Joe Morello: When I say “melodic” playing I don’t mean you have to have a million tom-toms. I still use the old drumset.
Maybe I could put it better by saying I like “thematic” playing. More theme. Theme development and recapitulation.
Then again, if you start talking that way it’s gonna seem contrived — and it’s not.
If you start something (thematically on the drumset) you can sort of get into it. It just develops while you do it. There’s no mystery to it. You just do your drums. You can’t please everybody. Who cares? The world’s a big place. There’s room for everybody. The guy that tries to please everybody — that’s the secret to failure.
“I loved [Keith Jarrett’s] attitude toward the piano, just sitting down and playing, just to see what would come out. Whether it worked or didn’t work wasn’t the point. It was simply doing it.”
Les DeMerle‘s interview appears in the October 1984 Modern Drummer. Les was an interesting musician who maintained a good balance between the business and artistic sides of drumming. At one point during the interview I ask Les, “It’s intriguing that you can remain so active in concerts, in teaching, in clinics, in seminars, in recordings, and in other areas of the music business – like owning and operating your own night club – and still grow on your instrument. How do you find the time to do all that?”
Les answers, “You have to make time for it. I openly admit that I’m totally dedicated to drumming and to music. Never in my life have I had to do anything other than play drums to make a living,” adding, “In other words, I keep enough things going so that if one falls through, the other one happens.”
I came across the transcript for this interview a few weeks ago. I’m sure it has been 30-years since I last read it. Les and I had good discussion. Here’s one part of it:
Scott K Fish: Fred Gruber told me that he once asked Buddy Rich what questions he would ask in an interview. And one of the questions Buddy asked Fred was, “What’s the greatest four-bar drum break ever recorded?” I’ll ask you the same question.
Les DeMerle: I would pick a four-bar break that Art Blakey does on the original recording of “Blues March.” I’m not even sure what album that’s on. The note placement gives me chills. Right where Art put the time is right where it should be.
There’s a live recording that Buddy did with Sammy Davis, Jr. Buddy plays a four-bar break on “Ding, Dong the Witch is Dead” that kills me too. But, as a favorite, I would say the Blakey one.
SKF NOTE: At 9:01 a.m. on July 4, 2014, I read guitarist Emily Remler’s May 1985 Down Beat article, “Emily Remler, Life After Wes,” with Julie Coryell. I know Emily’s name, but have never heard her music. I underline several Emily quotes, including these:
* “I’m trying to live up to my own expectations, which were that at 21 I should be like John Coltrane – and I’m not. So I’ve got to give myself to 31 now. To have a totally unique voice like Coltrane had. You hear two notes and you know that it’s him.”
* “I think [life maturity] is what you have to go through – that plus a spiritual maturity like Coltrane did. I want to be innovative.”
* “[Wes Montgomery] cracks me up. Because I can hear him quoting things. That’s obvious humor. When someone quotes a little song, you laugh. But other things; just the way he did an ingenious turnaround. Came around the bend like that. Raised up to a climax – just like life.”
* “There’s a lot of humor missing, I think, from some of the younger players today.”
Finishing her 1985 DB interview, I turn to the web to see what Ms. Remler’s up to in 2014. I like her ’85 perspective on the musicial life. I wonder what her music and life are like 29 years up the road.
I am very, very sad to learn Emily Remler never made it that far. She died in 1990 at age 32.
Joe Morello: When I say “melodic” playing I don’t mean you have to have a million tom-toms. I still use the old drumset.
Scott K Fish 
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