Birth name Earl Cyril Palmer Name Earl Palmer Role Drummer | Movies War Crimes Instruments Drums | |
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Born October 25, 1924New Orleans, LouisianaUnited States ( 1924-10-25 ) Died September 19, 2008, Los Angeles, California, United States Albums Drumsville, What'd I Say Similar People Hal Blaine, Plas Johnson, Rene Hall, Tommy Tedesco, Carol Kaye |
Earl palmer bio the most recorded drummer in history with mitch woods
Earl Cyril Palmer (October 25, 1924 – September 19, 2008) was an American rock-and-roll and rhythm-and-blues drummer. He is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Contents
- Earl palmer bio the most recorded drummer in history with mitch woods
- Steve maxwell vintage drums earl palmer s custom made 3x13 blaemire snare drum 10 07 13
- Biography
- Personal life
- Quotations
- Awards
- As leader
- As sideman
- Film scores
- Television scores
- References

Palmer played on many recordings, including Little Richard's first several albums and many other well-known rock-and-roll records. According to one obituary, "his list of credits read like a Who's Who of American popular music of the last 60 years."

Steve maxwell vintage drums earl palmer s custom made 3x13 blaemire snare drum 10 07 13
Biography

Born into a show-business family in New Orleans and raised in the Tremé district, Palmer started his career at five as a tap dancer, joining his mother and aunt on the black vaudeville circuit in its twilight and touring the country extensively with Ida Cox's Darktown Scandals Review. His father is thought to have been the local pianist and bandleader Walter "Fats" Pichon.
Palmer was 12 when he headlined a floor show at the Rhythm Club in New Orleans, "a very beautiful spot where one can enjoy a floor show, headed by Alvin Howey and Little Earl Palmer."
Palmer served in the United States Army during World War II and was posted in the European theatre. His biographer wrote,
Most Negro recruits were assigned to noncombatant service troops: work gangs in uniform. "They didn't want no niggers carrying guns," says Earl; they carried shovels and garbage cans instead. Earl's job, loading and handling ammunition, was relatively technical, but his duty was clear: to serve white infantrymen.
After the war ended Palmer studied piano and percussion at the Gruenwald School of Music in New Orleans, where he also learned to read music. He started drumming with the Dave Bartholomew Band in the late 1940s. Palmer was known for playing on New Orleans recording sessions, including Fats Domino's "The Fat Man" and "I'm Walkin" (and several more of Domino's hits), "Tipitina" by Professor Longhair, "Tutti Frutti" by Little Richard (and most of Richard's hits), "Lawdy Miss Clawdy" by Lloyd Price, and "I Hear You Knockin'" by Smiley Lewis.
His playing on "The Fat Man" featured the backbeat that has come to be the most important element in rock and roll. Palmer said, "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." Reportedly, he was the first to use the word funky, to explain to other musicians that their music should be made more syncopated and danceable.
Palmer left New Orleans for Hollywood in 1957, initially working for Aladdin Records. He soon started working with the Wrecking Crew, a loose-knit group of session musicians who recorded nonstop during their heyday from 1962 to 1968.
The musicians union tracked Palmer playing on 450 dates in 1967 alone.
For more than 30 years he played drums on the soundtracks of many movies and television shows. Amongst the many artists he worked with were Frank Sinatra, Phil Spector, Ricky Nelson, Bobby Vee, Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, Eddie Cochran, Ritchie Valens, Bobby Day, Don and Dewey, Jan and Dean, the Beach Boys, Larry Williams, Gene McDaniels, Bobby Darin, Neil Young, the Pets, and B. Bumble and the Stingers. He also played in jazz sessions with David Axelrod, Dizzy Gillespie, Earl Bostic, Onzy Matthews, and Count Basie, and he contributed to blues recordings by B. B. King.
Palmer played drums in a recording session with the West Coast folk singer-songwriter Jim Sullivan around 1969 or 1970. The album was released twice with different audio mixes. On the Monnie Records album, U.F.O., Palmer's drumming can be clearly heard, but on the Century City Record, Jim Sullivan, the drums, percussion and bass were moved back in the mix.
He remained in demand as a drummer throughout the 1970s and 1980s, playing on recordings for albums by Randy Newman, Tom Waits, Bonnie Raitt, Tim Buckley, Little Feat and Elvis Costello.
In 1982, Palmer was elected treasurer of the Local 47 of the American Federation of Musicians. He served until he was defeated in 1984. He was re-elected in 1990.
A biography, Backbeat: Earl Palmer's Story, by Tony Scherman, was published in 1999.
In later years, Palmer played with a jazz trio in Los Angeles.
Palmer died in September 2008, in Banning, California, after a long illness. He is buried at Riverside National Cemetery in Riverside, California.
Personal life
Palmer married four times and had seven children: In addition to his wife Jeline, he is survived by Earl Cyril Palmer, Jr., Donald Alfred Palmer, Ronald Raymond Palmer and Patricia Ann Palmer from his marriage to Catherine Palmer; Shelly Margaret Palmer and Pamela Teresa Palmer from his marriage to Susan Joy Weidenpesch; and Penny Yasuko Palmer from his marriage to Yumiko Makino.
Quotations
Awards
In 2000, Palmer became one of the first session musicians to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
As leader
As sideman
Film scores
Palmer was the session drummer for a number of film scores, including:
1961
Judgement at Nuremberg, score by Ernest Gold1963
Hud, score by Elmer BernsteinIt's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, score by Ernest Gold1964
Baby the Rain Must Fall, score by Elmer BernsteinRide the Wild Surf score by Stu PhillipsRobin and the Seven Hoods, score by Nelson Riddle1965
Boeing Boeing, score by Neal HeftiHarlow, score by Neal HeftiHow to Stuff a Wild Bikini, score by Les BaxterA Patch of Blue, score by Jerry Goldsmith1967
Pretty Polly, score by Michel LegrandCool Hand Luke, score by Lalo SchifrinIn the Heat of the Night, score by Quincy Jones1968
A Dandy in Aspic, score by Quincy JonesTelevision scores
Palmer was also the session drummer for a number of television show themes and soundtracks, including: