Rudy Collins

Nearly four decades of active service to the jazz community from the vantage point of the drum throne is the legacy of Rudy Collins. He is present on approximatly 100 different jazz records originally recorded between the early '50s and the early '80s, covering a stylistic range comfortable to both New Orleans jazz trumpeter Hot Lips Page and avant garde pianist Cecil Taylor. Those are probably not the affiliations that brought Collins before the widest audiences, though: that was the reward of stints with bebop trumpet maestro Dizzy Gillespie and Latin jazz flute tickler Herbie Mann. All told, it would be difficult to thumb through a jazz record pile of any size without coming across sides featuring Collins on drums.
He started out in music studying trombone in high school and prior to graduating also began drums at a community music school. Beginning in 1953 he studied for four years with Sam Ulano but he had already made his professional gig debut on the New York City club scene. Hirings by big name jazzmen began with trumpeters who shared a liking for fat, solid swing beats, the previously mentioned Page and the more lyrically expressive Cootie Williams. From 1953 through 1956 he was in the combo of pianist
Eddie Bonnemere, who favored drummers who used brushes. Other '50s settings considered of vital importance for Collins by critic Leonard Feather in his Encyclopedia of Jazz include a run with guitarist Johnny Smith at the Birdland club, another with trumpeter Roy Eldridge at Bohemia and a show-stopping set with trombonists Jay Jay Johnson and Kai Winding at the Newport Jazz Festival.
In the late '50s Collins was making music with both the new free jazz camp and leaders with
more commercial interests. He became one of Mann's men in 1959, just in time for a major African tour.
Collins was one of a series of strong musicians Mann hired as he toyed with different combinations of Latin, jazz, funk and rhythm and blues. The drummer came to be considered one of the first true
fusion jazz players due to this sort of affiliation, while also holding down gigs with strictly mainstream jazz performers including demanding vocalist Carmen McRae. No matter what kind of music he plays, Collins' reference point, stroke by stroke, is intricate bebop mastery influenced by legends such as Philly Joe Jones, Max Roach and Charlie Persip. Collins favors a dry, tight snare drum tuning which combined with certain rimshots can sound like a brick being tossed through a closed window. He made his last recordings in 1981 and died seven years later. ~ Eugene Chadbourne