Max Roach records in Hackensack, N.J., in 1955. Mosaic Images/Corbis
Drummer and ex-Cream member Ginger Baker, 74, will tour the U.S. starting Saturday night with his quartet, Jazz Confusion. His album "Why?" comes out June 24. He spoke with reporter Marc Myers.
Ginger Baker
All of the guys in my gang in the early 1950s listened to jazz. I was 14 then, and every day after school we'd go to a record store in Eltham in South East London. Back then they'd let you listen to the latest records in soundproof booths. One day I was going through new albums and came across "Quintet of the Year." That record changed me, particularly the song "A Night in Tunisia."
"Quintet of the Year" was recorded at Massey Hall in Toronto [in May 1953]. In America, you know the album as "Jazz at Massey Hall." The quintet was a superband with Charlie Parker on alto sax, Dizzy Gillespie on trumpet, Bud Powell on piano, Charles Mingus on bass and Max Roach on drums. They were bebop all-stars who had never played together as a unit—and never did after.
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