...called by The Guardian "one of the 10 best around the world". A link from your world, plugged into the Matrix, will open these magisterial worlds to yours.
Bio:
Henry Cole is a shape-shifting drummer whose versatile, multicultural style positions him at the forefront of a growing wave of jazz innovation and cross-cultural 21st-century rhythms.
A Grammy award winner, master drummer and skilled arranger he draws inspiration from a long line of highly skilled Boricua Pioneers who performed in local, military and jazz bands. His sonic roots – African, Indigenous and European – have been brewing for years and have come together to create a unique, mestizo sound.
A native of Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, Cole started playing the piano at the age of four and fell in love with the drums at the age of nine. The musical romance led to La Escuela de Musica de Mayaguez and the Conservatory de Musica de Puerto Rico.
Initially inspired by Latin percussionists Giovanni Hidalgo and Anthony Carrillo, Cole discovered a passion for Jazz and improvised music while attending Berklee College of Music in Boston. After moving back to Puerto Rico, Cole cultivated a reputation in Old San Juan’s diverse music scene, working with poets, rappers, bomba musicians, pleneros, rockers, and salsa ringleaders.
In the fall of 2003, Cole moved to New York City to attend the prestigious Manhattan School of Music where he received a scholarship to study with drummer, composer John Riley and quickly became one of the most in-demand sidemen.
Henry is an innovative, explosive drummer who takes Jazz to a never-before-explored dimension. Inspired by the album “Fela Ransome-Kuti and the Africa ’70 with Ginger Baker,” (1971) his debut album titled “Roots Before Branches” (2012) drew praise from National Public Radio, who selected it as “One of the Five New Directions in Jazz Evolution,” and living legend Chick Corea, applauded Henry for “beautifully expanding on the traditions he grew up with.”
In 2018 Henry released the single, “El Diablo” from the upcoming album, “Simple” with his new group Villa Locura, where he combines a wide variety of musical influences such as Puerto Rican folklore, funk, R&B, jazz, and Afro-Caribbean rhythms and creates a unique genre that bridges the traditional with the contemporary. He defines Villa Locura as “Raw, Spiritual, Interstellar Puertorican Funk!”
Literally and figuratively, Henry Cole is taking Puerto Rican “sabor” (flavor) to new, unexpected heights. His flexibility, grace and sheer power behind the drum-kit has proven indispensable to some of the world’s most acclaimed jazz groups, including the Grammy-nominated Miguel Zenón Quartet, Grammy Award winner David Sánchez, The Gary Burton Quartet, Quincy Jone’s Global Gumbo, Fabian Almazan Rhizome, The Ben Wendel Quartet, the all-star quartet “90 Miles” featuring Sánchez, Stefon Harris and Nicholas Payton, alto saxophonist Wil Vinson and the pianist Chano Domínguez, a living legend of new flamenco. Also, Henry has recorded and performed with Chambao, Calle13, Residente and Draco Rosa.
A unique musician and spiritualist, Henry takes a holistic approach to his craft. “I practice, exercise, study and try to maintain a healthy. I expose myself to many artists, from Giovanni Hidalgo to Virgil Donati, Zakir Hussein, The Wailers, Camaron, Felix Alduen and Kanye West. I also study the works of Einstein, Newton, Michelangelo, Joseph Campbell, Eric Thomas, Napoleon Hill, Taoism, Kobe Bryant, and the legendary martial artist, Bruce Lee.”
In 2011 Henry’s work with Miguel Zenon was nominated for Best Large Jazz Ensemble. Also, he was awarded the Grammy for the Best Urban Rap Album with Calle 13. In 2017 Miguel Zenon Quartet’s “Tipico” was nominated for Best Latin Jazz Album, and Residente’s self-titled album won the Grammy for Best Latin Rock, Urban or Alternative Music.
Henry Cole teaches private lessons, workshops and master classes around the world. He is an associate professor at Manhattan School Of Music, The New School, Academia Nazionale del Jazz, Sienna, Englesholm Jazz Camp in Denmark and an official Clinician for DW Drums.
Henry Cole’s primary goal is to see music as “One World,” a space beyond styles and reach a broad audience with a message of determination and unity.
These are pathways, originating in the sprawling cultural matrix of Brazil (Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazik, Arab, European, Asian...), integrating cultural matrixes worldwide.
Matrix ground zero is the Recôncavo of Bahia...virtually unknown center of gravity circumscribing Bahia's Bay of All Saints...end of voyage for more enslaved human beings than any other such throughout all of human history...birthplace of some of the most physically & spiritually uplifting music ever made. Many countries are happier than Brazil, but none are more joyous.
"Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix."
—Susan Rogers: Personal recording engineer for Prince, inc. "Purple Rain", "Sign o' the Times", "Around the World in a Day"... Director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory
I'm Pardal here in Brazil (that's "Sparrow" in English). The deep roots of this project are in Manhattan, where Allen Klein (managed the Beatles and The Rolling Stones) called me about royalties for the estate of Sam Cooke... where Jerry Ragovoy (co-wrote Time is On My Side, sung by the Stones; Piece of My Heart, Janis Joplin of course; and Pata Pata, sung by the great Miriam Makeba) called me looking for unpaid royalties... where I did contract and licensing for Carlinhos Brown's participation on Bahia Black with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock...
...where I rescued unpaid royalties for Aretha Franklin (from Atlantic Records), Barbra Streisand (from CBS Records), Led Zeppelin, Mongo Santamaria, Gilberto Gil, Astrud Gilberto, Airto Moreira, Jim Hall, Wah Wah Watson (Melvin Ragin), Ray Barretto, Philip Glass, Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd for his interest in Bob Marley compositions, Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam and others...
...where I worked with Earl "Speedo" Carroll of the Cadillacs (who went from doo-wopping as a kid on Harlem streetcorners to top of the charts to working as a janitor at P.S. 87 in Manhattan without ever losing what it was that made him special in the first place), and with Jake and Zeke Carey of The Flamingos (I Only Have Eyes for You)... stuff like that.
Yeah this is Bob's first record contract, made with Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd of Studio One and co-signed by his aunt because he was under 21. I took it to Black Rock to argue with CBS' lawyers about the royalties they didn't want to pay (they paid).
MATRIX MUSICAL
The Matrix was built below among some of the world's most powerfully moving music, some of it made by people barely known beyond village borders. Or in the case of Sodré, his anthem A MASSA — a paean to Brazil's poor ("our pain is the pain of a timid boy, a calf stepped on...") — having blasted from every radio between the Amazon and Brazil's industrial south, before he was silenced (that's me below left, with David Dye & Kim Junod for U.S. National Public Radio) ... The Matrix started with Sodré, with João do Boi, with Roberto Mendes, with Bule Bule, with Roque Ferreira... music rooted in the sugarcane plantations of Bahia. Hence our logo (a cane cutter).