Ben Riley

Ben Riley ( born July 17, 1933, Savannah, Georgia) is an American jazz drummer.

Riley, who lived in New York City since the age of four, in his high school years was a student of the bandleader Cecil Scott. Since 1953 he was in the U.S. Army, where he was a member of a jazz band. After army service, he worked with many of New York musicians, including Randy Weston, Mary Lou Williams, Sonny Rollins, Woody Herman, Stan Getz, Billy Taylor and Johnny Griffin.

In the 1960s, he was a partner of pianist Thelonious Monk, with whom he completed several tours and albums grossed. He also appeared in this period, with Earl Hines, Andrew Hill, Hank Jones, Barry Harris and Clark Terry. After working as a teacher in a New York school five years, he was the mid-1970s a member of the New York Jazz Quartet and partners of Alice Coltrane. He was also a member of the Ron Carter Quartet, with its members Buster Williams and Kenny Barron he later formed a trio. That was the tenor saxophonist Charlie Rouse, the band Sphere.

After the death of Rouse, the band broke up, Riley continued to work with Barron, besides also with Abdullah Ibrahim, Barney Kessel, Chet Baker, Johnny Griffin and others. He was inducted into the Coastal Jazz Hall of Fame of his birth city of Savannah in 1992.

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