollected musical experiences was when he heard his older sister and brother practicing classical violin and piano respectively (the parents made them take lessons). He remembers that he would sometimes "play" two popsicle sticks on the wooden floor, while his sister practiced the piano. When the parents were out, she played a little "jazz" figure, and he’d "play" with her.
He says he must have heard drums in parades, but he doesn’t think he saw the drums as a small child.. He remembers that the first trap drum set he saw was on a merry-go-round, where the set played automatically. He was fascinated with it.
All of this had taken place while Herb was a small child. At the same time, Herb's parents taught him principles to live by, and these had a lasting affect on his approach to musicianship: "Mom taught me I can do whatever I want....Daddy taught me if you’re gonna do something, do it right.., know as much as you can about it."
Both Herb's uncles (his mother's brothers) were drummers. One of them, Uncle Leon Monk Herbert, would take Herb along on his gigs, and later, actually turned over some of his gigs to Herb. In fact, Uncle Leon was indirectly responsible for Herb's first "paid" gig, at 11 or 12 years of age. In the 1930s "rent parties" were a popular form of entertainment in his area, and Herb was going to go to a neighborhood party and watch his uncle play drums with a pianist. (The pianist played the blues and stride styles of the time.) His uncle never got to the party for some reason, so Herb played a whisk broom and hairbrush on the body of a banjo, made from skin at that time. Herb says, "The piano player must have been tickled or amused....I guess I didn’t get in his way, and I got a dime...I ran out of there ‘cause I had to get home ...my parents would not have approved [of my being without supervision at] a rent party. After that my uncle never told me where those gigs were unless he took me with him."
But it was Herb's other uncle-- Arthur Herbert
, who gave him his intensive instruction in musicianship and drumming: "My Uncle Arthur fine tuned it. [He told me] This is the right way to do it." Uncle Arthur was "a big time guy." He played drums with Coleman Hawkins
, Jan Savitch (Shuffle Rhythm Orchestra, "a little hipper than Paul Whiteman"--a big band) and taught Shelly Manne
.
Herb was beginning to hear music—big bands like Count Basie, Bennie Goodman, etc.--on the radio and on records, and, since big bands featured saxophones, he told his Uncle Arthur he wanted to be a sax player. His uncle said that to play sax he should first take up the clarinet. Herb tried, but he hated practicing clarinet, and could hardly get a sound out. He decided to take up drums, since "I liked rhythm anyway." By this time, at about 12 or thirteen years of age, he was watching his Uncle Arthur play, and he didn’t see any music sheets, so he thought drums would be easier than clarinet. His uncle agreed to teach him drumming, and Herb credits this early training for much of his subsequent success.
Uncle Arthur was vehement that Herb had to be able to read music. He insisted that he "write down" the drum part onto manuscript paper from listening to a song on a record. (Bass drum, sock cymbal, high hat, arid snare drums each has a different line, space and symbol.) As it turns out, this was a pivotal factor in Herb's career. For example: "I was playing in Sammy Davis's show [1950's], and in a rehearsal, one of the arrangers came up to me and said ‘Wow, you’re catching everything...’ He wondered how I caught the licks that he wrote for the brass, and the saxes. I told him I was reading their music, over their heads. He said ‘I could write for you?’ --Sammy's regular drummer at the time could not read. The general tendency was to think that black musicians didn’t read, and especially the black drummers were not known as readers. The arranger all of a sudden was giving me charts. I showed him how to write for drums as I’d learned from my Uncle. That's why I got the job on Sammy's TV show. Reading was important, because there wasn’t time for a lot of rehearsal, and direction.
Of course that TV show led to many other important jobs. In studio recording, this kind of efficiency, made possible in part by literacy, was very important. Says Herb, "We’d record about four hit records in three hours...You never knew who was going to be in the studio. Leslie Gore, or Leslie Uggams, or Jerry Vale, Johnny Mathis, Aretha
, Connie Francis
. You never knew. You went from one studio to the next, and there these people would be, and you do what you gotta do, and on to the next." Literacy also made the advanced art of bebop possible. Herb points out that the beboppers were literate and highly educated. "Bebop was total structure--That's how come they could go that far out." tie was speaking of Roy Haynes, Max Roach, Elvin Jones, Kenny Clark, Tony Williams....and Herb Lovelle.
Uncle Arthur taught Herb to tune the drums. "You don’t pound your instrument. You touch it, caress it, and it will respond. But it must be tuned. The bass drum was tuned to enhance the bass fiddle with sympathetic vibration. Now if all the drums are tuned with themselves, you then get an over all sympathetic vibration of the band, so that when you hit with the brass, you didn’t over power the brass. When you pump with the saxophones, you didn’t thud the saxophones out. It was a warmth that came out, that felt good, so they’d pump some more! The brass are ready to roar, because they’re being enhanced; they’re being punctuated by a sympathetic instrument."
He’d tune to the piano, like all the other musicians. The technique for playing this tuned drum kit, taught by Uncle Arthur, held him in good stead for all of his career. "I would always like to think that I was the drummer coming off of it [the drum] rather that digging into it. The acid rock groups were....power—-boom bang. I never saw it like that. I saw ‘ping’--more of a touch, and the touch brought about articulation—more definition."
Tuning to be "sympathetic" with the bass player was important in that Herb claims that he learned a lot from bass players. His general technique was to "lock in" with the bass. "The nature of that instrument [the bass] is to keep the melodic beat..." When Fender (electric) bass became important in popular music, Herb had to adjust in many cases. "Many of the Fender players had no definition between one note and another... I had to lessen the function of a bass player, who had one continuous hum. I had to find another approach-latch onto somebody else. I’d pick out guys to deal with and have ‘conversations’ with them musically."
Herb is quick to point out that this wasn’t the case with all Fender players. For example, Jerry Jamont, of Aretha Franklyn fame, was very articulate in his playing, and Herb could lock in with him quite readily!
Part of Uncle Arthur's training was to make Herb take the drum set down and set it up again "nut for nut, bolt for bolt, screw for screw... washer for washer." Later, even when there were roadies to set up for him, he’d still do his own tuning and make sure everything was in order.
Herb got his first good set of drums right after he did his first real professional job (meaning he had a union card, and everything was "on the books") in 1949. This was with Hot Lips Page at Yale University. Buddy Tate and Walter Page
(from Count Basie's Orchestra) were in the band. Mary Lou Williams
was on the bill. It was a big deal. Herb had a set of makeshift drums, mismatched, which fell apart completely after he played the first few bars! "Everything went rolling off in several different directions into the audience." Herb had tears streaming down his face as he gathered it all up and put it together, while everyone else waited. When the job was over, Hot Lips said to Herb, "You better get you some drums." The implication was that if Herb didn’t get a functional set of traps, he wouldn’t be hired for the upcoming tour.
Herbs’ father had not wanted him to be a jazz musician, so he wouldn’t give him the money for drums. His mother had remarried, and his stepfather said "OK, how much do you need?", and he gave Herb the money. "Later his story was always, ‘Y’know, he paid me back, and he never looked back,’ meaning that I just went up, up, up...I got a beautiful set. I went to Manny's. My uncle was well known --‘Arthur Herbert's nephew!’ They let me pick out my own skins, drums. It wasn’t like you walk in now—my set came from the factory to my specifications. Spine head hide -—the back of the animal, less fat, much more sensitive. Even the ‘shells’ were shaped, cured, baked. That was before metal shells. The factory—Gretch—was in Brooklyn. ..I kept those drums as long as I could—My next set didn’t come till the 60s."
Uncle Arthur made Herb apply a certain "mental application" to drumming: "There were certain basic things I should apply when I play. ABCs... I should know what I play. If there's a lyric, I should know it....I should also have a feeling as to what the music was about for me, personally. - .and was that compatible with what was going on [with the other musicians]...You begin to do this instantaneously; you fall into what you call a groove. The people playing together are in agreement with what's going on." Herb is describing his ability to adapt to each playing situation thoroughly and quickly, which of course has everything to do with his versatility. "Early on I prayed that I want to be able to play with anybody, anywhere, anytime, from Count Basie to Guy Lombardo. Well, Joe Jones, [Count Basie's famous drummer) recommended me for The Count Basie Alumni Band in a European tour, which was a high point of my life-- and, by the time I was ‘up there,’ John Denver was the equivalent of Guy Lombardo. Or Peter Paul and Mary, Gordon Lightfoot, Bob Dylan—and I enjoyed it. My uncle's teaching was my success in those things. As far as I’m concerned there's no bad music to be played. It's your attitude that makes it good or bad. If you don’t want to play that music, don’t go. You make it bad for everyone else. People say ‘How can you play the same show every night?’ But it wasn’t the same show every night-It never was, for me. The minute you sit down you don’t feel the same as last night. I’m not the same. Everything around me is not the same. That singer on stage—there's more energy, less energy, in tune, out of tune, slower, faster....it's alive, it's the moment. You can’t find it boring if you’re living the moment."
A few years before he left the music business, Herb tells about some studio producers who called him in to record some of his "hot licks," as they put it. "This was completely out of context--there was no other musician, no song to be performed, nothing." Herb laughed, and told them he didn’t do it that way. [Of course, we now know they were simply trying lo digitally "sample" him, which, no doubt, they were eventually able to do anyway, by "sampling" from tracks he had already recorded.] "Hot licks?" he says, "I told them I didn’t have any, and I didn’t." To Herb, every performing situation was a different event, a different context, requiring a different participation from him.
When I asked Herb in what area he felt his biggest contribution(s) to music, his answer was "R&B." R&B, he felt, was "spawned in the studio," where he had the most influence. Herb maintains that R&B came from gospel music, but his early technique was to "simplify Black music to make it more understandable for white people." Then gradually R&B got more sophisticated, and eventually, "Funk" was born in the studio. Again, it was Uncle Arthur's training that was influential. "I was taught that the bass drum should be felt rather than heard, which made me, in my mind, sort of compromise the bebop foot, so that when I applied it to playing-- not jazz, but pop music-- rather than just ‘drop the bomb’ anywhere that I felt, which was wonderful for bebop, but didn’t fare too well with popular music, which needed to be more consistent—it became a pattern. That's how I applied it. Bernard [Purdy] came along later on and put the New Orleans ‘street beat’ [a kind of ‘triplets against eighths’ groove from the 1950s] with that and whipped it up, and went ten steps further. Steve Gadd took it way out, but it all came off the bebop."
When bebop left pop, and there was a real separation, people tried to decide which way they wanted to go. Herb went both ways. He wanted "to be able to play for anybody or anything." But a lot of musicians made a decision. "One thing was square, one thing was hip." To Herb, "there was no difference, just what was going on in my head at the time I was playing-— it was all music to me."
Drummer
A drummer is a musician who is capable of playing drums, which includes but is not limited to a drum kit and accessory based hardware which includes an assortment of pedals and standing support mechanisms, marching percussion and/or any musical instrument that is struck within the context of a...
, who played Jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
, R & B
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...
, rock and folk. He was also a studio
Recording studio
A recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties...
musician
Session musician
Session musicians are instrumental and vocal performers, musicians, who are available to work with others at live performances or recording sessions. Usually such musicians are not permanent members of a musical ensemble and often do not achieve fame in their own right as soloists or bandleaders...
and an actor.
Lovelle's uncle was drummer Arthur Herbert
Arthur Herbert
Arthur Herbert was an American jazz drummer.Both of Herbert's parents were of Trinidadian heritage. He worked in a silver and gold refinery as a young man, playing local gigs in New York nightclubs and hotels in his spare time...
. Lovelle began his career with trumpeter, singer and band leader Hot Lips Page late in the 1940s, then played in the 1950s with saxophonist Hal Singer
Hal Singer
Harold Joseph "Hal" Singer is an American R&B and jazz bandleader and saxophonist.-Biography:Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Singer studied violin as a child but, as a teenager, switched to clarinet and then tenor saxophone, which became his instrument of choice...
, Johnny Moore
Johnny Moore
Johnny Moore may refer to:*Johnny Moore , basketball player*Johnny Moore , American baseball player*Johnny Moore , American soul singer and songwriter, played with The Drifters...
's Three Blazes, and pianist Earl Hines
Earl Hines
Earl Kenneth Hines, universally known as Earl "Fatha" Hines, was an American jazz pianist. Hines was one of the most influential figures in the development of modern jazz piano and, according to one source, is "one of a small number of pianists whose playing shaped the history of jazz".-Early...
. Through working for both Lucky Thompson
Lucky Thompson
Eli "Lucky" Thompson was a United States jazz tenor and soprano saxophonist...
and Jimmy Rushing
Jimmy Rushing
James Andrew Rushing , known as Jimmy Rushing, was an American blues shouter and swing jazz singer from Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, best known as the featured vocalist of Count Basie's Orchestra from 1935 to 1948.Rushing was known as "Mr...
of Count Basie's Orchestra, he became house drummer at the Savoy Ballroom
Savoy Ballroom
The Savoy Ballroom, located in Harlem, New York City, was a medium sized ballroom for music and public dancing that was in operation from March 12, 1926 to July 10, 1958. It was located between 140th and 141st Streets on Lenox Avenue....
in New York City for much of the 1950s. He toured with tenor sax Arnett Cobb
Arnett Cobb
Arnett Cobb was an American jazz tenor saxophonist.Cobb was born Arnette Cleophus Cobbs in Houston, Texas. His musical career began with the local bands of Chester Boone, from 1934 to 1936, and Milt Larkin, from 1936 to 1942...
and pianist Teddy Wilson
Teddy Wilson
Theodore Shaw "Teddy" Wilson was an American jazz pianist whose sophisticated and elegant style was featured on the records of many of the biggest names in jazz, including Louis Armstrong, Lena Horne, Benny Goodman, Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald.-Biography:Wilson was born in Austin, Texas in...
in 1954. In 1959 he contributed to the pianist Paul Curry's album 'Paul Curry presents the Friends of Fats' on the Golden Crest label.
He performed on earlier television with the King Guion orchestra on the Jerry Lester Show and the Ed Sullivan Show. In 1966, Herb was the Lead Drummer for the Sammy Davis, Jr.
Sammy Davis, Jr.
Samuel George "Sammy" Davis Jr. was an American entertainer and was also known for his impersonations of actors and other celebrities....
TV Show out of NY.
He began playing more R&B
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...
music later in the 1950s, and soon found himself working as a studio
Recording studio
A recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties...
musician
Session musician
Session musicians are instrumental and vocal performers, musicians, who are available to work with others at live performances or recording sessions. Usually such musicians are not permanent members of a musical ensemble and often do not achieve fame in their own right as soloists or bandleaders...
, often with Sam "The Man" Taylor
Sam Taylor (jazz)
Sam Taylor best known as the tenor saxophonist Sam "The Man" Taylor, was an American jazz and blues player, whose honking style set the standard for tenor sax solos in both rock and roll and rhythm and blues....
. He plays on recordings
Sound recording and reproduction
Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...
by Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
(The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan is the second studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released in May 1963 by Columbia Records. Whereas his debut album Bob Dylan had contained only two original songs, Freewheelin initiated the process of writing contemporary words to traditional melodies....
), Pearls Before Swine
Pearls Before Swine (band)
Pearls Before Swine was an American psychedelic folk band formed by Tom Rapp in 1965 in Eau Gallie, now part of Melbourne, Florida. They released six albums between 1967 and 1971, before Rapp launched a solo career.-Early years, 1965-68:...
, Eric Andersen
Eric Andersen
Eric Andersen is an American singer-songwriter.-Biography:In the early 1960s, Eric Andersen was part of the Greenwich Village folk scene in New York...
, David Blue, John Denver
John Denver
Henry John Deutschendorf, Jr. , known professionally as John Denver, was an American singer/songwriter, activist, and humanitarian. After growing up in numerous locations with his military family, Denver began his music career in folk music groups in the late 1960s. His greatest commercial success...
, Tom Rush
Tom Rush
Tom Rush is an American folk and blues singer, songwriter, musician and recording artist.- Life and career :Rush was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. His father was a teacher at St. Paul's School, in Concord, New Hampshire. Tom began performing in 1961 while studying at Harvard University after...
, B. B. King
B. B. King
Riley B. King , known by the stage name B.B. King, is an American blues guitarist and singer-songwriter.Rolling Stone magazine ranked him at No.3 on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time. According to Edward M...
, and The Monkees
The Monkees
The Monkees are an American pop rock group. Assembled in Los Angeles in 1966 by Robert "Bob" Rafelson and Bert Schneider for the American television series The Monkees, which aired from 1966 to 1968, the musical acting quartet was composed of Americans Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork,...
, working well into the 1980s in the studios.
In 1976, he produced the first Stuff
Stuff (band)
Stuff was a New York-based jazz funk band active in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The members were Gordon Edwards , Richard Tee , Eric Gale , Cornell Dupree , Chris Parker , and later Steve Gadd...
album, which went platinum in Japan. He also played drums in the 1976 revival of Guys and Dolls
Guys and Dolls
Guys and Dolls is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. It is based on "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" and "Blood Pressure", two short stories by Damon Runyon, and also borrows characters and plot elements from other Runyon stories, most notably...
.
From the 1980s on, he acted in film and television, including on Law & Order
Law & Order
Law & Order is an American police procedural and legal drama television series, created by Dick Wolf and part of the Law & Order franchise. It aired on NBC, and in syndication on various cable networks. Law & Order premiered on September 13, 1990, and completed its 20th and final season on May 24,...
(1995–2004). His film credits include Bella
Bella (film)
Bella is a 2006 film directed by Alejandro Gomez Monteverde starring Eduardo Verastegui and Tammy Blanchard. Set in New York City, the film is about the events of one day and the impact on the characters' lives.-Plot:...
(2006), Mitchellville (2004) (Sundance), The Rhythm of the Saints
The Rhythm of the Saints
The Rhythm of the Saints is the eighth studio album by Paul Simon, released in 1990. Like its predecessor Graceland, the album gained commercial success and received mostly favorable reviews from critics...
(2003), Don't Explain (2002), The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001), in German, Im Bann des Jade Skorpions, Down to Earth (2001) in German Einmal Himmel und zurück, Girlfight
Girlfight
Girlfight is a 2000 drama film starring Michelle Rodriguez. It focuses on Diana Guzman, a troubled teen who decides to channel her aggression by training to become a boxer, despite the skepticism of both her abusive father and the prospective trainers in the male-dominated sport...
(2000), Maximum Risk (1996), Getting Away with Murder
Getting Away with Murder (1996 film)
Getting Away with Murder is a 1996 comedy film written and directed by Harvey Miller. The film stars Dan Aykroyd, Jack Lemmon, Lily Tomlin and Bonnie Hunt.This was the final project for veteran writer and director Harvey Miller....
(1996), White Lies (1996), Bleeding Hearts (1994), The Paper (1994), Running on Empty (1988), Death Wish III (1985), A Man Called Adam (1966).
His TV credits include Into the Fire (2005), How Do You Spell Belief? (2005), Kingpin Rising (2005), Third Watch
Third Watch
Third Watch is an American television drama series which first aired on NBC from 1999 to 2005 for a total of 132 episodes, broadcast in 6 seasons of 22 episodes each....
(2 episodes, 2005), and Law & Order
Law & Order
Law & Order is an American police procedural and legal drama television series, created by Dick Wolf and part of the Law & Order franchise. It aired on NBC, and in syndication on various cable networks. Law & Order premiered on September 13, 1990, and completed its 20th and final season on May 24,...
TV (1995–2004).
Testimonials
These three testimonials are reports based on extensive interviews with Herb Lovelle, and are put here at the expressed request of the interviewers. They were originally uploaded in Herb's presence after he reviewed the content.According to Janice Singleton, singer and actress, September, 2008:
… Hails from Brooklyn, New York and performed his first professional job as a musician with Hot Lips Page. Followed by one adventurous road tour after another with such pioneers as Lucky Millinder
Lucky Millinder
Lucius Venable "Lucky" Millinder was an American rhythm and blues and swing bandleader. Although he could not read or write music, did not play an instrument and rarely sang, his showmanship and musical taste made his bands successful...
, the Oscar and Johnny Moore Trio, Hal Singer
Hal Singer
Harold Joseph "Hal" Singer is an American R&B and jazz bandleader and saxophonist.-Biography:Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Singer studied violin as a child but, as a teenager, switched to clarinet and then tenor saxophone, which became his instrument of choice...
, Willis Jackson and Earl "Fatha" Hines
Earl Hines
Earl Kenneth Hines, universally known as Earl "Fatha" Hines, was an American jazz pianist. Hines was one of the most influential figures in the development of modern jazz piano and, according to one source, is "one of a small number of pianists whose playing shaped the history of jazz".-Early...
. These unforgettable events continued with Billy Graham, Dancer Paul Draper, The Billy Williams Quartet-plus 5, Nat "King" Cole
Nat King Cole
Nathaniel Adams Coles , known professionally as Nat King Cole, was an American musician who first came to prominence as a leading jazz pianist. Although an accomplished pianist, he owes most of his popular musical fame to his soft baritone voice, which he used to perform in big band and jazz genres...
and Arnett Cobb
Arnett Cobb
Arnett Cobb was an American jazz tenor saxophonist.Cobb was born Arnette Cleophus Cobbs in Houston, Texas. His musical career began with the local bands of Chester Boone, from 1934 to 1936, and Milt Larkin, from 1936 to 1942...
. Making the decision to settle near home for a short period earned him a coveted gig at the Savoy Ballroom
Savoy Ballroom
The Savoy Ballroom, located in Harlem, New York City, was a medium sized ballroom for music and public dancing that was in operation from March 12, 1926 to July 10, 1958. It was located between 140th and 141st Streets on Lenox Avenue....
with both Lucky Thompson
Lucky Thompson
Eli "Lucky" Thompson was a United States jazz tenor and soprano saxophonist...
and Jimmie Rushing.
As the word spread of his unique time-keeping abilities, the door of opportunity opened even wider and he stepped over into Gospel Music and began recording with Mahalia Jackson and the Drinkard Singers. This included a host of others that helped to plant the seeds for R&B Artists such as Laverne Baker, Ruth Brown, Willis Jackson and Hal Singer.
As a studio musician, Mr. Lovelle began by setting-up a groove for the original Pepsi-Cola jingle. Hey, somebody had to do it!... And major recording companies such as Capital, Columbia, and Warner/Electric/Atlantic began calling on his creative genius from which many a hit record was born. All this put Herb in demand and he started touring with some of the most important entertainers in the music industry many with whom he made recordings. Among them were Sammy Davis Jr., Lena Horne, BB King, Aretha Franklin, Tony Bennett, Jimmy Smith, Bob Dylan, Peter, Paul & Mary, Roberta Flack, Jon Lucien, Dinah Washington, Baby Washington, The McCoys, The Angels, The Main Ingredients, The Manhattans, Judy Garland, Connie Francis, Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masakela, Nina Simone, Shirley Horne, Gloria Lynne, Irene Reid, Gladys Knight & The Pips, The Isley Brothers, Leslie Uggams, Peaches & Herb, Inez Foxx, Chuck Jackson, Johnny Mathis, Vic Damone, Johnny Desmond, Jerry Vale, Astrud Gilberto, and Sam (The Man) Taylor. His seven year tour and recording dates with Rocky Mountain High Guy John Denver resulted in Platinum Selling, Grammy Award Winning Album, titled "An Evening with John Denver" which still hangs above the fireplace in the Lovelle living room.
Of course, the natural next step for Herb was his moving into the role of Record Producer. His knowledge and history earned him opportunities to work with cream-of-the–crop legends such as Blues Man BB King, for whom he produced two albums "Live and Well" and "Completely Well." He then founded, produced and recorded a group of East Coast Based musicians called "Stuff"
Stuff (band)
Stuff was a New York-based jazz funk band active in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The members were Gordon Edwards , Richard Tee , Eric Gale , Cornell Dupree , Chris Parker , and later Steve Gadd...
and released their first album by the same title on the Warner Bros. Label. Stuff contained such an excellent group of Musicians that Herb arranged for their extraordinary sound to be the background music on studio projects for every major record date created in New York City.
Always seeking more and newer ways to express his creativity, Herb moved into, and quickly conquered the Broadway circuit as a pit
Orchestra pit
An orchestra pit is the area in a theater in which musicians perform. Orchestral pits are utilized in forms of theatre that require music or in cases when incidental music is required...
musician. He worked in Tony Award winning show Don't Bother Me, I Can’t Cope, Guys and Dolls and The Wiz, all of which fueled his aspirations for becoming an actor. After several intense years of studying at the prestigious Sande Shurin Acting Studio located in New York City, Herb was then introduced to an agent and made his debut in the long-running soap opera The Guiding Light as a court auditor. He continued to return to primetime favorite Law & Order portraying different roles each time. He was a featured character named Richard Brooks in comedy skit "No One Called 911" on the Chris Rock Show. Herb is in a variety of television commercials shown on network and cable television. As an established film actor, his credits include: A Man Called Adam, The Paper, Getting Away With Murder, Red Merger, Death Wish III, Running On Empty, White Lies, Girl Fight, Down to Earth & Maximum Risk. His theater credits include King Lear, Driving Miss Daisy, I'm Not Rappaport, Miss Evers' Boys, Yesterdays (An Evening with Billie Holiday), Some Sweet Day, Song of Singapore, Ma Rose, Amen Corner, Conrack, Macbeth, Murder To Go, Inc.
Herb Lovelle is someone who is deeply concerned about the future of our children, for that reason, he along with world renowned Bassist Jerry Jemmott, are in the process of developing an exciting interactive learning program known as "Jamboree". In addition, Herb was a regular and welcomed speaker and Instructor at Pratt Institute for the Neighborhood Youth Corp of Brooklyn, New York.
According to Angele Dublin (Herb's granddaughter), November 2008:
After leaving the service, Herb was nagged into believing that the 9 to 5 rut was the sensible way for a family man to make a living. He accepted a position on the custodial staff at General Foods Co. in Hoboken, New Jersey, mopping the warehouse floors. In less than two years he had propelled himself into the most coveted job in the factory, mixing the flavors for JELL-O. The pulse of the mixing machines drove Herb crazy. All he heard was drum beats and patterns. His co-workers, his wife at the time, and his dad were very upset with his decision to quit and pursue the dubious career of a musician. As his marriage ended, his life in music began with his first "professional" job for Hot Lips Page
Oran Page
Oran Thaddeus Page was an American jazz trumpeter, singer, and bandleader born in Dallas, Texas, United States. He was better known as Hot Lips Page by the public, and Lips Page by his fellow musicians...
. THE DRUMS FELL APART AGAIN (the first time being his music debut in the service). This led to adventurous road tours with others such as, Lucky Millinder
Lucky Millinder
Lucius Venable "Lucky" Millinder was an American rhythm and blues and swing bandleader. Although he could not read or write music, did not play an instrument and rarely sang, his showmanship and musical taste made his bands successful...
, Oscar and Johnny Moore trio, Hal Singer
Hal Singer
Harold Joseph "Hal" Singer is an American R&B and jazz bandleader and saxophonist.-Biography:Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Singer studied violin as a child but, as a teenager, switched to clarinet and then tenor saxophone, which became his instrument of choice...
, Willis Jackson, Earl "Fatha" Hines, Billie Graham, Dancer Paul Draper, The Billie Williams Quartet-plus 5, Nat "King" Cole and Arnett Cobb. It should be noted at this point that the information in this document is in no way chronological.
Herb left the road tours to stay closer to home. Being employed by both Lucky Thompson
Lucky Thompson
Eli "Lucky" Thompson was a United States jazz tenor and soprano saxophonist...
and Jimmie Rushing, Herb held a coveted gig at the Savoy Ballroom. As the word of his abilities spread, Herb was exposed to the recording studio of Apollo Records and a list of "Gospel" groups that planted the seeds for R&B artists he later recorded with like Laverne Baker, Ruth Brown, Willis Jackson, Hal Singer and others. Herb got a good dose of the "Blues" playing with Lightnin’ Hopkins, Muddy Waters
Muddy Waters
McKinley Morganfield , known as Muddy Waters, was an American blues musician, generally considered the "father of modern Chicago blues"...
, Big Joe Turner
Big Joe Turner
Big Joe Turner was an American blues shouter from Kansas City, Missouri. According to the songwriter Doc Pomus, "Rock and roll would have never happened without him." Although he came to his greatest fame in the 1950s with his pioneering rock and roll recordings, particularly "Shake, Rattle and...
and Jimmy Witherspoon. "JAZZ" finds him with its distribution warehouse. He recorded with Mahalia Jackson
Mahalia Jackson
Mahalia Jackson – January 27, 1972) was an African-American gospel singer. Possessing a powerful contralto voice, she was referred to as "The Queen of Gospel"...
, the Drinkard Singers, Sonny Stitt
Sonny Stitt
Edward "Sonny" Stitt was an American jazz saxophonist of the bebop/hard bop idiom. He was also one of the best-documented saxophonists of his generation, recording over 100 albums in his lifetime...
, Ike Quebec
Ike Quebec
Ike Quebec was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. His surname is pronounced KYOO-bek.Critic Alex Henderson wrote, "Though he was never an innovator, Quebec had a big, breathy sound that was distinctive and easily recognizable, and he was quite consistent when it came to down-home blues, sexy...
, Wynton Kelly
Wynton Kelly
Wynton Kelly was a Jamaican-born jazz pianist, who spent his career in the United States. He is perhaps best known for working with trumpeter Miles Davis from 1959-1962.-Biography:...
, Art Farmer
Art Farmer
Arthur Stewart "Art" Farmer was an American jazz trumpeter and flugelhorn player. He also played flumpet, a trumpet/flugelhorn combination designed for him by David Monette. His identical twin brother, Addison Farmer Arthur Stewart "Art" Farmer (August 21, 1928, Council Bluffs, Iowa –...
, King Pleasure
King Pleasure
King Pleasure was a jazz vocalist and an early master of vocalese, where a singer sings words to a famous instrumental solo....
, Buddy Tate, Buck Clayton
Buck Clayton
Buck Clayton was an American jazz trumpet player who was a leading member of Count Basie’s "Old Testament" orchestra and a leader of mainstream-oriented jam session recordings in the 1950s. His principal influence was Louis Armstrong...
, Nat Adderley
Nat Adderley
Nathaniel Adderley was an American jazz cornet and trumpet player who played in the hard bop and soul jazz genres. He was the brother of saxophonist Julian "Cannonball" Adderley....
, Illinois Jacquet
Illinois Jacquet
Jean-Baptiste Illinois Jacquet was an American jazz tenor saxophonist, best remembered for his solo on "Flying Home", critically recognized as the first R&B saxophone solo....
, Johnny Hodges
Johnny Hodges
John Cornelius "Johnny" Hodges was an American alto saxophonist, best known for his solo work with Duke Ellington's big band. He played lead alto in the saxophone section for many years, except the period between 1932–1946 when Otto Hardwick generally played first chair...
, Budd Johnson
Budd Johnson
Not to be confused with Buddy Johnson.Budd Johnson was an American jazz saxophonist and clarinetist who worked extensively with Ben Webster, Benny Goodman, Big Joe Turner, Coleman Hawkins, Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday and Earl Hines, among others.-Biography:He initially played...
, Kenny Burrell
Kenny Burrell
Kenneth Earl "Kenny" Burrell is an American jazz guitarist. His playing is grounded in bebop and blues; he has performed and recorded with a wide range of jazz musicians.-Biography:...
, Mongo Santamaría
Mongo Santamaría
Ramón "Mongo" Santamaría Rodríguez was an Afro-Cuban Latin jazz percussionist. He is most famous for being the composer of the jazz standard "Afro Blue," recorded by John Coltrane among others. In 1950 he moved to New York where he played with Perez Prado, Tito Puente, Cal Tjader, Fania All...
, Willie Bobo
Willie Bobo
Willie Bobo was the stage name of William Correa , an American jazz percussionist.-Biography:William Correa grew up in Spanish Harlem, New York City. He made his name in Latin Jazz, specifically Afro-Cuban jazz, in the 1960s and '70s, with the timbales becoming his favoured instrument...
, Slim Gaillard
Slim Gaillard
Bulee "Slim" Gaillard was an American jazz singer, songwriter, pianist, and guitarist, noted for his vocalese singing and word play in a language he called "Vout"...
, Clark Terry
Clark Terry
Clark Terry is an American swing and bop trumpeter, a pioneer of the fluegelhorn in jazz, educator, NEA Jazz Masters inductee, and recipient of the 2010 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award...
, and Errol Garner.
He performed on earlier television with the King Guion orchestra on the Jerry Lester Show and the Ed Sullivan Show. Herb was the lead drummer for the Sammy Davis, Jr.
Sammy Davis, Jr.
Samuel George "Sammy" Davis Jr. was an American entertainer and was also known for his impersonations of actors and other celebrities....
TV show originating in NY.
Herb's contribution to the "DANCE" world began with Sophie Maszlo to Paul Draper to Alvin Ailey's "Revelations". The earlier Days at the Apollo Theater and the subsequent Black circuit tours plus Allen Freed and Murray the "K" prepared Herb for BROADWAY’S Don’t Bother Me I Can't Cope, Cindy (o.b.) Guys and Dolls and The Wiz. Herb thanks GOD for blessing him with gifts that helped to create and be a part of the "NEW YORK STUDIO MUSICIAN" era, included is, BLUES, R&B, POP,ROCK AND ROLL, AND JAZZ. Jimmie Smith, Bob Dylan, Peter, Paul and Mary, John Denver, B.B. King, Roberta Flack
Roberta Flack
Roberta Flack is an American singer, songwriter, and musician who is notable for jazz, soul, R&B, and folk music...
, Aretha Franklin
Aretha Franklin
Aretha Louise Franklin is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Although known for her soul recordings and referred to as The Queen of Soul, Franklin is also adept at jazz, blues, R&B, gospel music, and rock. Rolling Stone magazine ranked her atop its list of The Greatest Singers of All...
, Jon Lucien, Dinah Washington, Baby Washington, The McCoys, The Angels, Main Ingredient, Manhattans, Judy Garland, Connie Francis
Connie Francis
Connie Francis is an American pop singer of Italian heritage and the top-charting female vocalist of the 1950s and 1960s. Although her chart success waned in the second half of the 1960s, Francis remained a top concert draw...
, Lena Horne, Miriam Makeba
Miriam Makeba
Miriam Makeba , nicknamed Mama Africa, was a Grammy Award winning South African singer and civil rights activist....
, Hugh Masakela, Nina Simone
Nina Simone
Eunice Kathleen Waymon , better known by her stage name Nina Simone , was an American singer, songwriter, pianist, arranger, and civil rights activist widely associated with jazz music...
, Shirley Home, Gloria Lynne, Irene Reid, Gladys Knight & Pips, Isley Bros, Leslie Uggams, Peaches and Herb, Inez Foxx, Chuck Jackson, Johnny Mathis, Vie Damone, Johnny Desmond, Jerry Vale, Tony Bennett, Astrud Gilberto, Sam (the man) Taylor. Just to name a few!
The Formative Years of Herb Lovelle, 1997, by Paula Lockheart, vocalist, songwriter, and interpreter of classic blues and jazz
The name "Herb Lovelle" has been mentioned in various books and periodicals on jazz history, African-American music, rhythm and blues, American popular music and drumming. He is probably best known as a New York "studio" (recording) drummer in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s-— with major recording credits covering everything from mainstream jazz and bebop to folk, mainstream pop, country, "bubblegum," rock, R&B, "funk" and more. Herb also played the gamut of major performers’ tours, Broadway shows, television and live radio. It is possible that there has never existed a more versatile American drummer.
Before this interview of April 18, 1997, I already knew a lot about Herb. Therefore, it was a challenge for me to see if I could uncover new information and themes about his musical career and his contributions to American music. In fact, I got so much new input that I am limiting this report to a few of the early influences that shaped this highly successful musician, whose career was itself a big chunk of the American history of popular music and jazz.
Herb was born sometime in the late 1920s and was raised in Brooklyn. His parents were from Barbados and Trinidad, and came to the U.S. as children. His father was a Baptist preacher. The first music Herb heard and saw being played was most likely church music. There was the singing and handclapping, of course, but no tambourines, and, although he saw the organist, he was not close enough to see how the instrument was played.
One of Herb's strongest and most influential early recollected musical experiences was when he heard his older sister and brother practicing classical violin and piano respectively (the parents made them take lessons). He remembers that he would sometimes "play" two popsicle sticks on the wooden floor, while his sister practiced the piano. When the parents were out, she played a little "jazz" figure, and he’d "play" with her.
He says he must have heard drums in parades, but he doesn’t think he saw the drums as a small child.. He remembers that the first trap drum set he saw was on a merry-go-round, where the set played automatically. He was fascinated with it.
All of this had taken place while Herb was a small child. At the same time, Herb's parents taught him principles to live by, and these had a lasting affect on his approach to musicianship: "Mom taught me I can do whatever I want....Daddy taught me if you’re gonna do something, do it right.., know as much as you can about it."
Both Herb's uncles (his mother's brothers) were drummers. One of them, Uncle Leon Monk Herbert, would take Herb along on his gigs, and later, actually turned over some of his gigs to Herb. In fact, Uncle Leon was indirectly responsible for Herb's first "paid" gig, at 11 or 12 years of age. In the 1930s "rent parties" were a popular form of entertainment in his area, and Herb was going to go to a neighborhood party and watch his uncle play drums with a pianist. (The pianist played the blues and stride styles of the time.) His uncle never got to the party for some reason, so Herb played a whisk broom and hairbrush on the body of a banjo, made from skin at that time. Herb says, "The piano player must have been tickled or amused....I guess I didn’t get in his way, and I got a dime...I ran out of there ‘cause I had to get home ...my parents would not have approved [of my being without supervision at] a rent party. After that my uncle never told me where those gigs were unless he took me with him."
But it was Herb's other uncle-- Arthur Herbert
Arthur Herbert
Arthur Herbert was an American jazz drummer.Both of Herbert's parents were of Trinidadian heritage. He worked in a silver and gold refinery as a young man, playing local gigs in New York nightclubs and hotels in his spare time...
, who gave him his intensive instruction in musicianship and drumming: "My Uncle Arthur fine tuned it. [He told me] This is the right way to do it." Uncle Arthur was "a big time guy." He played drums with Coleman Hawkins
Coleman Hawkins
Coleman Randolph Hawkins was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Hawkins was one of the first prominent jazz musicians on his instrument. As Joachim E. Berendt explained, "there were some tenor players before him, but the instrument was not an acknowledged jazz horn"...
, Jan Savitch (Shuffle Rhythm Orchestra, "a little hipper than Paul Whiteman"--a big band) and taught Shelly Manne
Shelly Manne
Shelly Manne , born Sheldon Manne in New York City, was an American jazz drummer. Most frequently associated with West Coast jazz, he was known for his versatility and also played in a number of other styles, including Dixieland, swing, bebop, avant-garde jazz and fusion, as well as contributing...
.
Herb was beginning to hear music—big bands like Count Basie, Bennie Goodman, etc.--on the radio and on records, and, since big bands featured saxophones, he told his Uncle Arthur he wanted to be a sax player. His uncle said that to play sax he should first take up the clarinet. Herb tried, but he hated practicing clarinet, and could hardly get a sound out. He decided to take up drums, since "I liked rhythm anyway." By this time, at about 12 or thirteen years of age, he was watching his Uncle Arthur play, and he didn’t see any music sheets, so he thought drums would be easier than clarinet. His uncle agreed to teach him drumming, and Herb credits this early training for much of his subsequent success.
Uncle Arthur was vehement that Herb had to be able to read music. He insisted that he "write down" the drum part onto manuscript paper from listening to a song on a record. (Bass drum, sock cymbal, high hat, arid snare drums each has a different line, space and symbol.) As it turns out, this was a pivotal factor in Herb's career. For example: "I was playing in Sammy Davis's show [1950's], and in a rehearsal, one of the arrangers came up to me and said ‘Wow, you’re catching everything...’ He wondered how I caught the licks that he wrote for the brass, and the saxes. I told him I was reading their music, over their heads. He said ‘I could write for you?’ --Sammy's regular drummer at the time could not read. The general tendency was to think that black musicians didn’t read, and especially the black drummers were not known as readers. The arranger all of a sudden was giving me charts. I showed him how to write for drums as I’d learned from my Uncle. That's why I got the job on Sammy's TV show. Reading was important, because there wasn’t time for a lot of rehearsal, and direction.
Of course that TV show led to many other important jobs. In studio recording, this kind of efficiency, made possible in part by literacy, was very important. Says Herb, "We’d record about four hit records in three hours...You never knew who was going to be in the studio. Leslie Gore, or Leslie Uggams, or Jerry Vale, Johnny Mathis, Aretha
Aretha Franklin
Aretha Louise Franklin is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Although known for her soul recordings and referred to as The Queen of Soul, Franklin is also adept at jazz, blues, R&B, gospel music, and rock. Rolling Stone magazine ranked her atop its list of The Greatest Singers of All...
, Connie Francis
Connie Francis
Connie Francis is an American pop singer of Italian heritage and the top-charting female vocalist of the 1950s and 1960s. Although her chart success waned in the second half of the 1960s, Francis remained a top concert draw...
. You never knew. You went from one studio to the next, and there these people would be, and you do what you gotta do, and on to the next." Literacy also made the advanced art of bebop possible. Herb points out that the beboppers were literate and highly educated. "Bebop was total structure--That's how come they could go that far out." tie was speaking of Roy Haynes, Max Roach, Elvin Jones, Kenny Clark, Tony Williams....and Herb Lovelle.
Uncle Arthur taught Herb to tune the drums. "You don’t pound your instrument. You touch it, caress it, and it will respond. But it must be tuned. The bass drum was tuned to enhance the bass fiddle with sympathetic vibration. Now if all the drums are tuned with themselves, you then get an over all sympathetic vibration of the band, so that when you hit with the brass, you didn’t over power the brass. When you pump with the saxophones, you didn’t thud the saxophones out. It was a warmth that came out, that felt good, so they’d pump some more! The brass are ready to roar, because they’re being enhanced; they’re being punctuated by a sympathetic instrument."
He’d tune to the piano, like all the other musicians. The technique for playing this tuned drum kit, taught by Uncle Arthur, held him in good stead for all of his career. "I would always like to think that I was the drummer coming off of it [the drum] rather that digging into it. The acid rock groups were....power—-boom bang. I never saw it like that. I saw ‘ping’--more of a touch, and the touch brought about articulation—more definition."
Tuning to be "sympathetic" with the bass player was important in that Herb claims that he learned a lot from bass players. His general technique was to "lock in" with the bass. "The nature of that instrument [the bass] is to keep the melodic beat..." When Fender (electric) bass became important in popular music, Herb had to adjust in many cases. "Many of the Fender players had no definition between one note and another... I had to lessen the function of a bass player, who had one continuous hum. I had to find another approach-latch onto somebody else. I’d pick out guys to deal with and have ‘conversations’ with them musically."
Herb is quick to point out that this wasn’t the case with all Fender players. For example, Jerry Jamont, of Aretha Franklyn fame, was very articulate in his playing, and Herb could lock in with him quite readily!
Part of Uncle Arthur's training was to make Herb take the drum set down and set it up again "nut for nut, bolt for bolt, screw for screw... washer for washer." Later, even when there were roadies to set up for him, he’d still do his own tuning and make sure everything was in order.
Herb got his first good set of drums right after he did his first real professional job (meaning he had a union card, and everything was "on the books") in 1949. This was with Hot Lips Page at Yale University. Buddy Tate and Walter Page
Walter Page
Walter Sylvester Page , nicknamed "Hoss," was an African American jazz bassist and leader of the Oklahoma City Blue Devils jazz orchestra from 1925–1931...
(from Count Basie's Orchestra) were in the band. Mary Lou Williams
Mary Lou Williams
Mary Lou Williams was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger. Williams wrote hundreds of compositions and arrangements, and recorded more than one hundred records...
was on the bill. It was a big deal. Herb had a set of makeshift drums, mismatched, which fell apart completely after he played the first few bars! "Everything went rolling off in several different directions into the audience." Herb had tears streaming down his face as he gathered it all up and put it together, while everyone else waited. When the job was over, Hot Lips said to Herb, "You better get you some drums." The implication was that if Herb didn’t get a functional set of traps, he wouldn’t be hired for the upcoming tour.
Herbs’ father had not wanted him to be a jazz musician, so he wouldn’t give him the money for drums. His mother had remarried, and his stepfather said "OK, how much do you need?", and he gave Herb the money. "Later his story was always, ‘Y’know, he paid me back, and he never looked back,’ meaning that I just went up, up, up...I got a beautiful set. I went to Manny's. My uncle was well known --‘Arthur Herbert's nephew!’ They let me pick out my own skins, drums. It wasn’t like you walk in now—my set came from the factory to my specifications. Spine head hide -—the back of the animal, less fat, much more sensitive. Even the ‘shells’ were shaped, cured, baked. That was before metal shells. The factory—Gretch—was in Brooklyn. ..I kept those drums as long as I could—My next set didn’t come till the 60s."
Uncle Arthur made Herb apply a certain "mental application" to drumming: "There were certain basic things I should apply when I play. ABCs... I should know what I play. If there's a lyric, I should know it....I should also have a feeling as to what the music was about for me, personally. - .and was that compatible with what was going on [with the other musicians]...You begin to do this instantaneously; you fall into what you call a groove. The people playing together are in agreement with what's going on." Herb is describing his ability to adapt to each playing situation thoroughly and quickly, which of course has everything to do with his versatility. "Early on I prayed that I want to be able to play with anybody, anywhere, anytime, from Count Basie to Guy Lombardo. Well, Joe Jones, [Count Basie's famous drummer) recommended me for The Count Basie Alumni Band in a European tour, which was a high point of my life-- and, by the time I was ‘up there,’ John Denver was the equivalent of Guy Lombardo. Or Peter Paul and Mary, Gordon Lightfoot, Bob Dylan—and I enjoyed it. My uncle's teaching was my success in those things. As far as I’m concerned there's no bad music to be played. It's your attitude that makes it good or bad. If you don’t want to play that music, don’t go. You make it bad for everyone else. People say ‘How can you play the same show every night?’ But it wasn’t the same show every night-It never was, for me. The minute you sit down you don’t feel the same as last night. I’m not the same. Everything around me is not the same. That singer on stage—there's more energy, less energy, in tune, out of tune, slower, faster....it's alive, it's the moment. You can’t find it boring if you’re living the moment."
A few years before he left the music business, Herb tells about some studio producers who called him in to record some of his "hot licks," as they put it. "This was completely out of context--there was no other musician, no song to be performed, nothing." Herb laughed, and told them he didn’t do it that way. [Of course, we now know they were simply trying lo digitally "sample" him, which, no doubt, they were eventually able to do anyway, by "sampling" from tracks he had already recorded.] "Hot licks?" he says, "I told them I didn’t have any, and I didn’t." To Herb, every performing situation was a different event, a different context, requiring a different participation from him.
When I asked Herb in what area he felt his biggest contribution(s) to music, his answer was "R&B." R&B, he felt, was "spawned in the studio," where he had the most influence. Herb maintains that R&B came from gospel music, but his early technique was to "simplify Black music to make it more understandable for white people." Then gradually R&B got more sophisticated, and eventually, "Funk" was born in the studio. Again, it was Uncle Arthur's training that was influential. "I was taught that the bass drum should be felt rather than heard, which made me, in my mind, sort of compromise the bebop foot, so that when I applied it to playing-- not jazz, but pop music-- rather than just ‘drop the bomb’ anywhere that I felt, which was wonderful for bebop, but didn’t fare too well with popular music, which needed to be more consistent—it became a pattern. That's how I applied it. Bernard [Purdy] came along later on and put the New Orleans ‘street beat’ [a kind of ‘triplets against eighths’ groove from the 1950s] with that and whipped it up, and went ten steps further. Steve Gadd took it way out, but it all came off the bebop."
When bebop left pop, and there was a real separation, people tried to decide which way they wanted to go. Herb went both ways. He wanted "to be able to play for anybody or anything." But a lot of musicians made a decision. "One thing was square, one thing was hip." To Herb, "there was no difference, just what was going on in my head at the time I was playing-— it was all music to me."