“The Singer’s Drummer” chronicles the music and times of Harold Jones, a world class musician whose career spans the last five decades of jazz and big band swing music. This book highlights Jones’ career as he evolved into the drummer of choice for some of our most popular vocal legends. But it is about much more than that. It also gives us an entertaining insight into life on the road and is filled with Harold’s insightful, sometimes humorous, anecdotes and musings about the famous sidemen, legendary jazz musicians and vocal headliners he has known; featuring more than 100 photos of his renowned friends. Read “The Singer’s Drummer” and learn why Paul Winter called Harold the “Michael Jordan of young jazz drummers in Chicago.” Read why Harold became acknowledged as “Count Basie’s favorite drummer.” And why Tony Bennett says “This book is a knockout! I am happy that someone is finally putting together a history of what really happens on the road!”

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Harold Jones

The Singer's DrummerBy Gil Jacobs Joe Agro

AuthorHouse

Copyright � 2011 Gil Jacobs and Joe Agro
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4634-4628-4

Preface by Paul Winter.....................................................xixIntroduction by Joe Agro...................................................1Back Home Again in Indiana 1940 – 1957...............................5Chapter 1 - Harold in the Beginning........................................7Chapter 2 - Getting Around.................................................23Chapter 3 - Swinging In Chicago............................................33Chapter 4 - Really Swinging with Basie.....................................71Chapter 5 - Swinging Out West..............................................109Chapter 6 - The Unforgettable Ladies.......................................123Chapter 7 - The Great Male Artists.........................................151Chapter 8 – Harold Meets His Lady – Denise.....................161Chapter 9 - The Gene Harris Superband......................................165Chapter 10 - Swinging by the Golden Gate...................................175Chapter 11 - Touring with Tony Bennett.....................................187Chapter 12.................................................................203Chapter 13 – Reminiscing and Random Thoughts.........................213Chapter 14- Harold Jones' Workshop.........................................237Chapter 15 – Harold Jones Up To Now..................................247Chapter 16 – The Rewards.............................................267Index – People, Places and Events....................................279

Chapter One

Harold in the Beginning

Born February 27, 1940 in Richmond, Indiana

The "Singer's Drummer" chronicles the "Music and Times of Harold Jones" an outstanding musician whose career spans the last five decades of jazz and big band swing music. This book highlights the career of Jones as he transcends into becoming the singer's drummer wherein he accompanied some of the most popular vocalists and entertainment legends of the past fifty years. Harold's life has been remarkable from the very beginning of his music career, and continues so even today.

Born in the small town of Richmond, Indiana, Harold was fortunate in having a series of exceptional music instructors to guide him. In fact, several other future jazz greats would also come from this same rural area which is a further testament to the musical education offered in this region. This is a tradition carried forward from the early 1900's when Richmond became a recording center for jazz musicians. As reported in Chapter 13, Richmond, Indiana is now being chronicled as the "Cradle of Recorded Jazz".

* * *

While Jay and Juanita, Harold's parents, were not in the music business they did produce two sons who made quite an impact.

The younger son, Melvyn "Deacon" Jones became famous for being the King of the Hammond B-3 Organ and touring with John Lee Hooker, the Father of the Blues, for seventeen years.

Harold has made his mark of fame many times over the past fifty plus years; most notably with Count Basie, Tony Bennett, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan and Natalie Cole. And, there were many other highlights along the way to Harold becoming the singer's drummer.

Harold's dad was a maintenance worker at the local Perfect Circle Piston plant and he was also the custodian at Dennis Junior High School. In addition, he operated a car detailing business out of his home.

Working at Dennis Junior High School gave Jay access to contacts and information about the various music instructors in the area. This proved to be beneficial in guiding Harold in his quest for music education. The car detailing business also proved to be beneficial to Harold for it was there that he developed a friendship with Andy Simpkins. Andy and Harold would become close lifelong friends. Andy went on to be a bass player of some renown and would be instrumental in Harold joining the Sarah Vaughan trio some thirty years later.

Harold learned a good life's lesson while helping his dad perform his custodial duties. One day, when he was nine years old, Harold was operating the high pressure vacuum hose used to clean the stairs. The hose was heavy and the added high pressure made it difficult for the young boy to handle. "It was hard work" remembers Harold. When he complained to his dad, Jay responded, "I want you to see how hard it is now, so you won't want to do this when you get to be my age."

Harold's mother, Juanita, was a homemaker, until her husband died in 1956, and then she took over the maintenance job at the piston plant. Harold recalls working with his mother and noticing that she was doing a more thorough cleaning job than his father had been doing. This tweaked Harold's curiosity and when he asked his mother he learned another life's lesson, "It is always good to give more than what is required."

Harold took both of these lessons to heart. While he was never afraid of working hard, he steered away from physical hard work, in favor of working hard to improve his musical skills. And, he always gave more than what was expected as his career progressed. He lives by the creed to "Deliver more than what is promised".

Harold attended Garfield Elementary School which had a very good music curriculum. Don Schuerman was his first music teacher. Harold recalls when it came time to select an instrument all he had to do was circle the name of the one he wanted to play. But, at the time, Harold was having problems reading. He knew he wanted to play the trumpet and he circled an instrument that started with a "T". To his surprise, Mr. Schuerman later handed him a tuba which totally encompassed Harold's small frame. "Mr. Schuerman, that's not what I meant, I want to play the trumpet." And Harold remembers Schuerman's response till this day. "That's too bad because the tuba is a great instrument for black people because they tend to have thick lips and the tuba has the biggest mouth piece of all the instruments." Despite this logic, Harold still requested a trumpet only to find that there were no trumpets available. So Harold selected the drums, and what a monumental decision that turned out to be!

Harold learned his reading and spelling lessons very well. In his senior year in high school he finished number three in the school's spelling contest. He also finished in the top five in driver education. This was really important because he would be driving to lots of gigs in the towns and cities around Richmond and later Chicago.

Harold received important direction and lots of encouragement from his 7th, 8th and 9th grade music instructor, Mary Minnick. Ms. Minnick was the first instructor who identified Harold's perfect timing and rhythm. She was also the first one who advised him that he should not be a singing drummer. Sarah Vaughan would later concur with Minnick's assessments especially for the timing and rhythm and also for the singing.

From Garfield, Harold moved on to Hibberd Jr. High School which also was very big on students getting a good musical education. This is where he had his first drum instructor, Jack Kurkowski, who is credited with teaching Harold to read music. Harold says, "He learned to read music before he ever owned a set of drums." Harold was very well liked at Hibberd and he was elected the vice-president of his senior class. This was a unique...

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