Steve Gadd

Steve Gadd is the most influential drummer of our time and I had the recent honour to spend some time with him. The last couple of years have been important landmarks for Steve; in 2005 in addition to the two hugely successful Zildjian 'Mission From Gadd' tours, Steve celebrated his 60th birthday, received an Honorary Doctorate from Berklee College of Music and was inducted into the PAS Hall of Fame.  A great year to say the least!

On spending some time with Steve, it was very refreshing to see how humble and grateful he is. We all have our favourite Steve Gadd track or fill; whether its Paul Simon’s 'One Trick Pony' or Simon and Garfunkel’s '50 Ways To Leave Your Lover' , Chick Corea’s 'Lenore' or 'Friends' or Steely Dan’s 'Aja', the list just goes on. Mine is 'Chuck E's In Love' by Rickie Lee Jones - I just love that fill!!  I started off the interview by asking what’s Steve’s most memorable recordings were.

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S.G: There are so many memorable ones; I have been blessed to work with so many great musicians, but one would have to be the Paul Simon track 'Fifty Ways', one would be the Chic Corea album 'Leprechaun', and the album 'Friends'. I loved doing all the blues stuff with Eric Clapton, the stuff with Bob James especially 'Night On Blue Mountain', was so good.

When you did The Leprechaun album, didn’t you read the piano chart?
Yes!  The hardest part was trying to get it all taped up because the chart was so long, we had to put them on the wall and mic stands all around the drums.  That was the trick in those days, to try and get the music, so you could see it. That was a great and memorable session and we did it live. 

Did you create the Fifty Ways part on the spot?
Yeah, we rehearsed the song, one section sounded like it was good, one section we were still working on and I was just practising things between takes and Phil Ramone heard something I was practising and said 'why don’t you try that kind of feel...?' and that’s how it came about.

When you were recording it, did you think it was going to be so special?
No not really at the time. You don’t know what’s going to happen after you leave the studio, you hope, but you never know. I always try to give the best I can.

Obviously you have great feel and time.  What did you do to work on that and what advice would you give to drummers to work on these areas?
From being in the studio I had the opportunity to play and hear things back so I could critique my own playing.  There were some times when you were playing live in the room and it sounds great and when you play it back it was not as locked in as you thought, and being in that situation I was able to tell when I was rushing and I didn’t even know about it, so I became aware of thinking about those things.  I think for people to practice, first of all to be aware of trying to play good time and keeping it steady, secondly if you want to practice you should probably practice with a drum machine or click because then you have a point of reference.  When you play with a click or drum machine you play different dynamics, play a groove for 4 bars, or a groove for 8 bars and then a fill like you’re going to another section and those are the times when the tempo will change, when you start getting louder and changing what you are playing, so those are the times you have to think more about the time.  You get to learn when you rush and when you don’t.

Do you warm up before you play?
I try to keep my head pretty relaxed.  I make sure there are some sticks and a pad and I’ll do some warm ups on that.  When I do clinics I won’t go out and try to do anything that’s faster than it should.  I’ll just go out there and try and relax, warm up and play some music. When I am playing gigs I have a metronome on the side of the kit with speeds of the tracks that I have to count off and I’ll make sure that’s all locked in before I go on but It’s nice to just relax before you go on.

What musical difficulties have you had over your life?
It’s not so much musical but it’s hard when you’re away from home a lot and you miss your family. Some tours are easier than others, when you’re in a van driving from one place to another that’s hard work, if you don’t have a back line crew to help you getting your gear in and you have to do a lot of the stuff yourself.  Its not always flying on a private planes and 5 star hotels, there’s different levels of touring, some's easy and some’s hard, but so long as you’re doing what you love it sort of makes up for it.

That will be refreshing for the readers to know that you have to carry your gear and set up some times,  (Laughs) But if we love what we do that’s cool, we all have to do it.

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Do you get influences from other players that inspire you to try new things?
Yeah, I saw The Dirty Dozen at a benefit for the New Orleans hurricane victims, I’ve been listening to their stuff ever since, it’s great, really funky.  You hear guys do things and that’s how you get inspired. Originally you’re inspired by hearing someone else doing something and then taking it home and trying to learn how to do it. When I was growing up I would get records of Philly Joe, Elvin Jones, Tony Williams and guys like that and slow the records down and work out what they were playing and then work on it and put my own feel to it - that’s how we all learn.

Which drummers inspire you?
I’m into the guys I’ve been into for a while. I like Vinnie, Dave Weckl, Steve Jordan, and Terrence Higgins with The Dirty Dozen. I like anybody who can play.  It’s not about hearing someone and trying to play exactly like them, there’s a lot of guys that will play one thing that will really kill you, that’s what gets me, I’ll try to learn that one thing and make it my own.

Is there anyone you would like to work with that you haven’t?
I just love to play.  I love the fact that I’m still making a living playing, I love the people I am working with and it’s always good to meet new people, make new friends and share music with people, so I’ve been enjoying it my whole life and will continue to do so.

There’s a big demand in the UK at the moment for a Steve Gadd Clinic Tour, can we expect anything in the UK?
We’re talking about continuing the clinic tour ('Mission From Gadd') that I am doing with Zildjian, and possibly doing something in Europe, and the UK would be one of the first places we’d hit.

Interview: Mike Dolbear
March 07