In Memoriam: Roy Haynes, 1925–2024

By Thomas Staudter I Nov. 19, 2024

“I treat every day like it’s Thanksgiving,” said Roy Haynes in describing what made him successful.
(Photo: Michael Jackson)

Powerhouse jazz drummer and bandleader Roy Haynes died Tuesday in Nassau County, New York. He was 99. One of the few remaining figures from jazz’s bebop revolution, Haynes long résumé included bandstand associations from the late 1940s and early 1950s with legendary artists like Lester Young, Bud Powell, Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis and Sarah Vaughan.

Haynes was the recipient of many awards and honors throughout his career, including a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, France’s Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Letttres, the Danish Jazzpar Award, numerous DownBeat awards and induction into the magazine’s Hall of Fame in 2004, plus apropos recognition in 1960 from Esquire as one of the Best Dressed Men in America.

Even as an octogenarian and nonagenarian, Haynes maintained a touring and recording schedule. For his 85th birthday, he celebrated the milestone with a stretch of shows at the Blue Note jazz club in Manhattan, the dates spiced with special guests like piano great Chick Corea, who had engaged the drummer for his epochal 1968 album Now He Sings, Now He Sobs. More recently, in March 2018, Haynes was back at the Blue Note with his longstanding Fountain of Youth quartet for yet another birthday celebration.

Remarkably, Haynes was able to maintain his instrumental mastery at an advanced age. Asked about his secret to such a long, productive life and career, he remarked, “Truth is, I can’t say that I did anything different than anybody else. I keep truckin’. Keep moving, maybe that’s it. Make sure there are no dull moments. I like the fresh air and breeze in my face — I think that helps. And I don’t try to overindulge, although there certainly have been times when I did. I treat every day like it’s Thanksgiving.”

Born and raised in the Roxbury section of Boston, Haynes grew up in a musical family. His parents, both from Barbados, were big music fans, and his father played the organ at home and sang in church. One of four brothers, Haynes learned a great deal from his oldest brother, Douglas, who was a musician and graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music, later to work with Cab Calloway’s sister, Blanche, and her group the Joy Boys.

In his teens, Haynes started playing drums, and while in high school, he was gigging regularly with touring groups visiting Boston that needed someone in the drum chair. Many famed jazz musicians came from the Boston area, and it was just a matter of time before one of them recommended Haynes for the big leagues. In his case, alto saxophonist Charlie Holmes (formerly the principal oboist with the Boston Civic Symphony Orchestra) was playing with bandleader Luis Russell, and when a drummer was needed, Haynes got the call. He moved to New York City in 1945 at the age of 20. Russell’s ensemble was renowned across the country, having backed Louis Armstrong for a spell, and the experience of playing in a big band helped shape Haynes’s style of being able to match his playing to any tempo and timbre demands.

After working with Lester Young for two years, Haynes occupied the drum chair with the Charlie Parker Quintet from 1949 to 1952, and then enjoyed stretches with trombonist Kai Winding, tenor saxophonist Wardell Grey and Miles Davis during the trumpeter’s first years as a solo artist. There was a five-year stretch with Sarah Vaughan, a recording with Thelonious Monk, and in the 1960s, he played with John Coltrane Quartet as the personnel was still gelling; later, when regular drummer Elvin Jones needed a sub, Haynes was there.

“When you’re playing behind other people, it’s important to have a feeling of what the artist leading the gig likes,” said Haynes. “Much of that comes from being a careful listener. Sometimes you have to pick up that feeling right away on the job, then quickly translate it into the pulse, swing and sense of rhythm necessary to keep the music moving along.”

As a leader, Haynes recorded nearly 30 albums and co-led several others, including Question and Answer with Pat Metheny, who remarked to DownBeat, “I always refer to Roy as the ‘father of modern drumming’… On the level of microscopic musical detail, Roy has always had the hippest phrasing, the best feel, the magic component of heart and soul that puts him at the highest echelon of what one can achieve in this music.”

Among Haynes’s many recordings is A Life in Time, a four-disc survey of his long career during the evolution of modern jazz from the 1940s to present time. Fittingly, the collection includes appearances with numerous jazz luminaries, as well as the hit single “Don’t Go to Strangers” by Etta Jones before spotlighting the drummer’s solo recordings, like the early post-bop classic Out of the Afternoon with Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Henry Grimes and Tommy Flanagan; Birds of a Feather: A Tribute to Charlie Parker, featuring Roy Hargrove, Kenny Garrett and Dave Holland; and his cross-generational Fountain of Youth.

Haynes’s survivors include two sons, cornetist Graham Haynes and drummer Craig Haynes, and his grandson, Marcus Gilmore, also a drummer. DB