Druimnond, Billy
Druimnond, Billy
Druimnond, Billy, drummer; b. Newport News, Va., 1959. He began to play drums at the age of four, influenced by his father, who was also a drummer. His love for jazz was sparked by his father’s record collection, which included many of the classic recordings of Miles Davis, Art Blakey, Max Roach, and so on. During his youth, Drummond played in various school and local bands, and studied many styles of music. He then went on to college, taking a degree in Music Performance. In early 1988, Billy arrived in N.Y. His first major break on the circuit was to join the young band “Out of the Blue” (OTB), with which he played on the group’s final recording for Blue Note. Soon after, he joined Horace Silver’s Sextet and toured with them extensively. During the 1990s he performed and recorded with Sonny Rollins, J.J. Johnson (1992–95), Joe Henderson, Nat Adderley, Bobby Hutcherson, James Moody, Steve Kuhn, Freddie Hubbard, and Buster Williams. He and Renee Rosnes met and married while they were in J.J. Johnson’s band. He has also worked with Vincent Herring, Christian McBride, and Javon Jackson and is a member of the cooperative band Native Colours with Ralph Moore, Rosnes, and bassist Larry Grenadier. Peter Watrous, jazz critic for the New York Times, named Drummond’s Dubai as the top jazz recording for 1996.
Discography
Native Colours (1992); The Gift (1994); Native Colours: One World (1994); Dubai (1996).
—Lewis Porter