Donald Dean

Donald Wesley Dean ( born June 21, 1937 in Kansas City, Missouri) is an American drummer of modern jazz.

Life and work

Dean grew up in Kansas City; from 1961 he worked as a professional musician in Los Angeles, where he played with Kenny Dorham. In the 1960s he also worked with Ray Crawford, Andrew Hill, Carmell Jones, Dexter Gordon, George Shearing, Harold Land, Yusef Lateef, Ron Carter, Hampton Hawes and Gerald Wilson. From 1968 to 1972 he was a member of the band of Les McCann, with which he in 1969 at the Montreux Jazz Festival has performed ( the recording of the concert was released on the album Swiss Movement by McCann and Eddie Harris). In 1972 he joined in Montreux on with Rahsaan Roland Kirk, and McCann, so I can work until the mid- 1970s with Jimmy Smith and receive ( Blue Smith, Testifyin '). Later he was a member of the octet by Horace Tapscott. In the 1990s he founded the Donald Dean Septet; In 1996 his first album Diversity on the label " Posi - Tone" where musicians such as Bobby Pierce ( piano / organ), Charles Owens (tenor saxophone) and Thurman Green ( trombone) participated. On the Berlin Jazz Festival in 1998, he accompanied Oscar Brown Jr. and Pee Wee Ellis; In the same year he was involved with Tapscott at the birthday party of Freddie Hubbard in Leimert Park. He also toured in 1999 with Luluk Purwanto with which he recorded in 1992 and 1994, through Europe and then worked with pianist Phil Wright and guitarist Tomas Janzon.

His extensive photo collection and recording is a basis of the collections of the Los Angeles Jazz Institute.

Swell

• Richard Cook, Brian Morton: The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings. 8th edition. Penguin, London 2006, ISBN 0-14-102327-9.