SKF NOTE: Andrae Crouch, The Winans, Freddie Hubbard, Koinonia — Bill Maxwell’s work as drummer and producer is among the best. Bill first came to my attention through my ears in 1981. No pre-judging on my part.

“Introducing The Winans” arrived as a new album release on my Modern Drummer desk in 1981. I listened to “Introducing….” on a marginal stereo system in my rooming house residence — and the music grabbed me immediately. Everything about that album was first class: the group, the songs, the arranging, the musicianship, and the production.

The drummer and producer was a name new to me: Bill Maxwell. As of this posting, Maxwell has produced eight Grammy winning recordings.

Long story short, after listening and loving a few more albums with Bill Maxwell producing and/or drumming, Bill stopped by Modern Drummer on August 17, 1982 for a feature interview, published in the August 1983 issue. This is Part 1 of Bill’s interview.

We talk about his early studies in music, both piano and drums, until he started playing six nights a week in night clubs at age 14. Other than a newspaper route, Maxwell said he has never had a day gig.

You’ll hear how Maxwell practiced on drums to “Art Blakey records, Elvis Presley records, Brenda Lee records A weird assortment. Freddie King instrumentals. But I just liked playing with them,” said Maxwell.

He shares how he moved in and out of drug use, and how he adjusted to playing drums straight.

Bill Maxwell was quite personable and enjoyable to interview.

Finally, at one point in this interview I reference a quote by writer J.D. Salinger, which I give to Maxwell to read on a piece of paper. So listeners will have the same information, here is the Salinger quote and source:

“It seems to me indisputably true that a good many people, the wide world over, of varying ages, cultures, natural endowments, respond with a special impetus, a zing, even, in some cases, to artists and poets who as well as having a reputation for producing great or fine art have something garishly Wrong with them as persons: a spectacular flaw in character or citizenship, a construably romantic affliction or addiction – extreme self-centeredness, marital infidelity, stone-deafness, stone-blindness, a terrible thirst, a mortally bad cough, a soft spot for prostitutes, a partiality for grand-scale adultery or incest, a certified or uncertified weakness for opium or sodomy, and so on, God have mercy on the lonely bastards.”

― J.D. Salinger, “Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters & Seymour: An Introduction”