Idris Muhammad’s drum beat goes silent

4th August 2014   ·   0 Comments

By Geraldine Wyckoff
Contributing Writer

In a city renowned for its great drummers, Idris Muhammad was among New Orleans absolute best. Born Leo Morris, he was on the scene during the New Orleans rhythm and blues heydays and it’s his drums that are heard on the Hawketts’ Carnival anthem “Mardi Gras Mambo,” Fats Domino’s smash hit, “Blueberry Hill” and Lee Dorsey’s funky “Working in a Coal Mine.” On the flip side, jazz aficionados know Muhammad playing with an array of jazz giants like pianists Ahmad Jamal and Randy Weston and saxophonists Pharoah Sanders and Lou Donaldson. Idris Muhammad, an immensely versatile musician with a much-sought-after style all his own, died July 29, 2014 at the age of 74.

“I play (the drum set) from the bottom up,” Muhammad declared in his fascinating autobiography, Inside the Music – The Life of Idris Muhammad. He’d often repeat that explanation whenever he was asked about his unique rhythmic approach when playing in any number of genres including rhythm and blues, jazz and funk. Growing up primarily in New Orleans’ 13th Ward, as a child, he was surrounded by the sounds of brass bands leading social aid and pleasure club parades and the rhythms of the Mardi Gras Indians’ tambourines reverberating on Carnival Day. Street beats were the pulse of his playing and his life.

For instance, when Muhammad was performing at the 1999 Montreal Jazz Festival with saxophonist Joe Lovano’s “Tenor Summit,” the group dug into John Coltrane’s “India.” Muhammad began playing a repeated rhythm, continually smacking the snare while allowing the cymbals to ring. The alteration to the well-known jazz classic charged the atmosphere.

“That was the street beat,” declared the always affable Muhammad in an interview held soon thereafter. “I took them with me on a trip uptown on the levee, downtown in the 9th Ward, down in the 7th Ward. I took them on my trip, that’s what happened to ‘India.’”

Muhammad made his first out-of-town appearances with Art Neville and the Hawketts and Larry Williams who was riding high on hits like “Short Fat Fannie.” The drummer left New Orleans at a young age, first heading out on tour with vocalist Sam Cooke. He’s heard on Cooke’s 1960 chart-topper, “Chain Gang.” (Check Muhammad’s funky beat on this one.) Later he would work with soulmen Jerry “Iceman” Butler and Curtis Mayfield. It was also in the 1960s that Leo Morris became a Muslim and, against the advice of some business people, changed his name to Idris Muhammad.

At the time of his departure from his hometown, Muhammad rightfully considered himself strictly a funk/R&B musician as he had limited experience playing jazz. Recording as a leader on such albums as 1974’s monster Power of Soul and 1977’s Turn This Mutha Out, he demonstrated his continued involvement in funky music.

A turning point in his career came one night when Muhammad sat in with saxophone giant Rahsaan Roland Kirk. Trumpeter Kenny Dorham caught the gig and right there, Dorham asked the drummer to perform with him at a show at New York’s prestigious Town Hall. Dorham’s group was triple billed with trumpeters Lee Morgan’s and Freddie Hubbard’s bands. That night he also met jazz greats Betty Carter, Paul Chambers, McCoy Tyner, and George Coleman and eventually he played with them all. Not bad company for a self-declared “funk drummer from New Orleans.”

Muhammad’s hefty jazz discography includes 13 albums with Lou Donaldson and eight with pianist Ahmad Jamal who has a penchant for New Orleans drummers. Muhammad followed native son Vernel Fournier in the drum position of Jamal’s trio and Herlin Riley now plays with the pianist.

The drummer’s versatility and musical acumen were further acknowledged when he was given the position, which held for many years, of musical director of the theatrical production of “Hair.”

From 2000 to 2002, Muhammad fulfilled a lifelong dream of masking Indian when he transformed into Chief Red of Donald Harrison Jr.’s Afro-New Orleans cultural group, the Congo Nation (Now named the Congo Square Nation.) “It was like being a kid again,” he exclaimed. “When I put the suit on, I transform into something I always wanted to be.”

After years of living abroad, primarily in Austria, and New York, Muhammad, who gained international acclaim, returned to semi-retire in New Orleans in 2011. Wearing his trademark red sunglasses and flashing his red drum sticks, he played hot gigs at spots like Snug Harbor and Sweet Lorraine’s.

“My attachment with New Orleans has never left,” Muhammad once declared “My love for the city, the music and the people was always in my heart. It is always there because it put me in the position where I am today. My family taught me how to deal with people and my friends taught me how to be a friend. And my music taught me how to play music with anybody. My father taught me that you can’t be a good musician and a bad guy off the bandstand.”

Idris Muhammad took his father’s words to heart. He was a great musician and a great guy.

This article originally published in the August 4, 2014 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.