If you don’t know who Gene Krupa is/was then please bookmark this page and come back after you look him up. Any drummer who does not know about Gene Krupa, is missing out on one of the best who ever lived.

This page is dedicated to every drummer in the world, in honor of the late Gene Krupa. - chipritter.com

The Drummer's View - GENE KRUPA

An Exclusive Interview with Shawn Martin and Phil Dossick

This page contains information about GENE KRUPA!

    Our favorite Gene Krupa Tribute site is www.drummerman.net , but there are MANY places online where you can learn about who Gene Krupa was, and what he did for drummers around the world. Please look him up and find out who he was before reading on! If you do that first, this interview will make much more sense to you when you come back.

The Gene Krupa Drummer’s View Interview

Part ONE with Shawn Martin

Founder of the Gene Krupa Tribute website “America’s Ace Drummer Man Gene Krupa” www.drummerman.net

CR- Hey Shawn thanks for doing this interview, Your site  "America's Ace Drummer Man Gene Krupa" www.drummerman.net has been an invaluable reference tool for me personally for many years. How did you come about the idea of making a Gene Krupa Tribute site?

SM- Thanks Chip!  Even though I'm relatively young and grew up during the time of Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, Rush, and other hard rock bands, Gene was the guy who made me want to become a drummer.  I first got online around 1996 and started teaching myself html coding.  Once I learned a little bit, and decided to try my hand at putting together a website, it just made sense to devote one to Gene.  At the time, there were no sites that were dedicated solely to him.  I thought that it could possibly be of some value and never dreamed that it would still be up and running 7 years later.  I've made many friends through the website. I don't pretend to be an expert at building websites and would certainly like to make improvements. These days I don't have much time to spend working on it, so it's been largely unchanged for a year or two.  Hopefully, someday, I'll have more time to add to it.

CR- Did you ever get to see Gene Krupa play live?
SM- Unfortunately no. Gene died when I was 3 years old.  I've always been sort of an oddball when it comes to some aspects of culture and other people in my age
bracket.  When everyone else was listening to disco, I was immersed in rockabilly and early rock (Buddy Holly, Eddie Cochran...) By the time I was 12, I was totally infatuated with the Big Bands...Benny Goodman, Woody Herman, Charlie Barnet etc.  I then started into bebop, cool jazz, "mainstream" jazz...  I'm also heavily into instrumental surf guitar bands.  In the end, when it comes to drums, I always gravitate back to Gene Krupa.

CR- Krupa and Buddy Rich had drum battles in the past, wild concerts etc,
yet they remained close personal friends. Can you explain this to younger
drummers out there that may not understand what a real drum battle is?

SM- When Gene & Buddy were both playing in the Jazz at the Philharmonic concerts, Gene's small groups and his solos were a huge attraction.  I think Buddy was known more in musician circles at this time (circa 1952) than he was among the general public.  The first drum  battles between the two of them were apparently never recorded.  The famous "Drum Battle" was basically a set of tradeoffs between Gene & Buddy that built up to the two of them playing together into a grand finale.  The early battles weren't as much of a cutting contest as they became later on.  Gene, Buddy, Louie Bellson, and other drummers in the JATP shows often had battles with each other, depending on whomever happened to be scheduled together at a particular show. 

Unfortunately, very few of these exist for us to hear today.

CR- Any uncommon facts about Krupa that we can share here that are not
listed on your site?

SM- Wow, that's a tough one.  It's been so long since I put some sections of
the website together, I'm not sure what all is up there!  A lot of people don't know how bad of shape Gene was really in, during the last recordings and videos that we've heard and seen of him.  I've been told from people in the know that Gene often had to be helped on & off of his drum throne, even though he was able to play his butt off during the shows.  He was having blood transfusions and was in constant pain, but you'd never know it when you heard him play.

CR- How long have you been playing drums?
SM- I got my first set when I was a freshman in high school, so it's been about 20 years.
CR- What bands or groups do you perform with?
SM- I've honestly been out of the band scene for several years.  With work and other interests (I've been teaching myself guitar), I haven't been active in bands for quite a while.  I still practice and play when I have time.  Hopefully, one of these days, I'll get back in the swing again!

CR- What is the best advice you can give to a younger drummerwho is learning the drum set instrument today?

SM- I can tell anyone playing drums to listen to anything and everything you can.  There are so many musicians that have tunnel-vision and only listen to stuff that they are interested in.  If you're mainly into hard rock, you can learn just as much by listening to a country drummer, or tympani player in a symphony. You will discover that you'll like types of music you'd never dreamed you would, and that way you'll learn
something about music & drumming at the same time.

CR- Shawn what is your favorite Video/DVD performance of Gene Krupa, and why?
SM- The Benny Goodman Orchestra segments from the Big Broadcast of 1937 are
still the quintessential Krupa clips.  It's before he'd really developed his style, but his
enthusiasm and power during "Sing, Sing, Sing" still gives me goosebumps every time I watch it.

CR- Thank you for your time Shawn!
SM- No problem at all and thanks for helping to keep Gene's legacy alive!

CR- It’s all you Shawn, you are why we were able to do this interview, so thank YOU!

Scroll Down for Part TWO - with a private student of Gene's - Phil Dossick!

The Drummer’s View Interview - Gene Krupa

PART TWO with Phil Dossick - former student of the late Gene Krupa.

(Phil Dossick took one on one drum lessons with Gene Krupa)

CR- Hi Phil! Thank you so much for doing this interview.
PD- Sure
CR- When did you first hear of / meet Gene Krupa?
PD- Well when I was maybe 11 or 12 I used to listen to Symphony Sid's jazz show on
late night radio. And one night he happened to play Sing Sing Sing from the Benny Goodman Carnegie Hall Jazz concert.  (Must have been around the time the 1st LP
was released, in the early 50's? And when I heard Krupa's thundering drums,
I almost jumped through the ceiling. I couldn't believe the power, the hypnotic beat, the pure energy coming off that great  band. It was shocking and thrilling at the same time.
I had heard numerous big band recordings, but nothing else could compare. Krupa seemingly had made a pact with the devil -- to be able to reach out and get into sync with our hearts and souls. (Other drummers might have played faster, or with greater
technical bravura, but they never touched us on such a raw, purely emotional level. And to this day, I don't believe anyone ever has.)

How I met Gene was a pure New York story. I loved the drums so much that I
asked around for good teachers. I WAS one lucky s.o.b. to have lived at the right time (teenager in the mid  '50's, in the right location, Queens, New York, with easy access to
Manhattan), to know the people that could make the introductions.)
The late Sammy Spear (bandleader on the Jackie Gleason variety show) owned
a music store on Northern Boulevard in Queens. In addition to selling instruments and sheet music, he had  converted the downstairs into little soundproof
rooms, in which members of his band were giving lessons. Johnny Morris
(Paradiddle Joe) was giving drum lessons there.
He and I hit it off immediately. He appreciated the fact that even though I
was underage, I had gotten my local 802 musicians union card with the help of my best friend Howie Farber's father Irving.
Johnny Morris was a firm believer in mastery of the rudiments. I can honestly say I have never worked so hard, before or since. Practiced hours a day, week in and week out, to the horror of my parents, and to the utter neglect of my school work.
The result was that I became a fairly proficient player after a time.

Anyway, in conversations with Johnny Morris, I told him that I would love
to meet GK, to seek his guidance about whether or not I should devote myself full time to a career in music. He said that would be easy. GK and Cozy Cole had
opened a school for percussion in Manhattan. All I had to do was make a
phone call. Easy for him to say! I dropped the matter for at least a year.

Irving Farber, a working musician, excellent pianist, had been on the
radio, on NBC, in the 30's, as "Tiny Faber" and his Orchestra. His show had alternated at times with Benny Goodman's (as yet unsuccessful) band. And Irving Farber knew countless musicians who were working or had worked with all the great  bandleaders, including Dorsey, Goodman, Krupa, etc. Many of them were working at CBS's Studio 52 (now called the Ed Sullivan Theatre, where David Letterman's show is taped.) The Dorsey Brother's Stage Show, The Jackie Gleason Show, and many others were produced there. Well Irving once mentioned to Howie and I that his friend Harry Terrill, a sax player with Krupa, was now playing with Dorsey,
as was Charlie Shavers, who had recently done several albums with Krupa. Howie and I had visited Studio 52 countless times, to see live TV broadcasts, everything from Russ Columbo's show, Stage Show, Beat The
Clock, the Gleason show, etc. We felt totally at home there. And in those days, the mid 1950's, apparently there was little demand for tickets to tv shows because CBS had uniformed ushers hawking tickets daily out on the street to tourists. So we could always get in, virtually anytime we wanted to, to watch rehearsals, talk to people, and see shows going out live over the network.

This is what finally gave me the courage to climb the long tall stairway up to GK and Cozy's school.  The school was located in a building directly behind Studio 52. And Studio 52 had become almost a "home away from home"
for us. We sure weren't paying attention to our schoolwork! I was by that time a little cocky, and figured, what the hell, if they can
do it, well...you get the idea.

CR- As a student of one of the early masters of the drum set, Can you tell us about your first lesson with Gene?

PD- Sure. It was pure fear. My knees were literally knocking. It was pathetic.
I was a totally dopey nervous wreck. Afraid of being found out for the pathetic wretch I really was. That day I knew nothing. I remembered nothing. I was totally incoherent. Verbally and musically. Truly pathetic. All I think Gene was trying to  establish was what I hoped to gain from our lessons. And all I could say was the equivalent of Jackie Gleason's famous  "Homina homina homina" from
the timeless Quiz Show episode of the Honeymooners. It was the first and last time I was ever so star struck.

CR- What type of person was he in your opinion?
PD- One of the nicest, most decent human beings I have ever met. You will hear
that often, because it's true. But I can tell you that he was one of the most influential people in my life because of his innate kindness. He was all about encouragement. All about enabling others to become the best that they could be. He was a natural coach, a great coach, because he
genuinely wanted you to succeed. The private lessons cost something like $7.00! (remember, this is nearly 50 years ago), and on many an occasion, I just didn't have it, and it was never an issue.
He just let me slide. I think I still owe him a lot of money! But more to the point: he was a remarkable musician in that he truly did not believe he was anything special. He did not have a big ego. In fact, in person, he was self-effacing, almost shy. Nothing at all like the frenzied image that had been cultivated
by the press about him. He was not at all the hard-drinking, hard drugging player that had dogged his image for most of his career. Instead, he was a serious man, extremely thoughtful, who found  great beauty in all music, especially classical, and who took pleasure in continuing his own studies, especially the
tympani, with the most skilled teachers he could find. I still recall with amazement my learning that after my lessons were over, on Fridays, he was leaving the school to go take his own lessons, with Saul Goodman, timpanist with the New York Philharmonic. The master was still learning. Still striving. Still trying to perfect his own playing. Because of his sheer love of learning. It was a lesson I carry with
me today. That life is a journey that can be viewed as an opportunity to
learn and grow, no matter what skills you acquire.

CR- Did he eat any secret drumming food or have nutritional advice for you
as a drummer?

PD- No. In fact I don't think many people paid much attention to nutrition in
those days. We still all thought smoking was good for you! In hindsight, I wish he had taken better care of himself. He actually looked much older than his years, and I always thought the years he spent on the road had taken a terrible toll on him, physically.

CR- Why do you think Gene chose that specific drum set up and placement?
PD- That's easy. It's what he HEARD in his head. He had an acute idea of what
his drums should sound like, and what his solos
should sound like, even when the equipment did not exist yet, and he did
not rest until Slingerland produced drums that most closely resembled the
timbres he was hearing in his imagination. He was able to put it all
together because he was in a position to influence a leading manufacturer to create what in effect was a custom setup for him. Other drummers responded to the
set up immediately, because it just made such perfect sense. It was musically excellent. Not a whole mish-mash of cockamamie cymbals and toms, but a logically perfect, elegant setup, small, compact, complete. Really quite brilliant when you think about it.

CR- Agreed. Phil, What was the coolest thing you ever saw Gene Krupa do with your own eyes?
PD- Play along with parts of Stravinsky's Firebird Suite, and replicate,
perfectly, on his snare, the dominant rhythmic patterns of the piece.
He had clearly been practicing at home for the sheer fun of it. He was not
only a jazz master, but a classical master, and I think it was a great pity that at the time there just weren't the right venues for him to play like this before the public. I think he would have been a natural for the later Boston Pops concerts that featured great
jazz guest artists. But it was just not to be. The times were different then.

CR- When you first saw Gene did you ever think his life would impact so many drummers? Or by then had that already happened?

PD- That had already happened way before I came along. I think he was already a great drum star and public figure by the mid 1930's. His influence was legendary because for the first time, someone had put it all together: the musical; the visual; the
logical solos made up of really the simplest of rudiments. Legendary because he was showing other musicians that they could do it too. His solos were accessible. Not impossible acrobatics to be worshipped. On the contrary. He was showing
not only the audience, but other musicians that the music was to be shared  universally with everyone else. It was a "welcoming" approach to playing. He was sending out the message that he loved this music, and wanted to share it with everyone else. It was completely the opposite of Buddy Rich's approach. Rich, another master, was never welcoming. He was all about showing everyone that he was the fastest, most dazzling player that ever
was, and your role was to watch and worship him. It was ego versus sharing. Consequently everyone respected Buddy Rich, but LOVED Gene Krupa. GK welcomed them to the party. Buddy wanted to BE the party.

CR- Do you know if Gene Krupa knew Louie Prima's drummer? If so were they friends?
PD- I'm sure Prima worked with many drummers. I can't say if GK was friends  with any of them, although it was certainly possible.
CR- Both Buddy and Gene are two of my all time favorite drummers, It has been said that Buddy Rich idolized Gene, and that later the two became great lifelong friends. I have also heard that if it wasn't for Gene Krupa, we would have never had Buddy Rich. Charlie Adams made a point about that too in a recent interview we did, do you agree with that statement?
PD- Absolutely. As I said, Gene was the first to put it all together, combining
the best of the Dixie Land players with the best of the swing players, and all with incredible technical facility and flair. If you listen to very early BR with Artie Shaw, he actually sounds much like GK at that time, actually borrowing countless mannerisms and
techniques. And his drum setup is/was pure Krupa. I've always believed that Buddy entire style developed as a result of GK's influence, and that Buddy's desire to "out-Krupa Krupa" led to his later style. Everyone wanted to be Krupa at that time.

CR- I wish everyone wanted to be Krupa today, or at least I wish everyone knew who he was and what he means to many life long drummers out there. Phil, can you give us any advice to help us improve our drumming? Any basic guidelines or suggestions that may help us with our drumming overall?

PD- Chip I stopped playing as the '60's unfolded. But I do have what I think it pretty good advice, and I definitely learned it from Gene himself, so here it is

“Listen to every single type of music you can. You can learn from everything. Charlie Parker said the same thing. Try to improve yourself as the weeks, months and years go by. Try to really excel at something you enjoy.  Go through life not only with hope, but with PURPOSE.”

 – Phil Dossick – The Drummer’s View 2004 - chipritter.com

CR- Phil thank you so much for being in The Drummer’s View with us!
PD- Thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts!

CR- The pleasure is ours Phil, thank YOU!

Gene Krupa may be gone, but his memory lives on through drummer's and fans like us around the world.

If you have a rare or unreleased picture of Gene Krupa

that you would like added to this page, please let us know! Thank you., Chip - chipritter.com

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thnx Chip