Gerry Hemingway
b. 23 March 1955, New Haven, Connecticut, USA. Hemingway comes from a musical family—his grandmother was a concert pianist, his father studied composition with Paul Hindemith—and he was attracted to the drums ‘from the first’. A rock fan as a teenager, he was later seduced by the jazz he heard in New York's nightclubs and, back in New Haven, began to play with Anthony Davis and George Lewis, both studying at nearby Yale, and Leo Smith, who had recently settled in the area. Hemingway attended the Berklee College Of Music but hated it, dropping out after one semester. Returning to New Haven, he formed a group, Advent, which later turned into the Anthony Davis Quartet (with Davis, Hemingway, Mark Helias and Jay Hoggard). He studied privately with Alan Dawson, attended classes in Indian and West African drumming at Yale and Wesleyan universities, played a series of solo percussion concerts and also began a long working relationship with Ray Anderson. In the late '70s Hemingway set up his own label, Auricle, released his debut KWAMBEand then OAHSPE, the latter also the name of the trio he formed with Anderson and Helias. In 1980 he toured Europe with Anderson's quartet, recording HARRISBURG HALF LIFE, and in 1981—by now living in New York—released SOLO WORKS, inspired in part by his collaborations with composer/electronic music expert/saxophonist Earl Howard. In 1983 he joined the Anthony Braxton Quartet, of which he remains a member, and has toured and recorded with the group many times, thereby establishing himself on the international stage. Oahspe, renamed on occasion the Ray Anderson Trio and BassDrumBone, continued to perform sporadically and Hemingway has also played with Davis's group Episteme ( UNDINE), with Marilyn Crispell ( CIRCLES, THE KITCHEN CONCERT) and in Reggie Workman's ensemble. By the late '80s he had become well-known in Europe, following a 1985 UK tour with Derek Bailey, frequent concerts in Holland, often with cellist Ernst Reijseger (currently a member of Hemingway's own quintet) and, most recently, his work as a member of German pianist Georg Gräwe's trio ( SONIC FICTION). He has also released three albums of his own music on European labels: one is the solo TUBWORKS, the others quintet sessions ( OUTERBRIDGE CROSSING, SPECIAL DETAIL) which reveal his love of darker sonorities. Back in New York, he works with the recently-formed quartet Tambastics (with Robert Dick, Mark Dresser and Denman Maroney), whose debut recording was released in 1992. Hemingway is expert at coaxing an incredible range of timbrel colours from his kit, even if it means using unorthodox means such as flicking the cymbals with a towel or rolling coins across his snare drum.