Earl Palmer was the main drummer who worked at J&M Studios at the start of the post-war development of the New Orleans signature R&B sound. He was born in the Tremé neighbourhood of New Orleans in 1924. As a child he toured with his mother, who worked in vaudeville. He learned to tap dance and some people say that is why he is such a good drummer, with an impeccable sense of timing and the ability to dance on the drum pedals. It’s a nice idea and it may well be true! There is also his love of Jazz to take into account. When you visit New Orleans, it feels like a city built on Jazz. There are live bands in the bars and cafes, and groups of musicians playing on the street corners in the French quarter. Earl would have grown up in New Orleans surrounded by Jazz music and he certainly loved playing it himself.
After the war Earl Palmer completed his music studies and joined Dave Bartholomew’s band in 1947, playing on most of the hits that came out of Cosimo Matassa’s Studios for the next ten years. Stand-out tracks are Fats Domino’s “The Fat Man” and “I’m Walking”, Lloyd Price’s “Lawdy Miss Clawdy”, Professor Longhair’s “In The Night” and “Tipitina”, Smiley Lewis’ “I Hear You Knockin’”, Little Richard’s “Tutti Frutti” and “The Girl Can’t Help It”, Art Neville’s “Ooh-Wee-Baby” and “Shirley and Lee’s “Let the Good Times Roll”.
The first of these, “The Fat Man”, is probably the most significant, as it features a backbeat that Palmer borrowed from Jazz. He has described this innovation in simple terms: “That song required a strong afterbeat throughout the whole piece. With Dixieland you had a strong afterbeat only after you got to the shout last chorus…It was sort of a new approach to rhythm music.” The backbeat had been used before in some popular songs, but the success of the Fats Domino/Dave Bartholomew tune meant that it was now copied to such an extent that it became a key element of later Rock & Roll songs.
In 1957 he moved to Los Angeles, following an offer from Eddie Mesner to join Aladdin Records as an A&R man. One of Palmer’s first sessions in the studios on the West Coast was to play drums on “You Send Me” for a young singer called Sam Cooke. It was a good omen. Earl Palmer went on to work with a host of iconic artists, playing on hundreds of sessions and a multitude of hits. He worked with Harold Battiste and Robert Blackwell, who, like him, had left New Orleans to work on the West Coast. He also joined with other session men to form the Wrecking Crew. Being in Los Angeles also gave Earl Palmer the chance to work in the wider entertainment industry. He was asked to play on a large number of film and TV soundtracks.
There are too many hits to list, but, as an indication of his quality, here are two of the best: “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’” by the Righteous Brothers and “River Deep, Mountain High” by Ike & Tina Turner. Do you remember a quirky instrumental called “Nut Rocker” by B. Bumble and The Stingers? Yes, Earl played on that too.
In the year 2000, Earl Palmer was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, one of the first session musicians to be honoured in this way.
Earl Palmer 2000
Photo: Kingkongphoto & www.celebrity-photos.com (Wikimedia Commons)
Mike Clark (drummer with Herbie Hancock) has summed up why Earl Palmer was so special:
“Like most young drummers growing up in the ’60s, I heard Earl Palmer on a daily basis. But I never heard of Earl Palmer until the mid-’70s, when I began to research who was playing on these songs I loved so very much. It turns out about twenty of my favourite drummers were all Earl Palmer. His taste, musicality, feel, and ability to put just one note in a space that could accommodate many more, but put it in the perfect place, were an inspiration beyond measure. Thank you, Earl.”
(Quoted from “Earl Palmer Remembered” by Mark Griffith, Modern Drummer Website)
