Ralph MacDonald
Ralph MacDonald ( born March 15, 1944 in New York City; † December 18, 2011 in Stamford, Connecticut) was an American drummer and composer.
Life
MacDonald was born in 1944 in New York's Harlem, the son of originating from Trinidad Calypso musician Patrick MacDonald, who was known by the pen name Macbeth the Great. Therefore, Ralph MacDonald came as a child with Caribbean music in touch. From his uncle Boug he learned playing the Conga. At fourteen he began playing steel drums in a band of a Harlem youth clubs.
After he had received as a teenager by a friend Contact the band by Harry Belafonte and was at their samples often present, he finally got the chance to prove his skills by the disease-related loss of a Drummer. Thus began a ten-year commitment to Belafonte, which brought him together with arranger and conductor William Eaton and bassist William Salter. In 1966, he composed for the tracks on the album Belafonte Calypso Carnival, where he resorted to some extent on material that his father had already been used. At the age of 27 years founded Ralph MacDonald, William Salter and William Eaton with together the music publishing Antisia Music. Nearly two years later, Roberta Flack took on written by him and Salter piece Where Is the Love, the ten million -selling recordings gave the publisher the final breakthrough.
Later, MacDonald worked with musicians such as James Taylor and Carly Simon ( " Mockingbird " ), Billy Joel, Bette Midler, Diana Ross and Paul Simon, in the field of jazz with Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Ron Carter, Paul Desmond, Randy and Michael Brecker, David Sanborn and Grover Washington Jr. together.
For the 1979 Grammy-winning soundtrack to the film Saturday Night Fever as he steered self -producing artists at the track Calypso Breakdown. In 1982, he won a Grammy as a composer for the hit song Just the Two of Us by Grover Washington, Jr. and Bill Withers.
Ralph MacDonald came to the end of the 2000s as a musician and released new albums, most recently in 2008 Mixty Motions. He died in December 2011 of lung cancer.
In an interview with the UK's The Times MacDonald said he had never regretted to have remained relatively unknown despite its merits: " I do not want to be a superstar. Above all, I'm a musician first. "
Disco Graphical Notes
- Sound of a Drum ( LDC, 1976)
- The Path ( Marlin Records, 1978) with Michael Brecker, David Sanborn, Bob James
- Surprize! ( Polygram Records, 1985), among others with Marcus Miller and Eric Gale