Harold Jones

Bo Eder

Platinum Member
Had to share this man here. This is Harold Jones. I saw him playing with Tony Bennett on Saturday, and it was such a great drum lesson in swing and style. Here's a video from 1968 when he was playing with Count Basie. When Tony introduced him as coming from Basie's band, you knew the rhythm was going to be great, and it was.

And the funnier thing when you go to see someone like Tony Bennett, basically every song he sings is a hit. So it's hard to know when the show is over because he probably could've done 6-hours of hits (they're all standards) ! Every song they did, everybody knew - amazing. They did great re-arrangements of the classics and some entirely different interpretations as well, so it was nice that he and his band continue to re-discover the standards instead of just hacking through the old songs the way they were done 40-50 years ago.

For those of you wondering, Tony still has it. He was still hitting the notes, and there was a couple of times when he wasn't quite there, but was able to back off of it rather gracefully (you wouldn't know he was doing it unless you knew what to listen for). In one song I think he forgot maybe half a verse but with an 'eye-cue' to the band, the band took over and he came back in at the next verse. But other than those three instances, there were no other glaring issues in the two-hour show. I hope when the time comes, Tony retires in style and stops. I saw some of those old videos from Frank Sinatra's last concerts and it was sad, as great as Frank was, he should have stopped. He was missing notes and forgetting lyrics. Tony is not there yet.

Enjoy!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqnp38-3L_A
 
Thanks for sharing, Bo.

I don't think Harold Jones gets nearly the attention he deserves. Seriously one of the best.
 
Jo Jones and Sonny Payne are the drummers touted as the best drummers of the Basie band.
One drummer who is often forgotten, and who I enjoyed more even that Sonny Payne, is Harold
Jones, who spent recent decades as Tony Bennett's sticksman. But dig the fire with which Harold
kicks this tune. I see what he was Bill Basie's favorite:
 
Jo Jones and Sonny Payne are the drummers touted as the best drummers of the Basie band.
One drummer who is often forgotten, and who I enjoyed more even that Sonny Payne, is Harold
Jones, who spent recent decades as Tony Bennett's sticksman. But dig the fire with which Harold
kicks this tune. I see what he was Bill Basie's favorite:
Thanks for that! Sonny is swinging. So inspiring to hear up-tempo swinging that separates the men from the boys! Love how his bass drum is punching through!
 
Thanks for that! Sonny is swinging. So inspiring to hear up-tempo swinging that separates the men from the boys! Love how his bass drum is punching through!
And “without all the assistance” as Buddy Rich would say…. No mic on that 20
 
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