Bath RhythmFest

A former pupil of percussion guru Max Abrams, Mark worked in clubs, bars, Theatres, TV/Radio sessions, cruises from the early 1970s until the mid-eighties, when he became in-house drummer at Ronnie Scott’s.

Dizzy Gillespie, Harry ‘Sweets’ Edison, Mark Murphy, Tim Garland, Flora Purim, Johnny Griffin, David Gilmour, Hatfield & the North, Soft Machine, Liane Carroll, Norma Winstone, Ronnie Scott, Geoff Eales , John Etheridge, Tony Coe , Georgie Fame, James Moody, Cedar Walton, Gary Boyle, Teddy Edwards, Ian Shaw, Joclyn Brown, Hugh Cornwell, Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook, Lea DeLaria are just some of the many fine artists that this exciting/creative drummer has worked with.

He’s a much in-demand studio player and first-call guy for many visiting American Jazz artists.

Pete Cater was born in Lichfield in 1969. The son of a drummer, he showed natural flair for the instrument from infancy and by age 2 had appeared on local TV soloing in 5/4.

Jazz has always been Pete’s first love, and his early heroes on the instrument were Joe Morello, Kenny Clare, Buddy Rich and Louie Bellson. Pete got his first real taste of big band drumming and national attention aged 13 when he joined the award-winning Midlands Youth Jazz Orchestra and by 16 he was doing professional work both live and in studios.

Lack of opportunity to progress caused Pete to relocate to London in 1992. He quickly established himself as a player with tremendous versatility, and whilst his later career has been largely jazz oriented he remains in demand to a wide variety of musical situations.

His own group, The Pete Cater Big Band has released two internationally acclaimed CDs and was big band of the year in the British Jazz Awards 2000. The band’s new album will be out in early 2006.

Furthermore his performing career takes him all over the world with a diverse range of artists, from jazz/electronica pioneer Matthew Herbert to veteran performers “The Best of British Jazz” and the Ted Heath Big Band. Away from the specialist jazz niche Pete has worked with a diverse range of artists including Tom Jones and Jamie Cullum. In addition he is constant demand as a freelance player, and recently appeared in BBC4’s “Jazz Britannia” season.

Other bands and artists with whom Pete Cater has appeared include: The BBC Big Band, Echoes of Ellington, Back to Basie, The Ricky Woodard Quartet, The Terry Gibbs/Buddy DeFranco Quintet, The Vic Ash Quartet, Lillian Boutee and Friends, Benny Carter, Harry Edison, Barney Kessell, Scott Hamilton, Harry Allen, John Dankworth, Dick Morrisey, Ronnie Scott, Jeff Berlin, Sax Appeal, and recorded and toured with the late American saxophonist Spike Robinson.

Pete has appeared everywhere from the Hollywood Bowl to the Tokyo Blue Note and top line UK venues including the Barbican Centre, The Royal Festival Hall and Ronnie Scott’s Club, and was the subject of an in-depth article in the November ’04 edition of “Drummer” magazine. Pete is also in great demand as an educator and clinician, and has for many years been associated with the renowned Drumtech school in London.

Pete began playing drums at age 15 and was soon playing along to albums by Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne and Deep Purple. Having spent a couple of years finding his own way he began working from such well known books as Gary Chester’s New Breed and Gary Chaffee’s Patterns series.

At 20 Pete headed south from his hometown of Leicester and was soon out gigging, which eventually led to him hooking up with guitarist Jan Cyrka.

Around this time Pete began studying with renowned teacher Bob Armstrong who was responsible for ironing out a few areas of Pete’s playing as well focusing on traditional grip and developing reading skills.

Pete went on to record two CDs with Jan and during this time he also worked with a couple other guitar greats including recording work with Motorhead’s Eddie Clarke and lots of UK touring work Phil Hilborne.

In 1996 Pete began teaching at the then new music school the Academy of Contemporary Music in Guildford where he still teaches. One day whilst at the ACM Pete got a call from a friend of Jan’s to audition for the pop band Republica with whom Pete went on to work over the next three years.

Pete has also written regular articles for Rhythm magazine as well as having work published in Modern Drummer. He’s also the author of three drum books, Double Trouble, 100 Tips For Drums and Crash Course-Drums.

Lynchpin Jamiroquai band member and drummer supreme Derrick McKenzie joined the band in 1994 for the recording of their sophomore album Return Of The Space Cowboy. Derrick was born on 27th March 1964, with drumming in his blood. His career was kick-started early with performances on his Mum’s tables, chairs, telephone books and biscuit tins! After a succession of jobs to support his drumming, Derrick became a full time and sought after session drummer with bands such as Urban Species. When Jay was looking for a drummer in 1994 he knew straight away that Derrick was the man. Influenced by classic soul artists like Patrice Rushen, virtuoso musicians like Prince and his drumming hero Billy Cobham, Derrick fitted right in to the Jamiroquai family. In fact he was whacking the skins so hard and with such enthusiasm at his first Jamiroquai gig (in Paris, 1994) he had to have his aching arms sprayed with Raljex! His favourite Jamiroquai show so far has been Wembley Arena 1999 and visiting Buenos Aires with the band in 1997 was also one of the highpoints of his career.

Ian Paice made his name as drummer with seminal heavy rock band Deep Purple. In fact, throughout their long career, which has seen numerous changes among the other personnel, he is the only drummer the band has had, playing on a whole string of million-selling albums. For three years between mid 1973 and mid 1976, Deep Purple were the biggest rock band in the world, a fact which record sales prove.

It’s a fact that the key element underpinning the whole development of heavy rock was the rhythm section and, along with a few others, Ian Paice can lay claim to have been right at the forefront of this movement. It has been said that Deep Purple set new standards for heavy rock bands and much of the credit for that achievement must go to Ian whose style became one of the most influential in rock drumming.

Ian brought forward from a previous generation of rock drummers the tight, precise playing and crisp, clean sound of the best of his predecessors but added power, formidable speed and technique to create a unique style and sound giving the best of both worlds. His fills on the single, `Black Night’, which rose to Number 2 in the charts in late September 1970, caused problems for many a `covers’ band who must have been very grateful that Deep Purple didn’t release more singles! (Listen to the drumming on `Fireball’, `Burn’ or `Highway Star’ among others).

Without doubt, Ian Paice has assured his place in the drummers’ hall of fame.

drummerworld

Jerry started out on the drums at age 8, played his first gig at age 14 and by 18 was playing drums on the Gloria Gaynor tour. He is an incredibly versatile drummer and has played with a variety of top Jazz, pop and gospel acts. He has appeared on many different promotional tours with the likes of Tina Turner, Angie Stone and Incognito as well as live tours with diverse artists such as Will Young, Girls Aloud and Belinda Carlilse to name a few. He has recorded DVD’s with Jamelia, the London Community Gospel Choir and also a DVD for the very first ‘Fame academy’ tour.

Born and raised in New Orleans (and living there still, when he’s not on the road), Stanton Moore is very much a product of geography, culture and creative networking. He grew up in the thriving music scene of his hometown that included Professor Longhair, Doctor John, the Meters and countless other Big Easy mainstays.

In the early ‘90s, Moore hooked up with guitarist Jeff Raines, bassist Robert Mercurio and keyboardist Rich Vogel and saxophonist Ben Ellman to form the New Orleans-based “steam-roller” funk band known as Galactic. After receiving his bachelor’s degree in music and business from Loyola University, Moore and the band made their first record (the widely acclaimed Coolin’ Off) and hit the road to do nearly 200 gigs a year for the first ten years of Galactic’s existence. The band has since released five more albums since Coolin’ Off, and continues to amass a worldwide audience via recording and touring globally.

Aided by eight-string guitar virtuoso Charlie Hunter and saxophonist Skerik (Les Claypool, John Scofield, Roger Waters), Moore launched his solo career in the late ‘90s with the All Kooked Out!, an album recorded in New Orleans just after Mardi Gras in 1998 and released later that year. In addition to the Moore-Hunter-Skerik core, All Kooked Out! also featured a handful of New Orleans horn players, including Brent Rose, Brian Seeger, Matt Perrine, Ben Ellman, and former Sun Ra trumpeter Michael Ray. Moore extended the solo discography with the 2001 release of Flyin’ the Koop (Verve/Blue Thumb).

In the midst of Moore’s All Kooked Out! sessions, yet another concept was taking shape. Outtakes from the session turned into the first Garage a Trois release, Mysteryfunk (1999). In 2000, the trio was augmented by percussionist Mike Dillon (Les Claypool, Ani DeFranco) and has since released two more albums – Emphasizer in 2003 and Outre Mer (on Telarc) in 2005 – both with Moore behind the drum kit.

Moore continued his Telarc affiliation with the September 2006 release of III, his third solo recording. Boasting a trademark sound that Modern Drummer has called “infectious, jazz-meets-Bonham, nouveau second-line,” III featured organist Robert Walter (Greyboy Allstars, The Head Hunters), guitarist Will Bernard (T.J. Kirk, Doctor Lonnie Smith), along with a few special guests: Skerik and trombonist Mark Mullins (Galactic, Bonerama, Harry Connick, Jr., Better Than Ezra).The album was recorded at the legendary Preservation Hall in New Orleans.

Emphasis (on parenthis), the followup to III, is due in stores in April 2008. The album includes the scaled back session crew of Moore, Robert Walter and Will Bernard. “When it came time to do another record,” says Moore, “I had already known for a while that I wanted to build on the momentum of this band – three musicians who were becoming a unit unto themselves – and I wanted to get a little more adventurous with the music itself.”

Moore has also been keeping busy with numerous side projects, including new albums with Galactic and Garage a Trois. He’s also working on his second book/DVD project, Groove Alchemy, an instructional package focusing on groove drumming (Groove Alchemy is the followup to a similar instructional package in 2005 that focused on New Orleans drumming styles).

He stays very involved in education, constantly teaching private lessons in New Orleans and on the road. He was a contributing writer for Drum! magazine and is currently a regular writer for Modern Drummer, which featured him on their April 2004 cover. Showing a rare versatility, he appeared (within the same year) on Heavy Metal Grammy nominees Corrosion of Conformity’s In the Arms of God, Irma Thomas’ After the Rain and Robert Walter’s Super Heavy Organ. In 2005, he launched a signature line of cymbals with Bosphorus Cymbals and a signature drum stick with the Vic Firth stick company.

Despite some severe property damage and other personal setbacks in the aftermath of Katrina, Moore was quick to lend a hand to other drummers in New Orleans by donating cymbals and other gear to musicians whose equipment was damaged by the storm. He has also played a number of benefit concerts in the past year to help raise money for Katrina victims. He recently spearheaded the Tipitina’s Music Workshop to work with young and developing musicians in the New Orleans area. The workshop will focus on the preservation of New Orleans music and culture and will host a rotating cast of well known local and national musicians to work with the attendees. He continues to play dates throughout the Big Easy as well as globally with an ever-evolving cast of musicians: John Scofield; Karl Denson; George Porter, Jr., and Leo Nocentelli (of the Meters); Charlie Hunter; Warren Haynes; John Medeski and John Wood (of Medeski, Martin and Wood); Donald Harrison Jr.; Robert Walter; the New Orleans Klezmer All-Stars; the Preservation Hall Jazz Band; Corrosion of Conformity; and Irma Thomas to name a few.