Max Roach
January 10, 1924 – August 16, 2007
Many jazz fans consider Max Roach to have been one of the genre’s greatest drummers. One of the early practitioners of bebop, Roach made his mark playing behind some of popular music’s greatest musicians. That list includes Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus and Sonny Rollins. Throughout a recording career that spanned nearly 60 years, Roach performed on over 100 albums, either as a sideman or leader. Of those albums, 1962’s Money Jungle with Mingus and Ellington has been called the greatest trio album ever recorded. Off the stage, Roach was an civil rights activist. He passed away at the age of natural causes at the age of 83.