Drummer, pianist, and Woodstock resident Jack DeJohnette, a towering figure and anchor of Woodstock’s enduring artistic legacy who dazzled, inspired, challenged, and delivered creative resolution to audiences across decades, performing with everyone from Miles Davis to Levon Helm, has died. He was 83.
DeJohnette, a recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master Fellowship, the nation’s highest honor for jazz artists, died peacefully at Kingston Hospital in New York on Monday, surrounded by his wife, family, and close friends, according to a post on his official Facebook page.
Saugerties resident Danny Melnick, producer of the Saratoga Jazz Festival in Saratoga Springs, first met DeJohnette in the autumn of 1989. Melnick was in his 20s and working in publicity, marketing, and promotion at New York’s famed Blue Note jazz club.
DeJohnette was booked at the Blue Note several times a year then, usually with his band Jack DeJohnette’s Special Edition. According to Melnick, DeJohnette was gigging hard, typically leading his band six nights a week, two shows a night, with three on Fridays and Saturdays.
Melnick and DeJohnette became friends and colleagues. Melnick booked him multiple times for the Saratoga Jazz Festival and the Newport Jazz Festival. A co-founder of The Local, a music venue in Saugerties, Melnick last booked DeJohnette at Newport in 2017 for a performance celebrating the drummer and pianist’s 75th birthday.
“Jack talked a lot about peace, about togetherness, about community, about unity,” Melnick recalled, as a friend and neighbor. “Jack was a very funny, very low-key, soft-spoken guy. But in conversation with you, he really focused on peace. He was very spiritual. It was really all about being together, whether on the bandstand or in the community.”
Added Melnick: “We’ve lost a beacon.”
In a career of epic musical moments, there is little daylight for disagreeing that DeJohnette’s work with Davis carried celestial thrust with its own special shine and kick and, at times, gravity.
DeJohnette was born in Chicago in 1942. At age 4, he began studying classical piano, first through private lessons and later at the Chicago Conservatory of Music. He took up the drums at 14 when he joined his high school concert band.
By the mid-1960s, DeJohnette had immersed himself in Chicago’s jazz scene as the leader of his own fledgling groups and as a sideman on piano and drums. He performed with the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians and later drummed alongside Rashied Ali in the John Coltrane Quintet.
He joined Miles Davis in 1968, just before the recording of “Bitches Brew,” the landmark jazz album that continues to be studied more than 50 years after its release. According to DeJohnette’s website, Davis wrote in his autobiography that “Jack DeJohnette gave me a deep groove that I just loved to play over.” DeJohnette stayed with Davis for three years and contributed to recordings including “Live-Evil,” “A Tribute to Jack Johnson” and “On the Corner.”
Starting with “The DeJohnette Complex” in 1968, DeJohnette began releasing albums as a bandleader. He followed with “Have You Heard” in 1970, “Sorcery” in 1974, and “Cosmic Chicken” in 1975.
During the mid-1970s, he performed with the Gateway Trio (featuring Dave Holland and John Abercrombie), Directions (with Abercrombie and Alex Foster), and New Directions (with Abercrombie and Eddie Gomez). His group “Special Edition” — which helped launch the careers of David Murray, Arthur Blythe, Chico Freeman, John Purcell and Rufus Reid — remained active into the 1990s.
DeJohnette’s high-profile 1990s projects also included a touring quartet with Holland, Herbie Hancock and Pat Metheny.
In 2005, he launched his own record label, Golden Beams Productions, and in 2007 he partnered with South African singer Sibongile Khumalo. That same year, DeJohnette toured with Bruce Hornsby, Christian McBride, Hancock, Wayne Shorter and Ron Carter.
His album “Peace Time” won a Grammy in 2009 for Best New Age Album. DeJohnette received a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master Fellowship in 2012, and “Skyline” — featuring DeJohnette, Carter and Gonzalo Rubalcaba — won the 2021 Grammy for Best Jazz Instrumental Album.
According to the official website of Miles Davis, DeJohnette was, “one of the most important musicians to help guide Miles into his electric fusion period, and a hugely influential drummer and key member of Miles’ ‘Lost Quintet’ of 1969.”
DeJohnette shared a kinship with Helm, the famed drummer of The Band, and another Grammy-winning Woodstock neighbor.
Helm welcomed DeJohnette to sit in at one of his famed Midnight Ramble house concerts and the two performed side-by-side on separate drum kits.
DeJohnette played a scaled-down kit beside Helm’s full trap set, delivering what is recalled as one of the most electrifying guest performances ever held inside Levon Helm Studios.
“We’ve lost a beacon.”
Danny Melnick
Saxophonist Erik Lawrence, who performed with the second incarnation of The Band and later with the Levon Helm Band, remembered sharing the stage with DeJohnette at one of Helm’s Midnight Rambles.
Lawrence, a musician deeply rooted in jazz, was part of the Levon Helm Band horn section the night DeJohnette sat in at the Ramble on Sept. 20, 2008. Reflecting on that evening, Lawrence was reminded of another memorable performance—when The Band played the 1993 Clinton presidential inauguration’s Blue Jean Bash in Washington.
That show featured several special guests, including Helm’s former bandmate and Woodstock neighbor Bob Dylan. Lawrence said he could still picture Helm’s expression that night, one that captured his generous spirit and lifelong musical bonds.
“I’ve seen that boyish grin on Levon’s face twice,” Lawrence said. “The first was when Dylan joined us for the Blue Jean Bash—Dylan and Levon were just like, ‘This is fun.’ The second time was when Jack played the Ramble. Their eyes were locked that whole night. They were just laughing and smiling. Those guys were like kids in a playground. Making music was a very different experience for them compared to us mortals.”
Another example of DeJohnette’s wide reach as a creative genius came some time later, when Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers sat in with Helm and played the very same drum kit, what Helm called his “cocktail kit,’ with the Levon Helm Band.
Smith, during an interview with a journalist conducted moments after the performance ended, was very interested to learn that he had just played a set of drums on which DeJohnette had previously performed.
John W. Barry is a contributing writer for The Overlook. Reach him at reporting@theoverlooknews.com.