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Sunny Murray

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Sunny Murray was born in 1936 in Idabel, Oklahoma, and grew up with an uncle. He began drumming at the age of nine. After a childhood in Philadelphia he moved to New York in 1956, where he played with, among others, Red Allen, Ted Curson and Jackie McLean. He was one of the pioneers of free jazz drumming.

Music and breakthrough

The turning point came in 1959, when he first played with the pianist Cecil Taylor. Together with Taylor and the saxophonist Jimmy Lyons he made a stylistic breakthrough in Scandinavia in 1962, captured on Nefertiti the Beautiful One Has Come. There he also met the saxophonist Albert Ayler. Murray played in Ayler's trio with the bass player Gary Peacock and recorded, among other things, Spiritual Unity with him. Under his own name he made his debut in 1965 with Sonny's Time Now, released on Leroi Jones's label. Later he lived in Europe, where he made records for BYG Actuel. In 1980 he played with Taylor again, on It Is in the Brewing Luminous. He died in 2017.

Influence

Murray gave up the drummer's role as timekeeper and played mainly texture: a sustained hailstorm of strokes, with continuous shimmering on the rims of the cymbals, an irregular stream on the snare and scattered accents on the bass drum. In this way he freed the soloist from the beat. For the development of free jazz that was essential: he let Ayler and Taylor move wherever they wanted.

Listening

Listening tip. Listen to Spiritual Unity by Albert Ayler and notice how Murray does not play a fixed pulse, but lays a rolling bed of cymbals and snare beneath the saxophone.

Discography

Studio albums

Categories: Artists