I’ve had the privilege of playing with the great Ralph Peterson on a few occasions, and every time was an unforgettable experience. So much energy, artistry, knowledge, and history come through when he sits behind the drums that one cannot help but be drawn into his presence. I learned so much from him on and off the bandstand, and this interview was no different.
With the level of proficiency with which he handles the drums one might just assume that it is a god-given gift. While the legendary drummer comes from a family of drummers, his road to success is one of the hardships filled with ups and downs, but all of which he has overcome. As I sit here trying to come up with a grandiose introduction for him I remember a gig we did together at the Philadelphia Museum of Art where I was announcing a tune, trying to figure out how to explain the complexity and the message behind a tune and Ralph in his infinite wisdom said, “Don’t say anything!” and he was correct! It’s a lesson that I look back on with great fondness, and in trying to stay true to this lesson he taught me I will get straight to the point and let the maestro tell his story in his own words….
Thank you for doing this interview, it’s a pleasure to have you. I wanted to start out first with some background on some of your influences growing up learning how to play.
Well, you know I come from a generation of drummers two generations deep back to my grandfather, who played cymbals in church, and probably before that! I haven’t done the ancestral research of my African roots, but it wouldn’t surprise me. My father was a drummer playing with people like Sonny Stitt, Bill Davison, and subbed for the great Chris Columbo- father of Sonny Payne, who was the drummer from the Basie Band (Count Basie Orchestra). My uncle in Oregon played drums as well as my uncle in Philly. So I grew up with many great musicians around me. I grew up in Pleasantville, NJ which is seven miles from Atlantic City and nine miles from Vetnor. Harvey Mason is from Atlantic City and Peter Erskine is from Ventor, so as small of a small town that it is it has a rich history of drummers that come from that area.
Drums were always in the house and growing up I’d do little things to try and get in trouble and I would have to stay in the house… that’s where I got most of my practicing in! Every time I got in trouble I’d bring another instrument home from school (laughs). But I started playing drums when I was three years old and then I started playing trumpet in fourth grade and through high school in the marching band. In the jazz band, I played drums and sometimes trumpet. I also studied music theory and sang in the choir with Dr. Ola H. Gathers, who was one of my great early influences and was like a second mom to me. She taught me music theory, had the entire choir singing the whole Christmas section, recitatives, and the solo pieces from Handel’s (G.F. Handel) Messiah from memory in high school. I continued on to college and failed the percussion audition as a freshman because I knew more major and minor scales than I knew rudiments (laughs). So my first semester in freshman year I played trumpet in the band sitting next to Terrence (Blanchard).
I had an R & B background growing up. Jazz was always in the background, but I didn’t pay it any attention. I listened to a lot of instrumental R & B. My uncle Andrew, the one who didn’t play any instruments, is probably responsible for exposing me to all this music growing up because he would bring records with him when he came down from New York. So that’s about it for the early part of my exposure.
I know you were handpicked by the great Art Blakey as the second drummer in his legendary Jazz Messengers Big Band, and I’d like to hear about this experience as well as some of your other musical mentors as a young drummer coming up.
Well before Art Blakey, there was the great Paul Jeffrey- last musical director for Thelonious Monk and one of Charles Mingus’ last musical directors. I auditioned for Rutgets in the summer, but the percussion instructor wasn’t there so I auditioned on trumpet. He heard me play and I was accepted into the department and once I heard Terrence Blanchard I said now there’s a trumpet player. I’m just a guy who plays trumpet! I was trying to convince Paul that I play drums, that I was really a drummer who played the trumpet. He said, “Man you could be halfway decent if you’d settle down and practice, and stop thinking about them drums.” Then I met Michael Carvin in the first semester and as I mentioned earlier I didn’t know any rudiments. So he tells me “ Man, you can’t study with me. You don’t know any rudiments. You gotta go and learn the alphabet for the language of drums. How many letters are in the alphabet?” I said twenty-six. He said, “How many rudiments are there?” I said I don’t know, to which he responded: “That’s why you can’t study with me.” Carvin told me to go study my rudiments which was my first lesson, and I practiced my rudiments all semester along with trumpet.
In the middle of the spring semester, I got a chance to sneak up on the drums when Paul had his back turned to give the next musical cue, and the band was cooking. When I got on there wasn’t any lack of energy or any dip in musicality so that’s how I finally proved myself as a drummer. Then I came back in the spring to learn my rudiments and I’ve been a student of Michael Carvin’s ever since.
So it was Michael Carvin, Paul Jeffrey, Kenny Barron, and Ted Dunbar who put guys like Kenny Clarke, Art Blakey, and Philly Joe Jones for the first time. Those were the cats I was exposed to and for whatever reason, I was drawn to the sound and approach of Art Blakey. Then Terence got the gig with Art Blakey. I guess part of the reason I was drawn to Blakey was because Terence and I used to listen to his albums so much because Terence was trying to get that gig. So once Terence got the gig and left school we stayed in touch and whenever the Jazz Messengers would perform within 50 miles of New York or New Brunswick I was there. Not having any money I’d sneak in the back or pick up an instrument case to walk in with the band. I would always sit right next to his hi-hat so I could see his hands and his feet…. That’s probably why I’m hard of hearing! I probably got hearing loss because of that! (laughs). After a couple of months of doing that, at the old Jazz Forum on West Broadway in New York, Blakey patted me on my shoulder on his way into the dressing room. It was a nonverbal acknowledgment from him to say “I’ve seen you around and I want you to know that I know.” So you know I’m all excited that I exist to Art Blakey.
Shortly after this, I did my first gig in New York with Walter Davis at Barry Harris’ jazz cultural center, and there are still people in New York to this day who remember that gig because it was a hell of a gig and a hell of a night of music. Walter was a great influence of mine, and he took a liking to me after meeting me at Rutgers. He started throwing me some work and taught me about Bud Powell, which allowed me to get my Max (Max Roach) game up!
Then Blakey returns back to New York and is playing at McCale’s and on one of the nights I went three, drummers sat it in- Smitty, Tain (Jeff “Tain” Watts), and I think Cindy Blackman. On one of the breaks, Wynton reintroduces me to Art and says I am sound good and that he should let me sit in. Art says “Well if he’s that good why don’t you hire him?” (laughs). It seemed like a reasonable question to me! So I sat in that night, and after the hit Blakey keeps me up until sunrise and says to me, “I’ve been waiting for you. We’re gonna get the big band together we gonna get everybody together…get Freddie Hubbard, Wayne Shorter, Hank Mobley, Lee Morgan.” I said to myself wait a minute they ain’t here no more I dunno if I want to be in that band (Laughs). Cats were warning me to not get too excited because Art was feeling no pain” because it was the happy hour… 4 am! But true to his word in March of 1983 I played for the first time with Jazz Messenger, a two drummer big band at the Boston Globe festival at Berklee College of Music. I still get goosebumps walking into that venue. Now having been on the faculty at Berklee for 19 years now it still doesn’t get old.
Your career has spanned well over thirty-five years, performing at the highest level which has allowed you to perform and record with many great artists, both as a leader and a sideman. Can you share with us some of the secrets to your success?
With the music, you have to go into it respecting the shoulders of the giants on which you stand, and remember where you’re coming from. And get over the notion that anything you’re doing is wholly and completely original. Most of the time the cats who think they are completely original or the writers who write about something being unique and original are exposing more of their own ignorance and lack of thorough study. It’s an art form that continues to develop, but the founding principles stay the same. That’s an important part of what I teach as an educator at Berklee.
In terms of my personal life, my story is an example of what you should and what you shouldn’t do cause you know I got caught up in the cocaine piece for a long time and was unemployable for a minute. But now I have been alcohol and drug-free for over 24 years now; longer than I ever used anything. I haven’t even had a cigarette in 17 years. Nonetheless, I’ve been battling cancer for the past five years; a different cancer not related to smoking. Now, in three days (from the day this interview happened) I’ll be 58 years old. I’m a fifth-degree black belt in taekwondo, and I can still get on the stationary bike and ride 20 miles. Spirituality conditioning is important. I’m a practicing Buddhist going on thirty-one, thirty-two years, but it includes the best from all the spiritual practices I’ve done and I’ve practiced several. And this music is a religion too you know… how we deal with it, what it does for us, what it does for the world..it’s not unlike a religion. Especially now with this pandemic, I’m reading the headlines about how this is gonna be the death of the music industry, but you know what? People are always gonna want and people are always gonna need music because like Art Blakey said, “Music washes away the dust of everyday life.” And it’s a spiritual cleansing when you decide you’re gonna create it, and you decide you’re gonna sit down with Giant Steps (John Coltrane composition) at the piano, and you come away being able to play it 120 quarter note when you couldn’t do before at quarter note equals 40 before. That sense of growth is good for the human spirit. I find the same kind of goal setting has helped me in martial arts as well. Everyone needs to find their own thing. You need something to counterbalance the obsession of music because you have to be able to relate with people in non-musical terms. Art Blakey used to say “Be careful not to play over the heads of people. Play to the heart of people.”
Sometimes people think drums don’t have a sound to them, but many great drummers such as yourself clearly have a distinct personality on the instrument. How did you develop your own sound and how do you continue to develop this sound?
The development of a sound is not unlike the development of a style and that process is similar regardless of the discipline whether it’s boxing, basketball, martial arts, or stand up comedy. Each generation is influenced by the generation before because it’s the generation before that inspires you to say “I want to do that when I grow up! That’s what I wanna do.” You had to first see what you want in somebody else and then from there gather stuff from different sources. Then you combine it from the stuff I heard here and mix it with the thing I heard over there, and then you figure out how to do it all at the same time. You develop the dexterity and technical ability to do that and if you’re lucky, life, music, experience, or a teacher will come along and say “You don’t need to play everything you know.” Then you move into the Michelangelo approach. Michelangelo is with his apprentice and the apprentice asked how he makes such beautiful sculptures to which he responds, “The sculpture is already in there, I’m just removing the unwanted pieces.” So after you gather all this facility you then have to figure out what you want to say based on what you’re feeling in your spirit or your gut, and how little you need to say what you want to say. And that might seem like a lot coming from a guy who plays “as much as I do,” but my playing only sounds like too much if you’re only listening to it as drumming. If you’re only listening to it as drumming then you’re not vibrating on a high enough frequency to appreciate what I’m doing…and that’s okay! Keep coming to the music and keep listening because I didn’t like Charlie Parker or Joe Henderson the first time I heard them and they’re my two favorite saxophonists.
Now they are, but I had to grow into them. I had to become enough of a student to understand why they are my favorites and so it’s the same thing with sound. Rather than get into tuning or product endorsements, you may decide a particular set up helps you get the sound and feeling you want, and that’s part of the process. I’ve used recordings to teach the four cymbal companies I’ve been with including Meinl, to get the sound I want. They get as close as they can, but then after that, it’s my job to PULL that sound out that I’m hearing out of that instrument. People get too reliant on brands and equipment sometimes. I’ve listened to and watched Art Blakey not have his cymbals, and not have his sticks…I used tune arts drums! Everything you’ve heard like the Live at Sweet Basil with Terence Blanchard on drums, I tuned those drums. And Blakey sounded just like Blakey!
We’re in the middle of a pandemic, and you seem to keep staying as busy as ever, which should be an example for many to follow! Can you share with us some of the things you’ve been up to? What advice would you give to musicians during these times?
Having a spiritual base, some physical activity…. Having the good sense to just get out of the house even if it’s just for thirty minutes! It’s amazing what it can do! This pandemic isn’t going to be responsible for an explosion in the birthrate, it’s gonna be responsible for an explosion in the divorce rate, ya dig?! (Laughs!). But what I’m trying to say is I have been really blessed and grateful to have worked hard to get my career as a performer and an educator, to the place where I’m not desperate. Because of that for the first couple of months of this quarantine, I haven’t participated in soliciting private students because there are too many full-time musicians out there that don’t have the benefit of a teaching gig who need to get their teaching thing off the ground in order to survive. Now, having sat out these past three months… The cut off is on my birthday. I’m gonna start taking private students online. I feel like I’ve sat out long enough to let anyone who needs to really get in to get in. Anyone who ain’t got in by now, just ain’t really trying (laughs). There’s a lot of students who are looking forward to working with me and I’m looking forward to working with them. I’m grateful to Berklee for their support through this health battle so now I give like my life depended on it because if it weren’t for that support I wouldn’t be here I would be gone already.
The other thing I wanted to share about this pandemic is that there is a level of the playing field that is going down right now that in a way is almost a blessing if you can get yourself to see it that way. All problems bring gifts! There’s some opportunities for the forward-thinking musician and even the old head who is willing to get with the technology.
As an heir to Blakey’s drumming legacy, you’ve formed the Messenger Legacy band which has had a great deal of success. Can you tell us about the group and some of the upcoming projects you have in store with the group?
I’m really excited about this new record I’m about to release. It’s a classic example of how agile and nimble you have to be in today’s circumstances. I was all set up with a CD release party, a two-day event at Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Appel Room, May 1st, and 2nd. I had assembled seventeen Jazz Messengers- the original band was Art Blakey, Horace Silver, and seventeen messengers. I wanted to do a conclave of Messenger alumni as well as introduce to the fold two or three cats who I and some members of the band felt would surely have become Messengers had Art still been alive. There are fourteen alumni, and three Legacy Messengers in Zaccai Curtis, Anthony Wonsey, and Renaldo de Jesus. I was really lucky to find some financial backing for this project, shout out to my man Hank Skalka for his support! Sean Jones was supposed to be on the record but his daughter was born the week of the session so he couldn’t make it. But I have Bryan Lynch and Phillip Harper on trumpet, Craig Handy on alto and tenor, Bill Pierce on tenor, Jean Toussaint from London, and on trombone I have Steve Davis and Robin Eubanks, I have Kevin Eubanks on guitar for a tune, piano is Zaccai, Wonsey, and JoAnne Brackeen whom not a lot of people know she played with the Messengers before James Williams. On bass, I have Essiet Essiet and Melissa Slocum who I introduced to Art! And I have Peter Washington and Lonnie Plaxico so it’s a crazy line up!! Donald Brown produced the date. I was gonna release the record May 1st and 2nd, and then Corona hit…Toussaint barely made it out of JFK! When the gigs got canceled I had to look at the wisdom of releasing a record during a time when I had no gigs so I decided to take a page out of the hip-hop culture. So on May 20th, which is my birthday I’m gonna drop a single, and then on the 4th of July weekend I’m gonna drop another single, and then in September, I’ll drop the whole record. The record is called Onward and Upward. It has configurations of a quintet, sextet, and septet. It goes beyond the first Messengers legacy record where we just conjured up some of the great tunes from the band’s hay day. With the exception of one tune by Bill Pierce, Sudan Blues, the other ten tunes are tunes never done by Blakey, but they all carry the energy and idiomatic expression of the Jazz Messengers. And what’s interesting is that the records of Jazz Messengers are usually of people in their twenties because Art liked to keep the young cats around. Now this record has this concept at its base but it has my 35 years of experience, Bill’s 45-50 years of experience, and you times that by 17… you got almost a thousand years of experience. So we have videos and interviews ready to drop so I’m really excited about that.
The full interview, recorded on May 17th, 2020 is on our Occhi Magazine YouTube channel. Here, you can get further backstories and further history on Ralph. This is the first part of this interview and I look forward to circling back with maestro Peterson in the near future to have him answer some other burning questions we at Occhi magazine have for him. ‘El Grito’, his single from the upcoming album Onward and Upward is available now, and be sure to visit www.ralphpetersonmusic.com for all the latest! I want to thank Ralph for his time and all the knowledge and history he has been so generous with, and I’m looking forward to round two!
Featured images: Courtesy of Ralph Peterson Jr
About Author
