Harry Potter & Benny Goodman

An occasional series in which various parts of the 100 Years of Jazz In 99 Minutes show are ruminated on.

How did Harry Potter ever meet Benny Goodman's - Sing Sing Sing?

One of the nicest compliments I've had was from Pete Long when he called me "the bastard love child of Gene Krupa and Ringo Starr" (however he could have been referring to the fact that I have the same drum kit as Gene Krupa and the same nose as Ringo Starr - damn it, it was an insult after all). 

 Sing Sing Sing   Benny Goodman and his Orchestra 1937, Carnegie Hall.

Sing Sing Sing was the first time an extended drum solo was released on a 78 rpm.  Before then drummers got four bars (or three and a half seconds) to show their stuff or eight bars  (or 7 seconds) if they were lucky - this was a jolly good thing as most drum solos get rather tedious after the first seven seconds - that is unless you're watching one (but even that is tedious now as most drummers have developed stupendous techniques where they barely move a muscle to play everything on their kit at astonishing speed - I seem to have developed exactly the opposite approach).  

Drum solos should be theatrical experiences and no one understood this better than Gene Krupa.  Having Hollywood idol good looks and more charisma than is fair helped a bit too.  Oh and creating drum solos that people can dance to as well is also a popular move and probably explains why the record sold 100000000000000 copies.

Have we found Richard's missing music?  Check out the sound track in this clip of Prof. Lupin's Boggart Class... 

A while ago I recorded a pastiche of Sing Sing Sing for a Harry Potter movie (I think it was the nineteenth in the series called the Transgender Niblets of Tharg or some such thing).  I took my son to see it and in a desperate attempt to impress him with how cool his dad was I kept banging on about how I would be featured in the magic shop scene.  When it finally came to the scene the music I'd recorded had been edited out - cue bemused look from son and cool rating back to its regular zero.

Here in the movie "Hollywood Hotel", 1937

Is Sing Sing Sing the best drum solo of all time?  The readers of Modern Drummer voted it so.  What do you think?   I like the solo by Ringo on Abbey Road - I can play it note for note or bash for bash or whatever the technical term is...