Cookin’ with the Hammer
IN A VIDEO PULLED TOGETHER by Kendrick Scott and posted on social media during the pandemic, 39 top-notch jazz drummers play along, one by one, with Thelonious Monk’s “Evidence.” It seems entirely appropriate that Jeff Hamilton starts the video off with a typically impressive use of brushes on a snare. Hamilton has a reputation for both enviable technique and complete devotion to making everything swing. He developed that reputation quickly while apprenticing with several of the great bandleaders of swing and bebop, including Woody Herman, Stan Kenton, Count Basie, Oscar Peterson, Monty Alexander, and Ray Brown; the latter nicknamed him “The Hammer,” a moniker by which he’s still affectionately known to his fellow musicians and fans alike.
Settling in Los Angeles, he drew on all that sideman experience when forming his own groups. In 1985, with his lifelong friend John Clayton, he founded the Clayton/Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, a big band that has set the gold standard for large jazz ensembles. In 1995 he created a piano trio that now features pianist Tamir Hendelman and bassist Jon Hamar, with whom Hamilton recorded Catch Me If You Can, released by Capri earlier this summer. Just a few years ago, he formed an organ trio with Akiko Tsuruga and Graham Dechter, whose most recent album was Equal Time (also on Capri).
Over the years, Hamilton has also been a first-call studio musician for countless instrumentalists and singers, from pop stars looking to make their jazz statement, including Paul McCartney and Barbra Streisand, to legendary jazz singers like Ernestine Anderson and Rosemary Clooney seeking a swinging rhythm section. And if all that weren’t enough, he can claim more than a little credit for mentoring a certain young Canadian pianist who became one of the music’s most popular performers. As you’ll read in this freewheeling conversation, Diana Krall owes quite a large debt to the Hammer.
JazzTimes: Do you remember falling in love with drums?
Yes, I remember seeing Gene Krupa on TV when I was five years old. That did it for me. I said, “I want to be just like him.” I was taking piano lessons at the time like everyone else in my family, but I hated it. So the teacher let me quit. He said, “He hates
