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My conversation with Jack DeJohnette didn’t begin smoothly. It was the summer of 2000, as DeJohnette had come to London for a series of concerts with Keith Jarrett’s Standards Trio. Labeling him in my initial question as a “drummer” seemed logical, but DeJohnette didn’t appreciate being pigeonholed and responded sharply: “I’m a complete musician.” Shortly after, sitting in the Royal Festival Hall watching the Standards Trio, an instance of pure enchantment thrilled me as Jarrett sustained a long sequence of repeated notes high on the piano and DeJohnette powered the music forwards with a complex percussion display as harmonically searching as anything Jarrett had played. Truly a multifaceted artist.

“The idea of improvisation,” DeJohnette told me, “is linked to the very essence of being. We don’t anticipate life unfolding without changing and we never know what lies ahead – why should music be any different?”

He went on to clarify that each part of his drum kit he considered to be a musical being “with its own identity.” He crafted and adjusted his cymbals according to his personal standards. Combine the tones of cymbals with the drums and then “you think harmonically on the kit,” he noted. The auditory ideas inside DeJohnette’s head were never limited by the traditional rules of percussion. He was also a pianist of significant talent – who issued a solo piano album, Return, in 2016 – and every facet of his musicianship was consistently evident all of the time, until his passing at the age of 83.

A Unique Life-Force in Artistic Performance

Many drummers tune their kit to a bespoke design, but DeJohnette’s playing radiated a vitality that was entirely his own. To hear him play on “What I Say” from Miles Davis’s album Live-Evil is to marvel at apparently superhuman drive as he sustained a powerful funk/rock beat for 20 minutes. DeJohnette, who additionally performed on Davis’s epoch-defining Bitches Brew, had by 1970 emerged as Davis’s preferred percussionist in a meeting of mighty musical minds. His drums rooted What I Say deep in the Earth and allowed Davis, and subsequently saxophonist Wayne Shorter, all the space they needed to experiment, while DeJohnette packed his playing with complex percussive interjections – keeping a continual discussion with the other musicians.

Early Innovations and Artistic Independence

His own 1968 debut album, The DeJohnette Complex, immediately proposed that his was a voice intimately connected with a jazz scene rapidly diversifying around him, while he remained doggedly independent. The pieces DeJohnette created for his album were harmonically ornate and asserted jazz/rock energy while also occasionally leaning towards free-form improvisation. He featured himself playing a wind instrument, and his folky melodic inventions took flight.

The DeJohnette Complex revealed that DeJohnette’s aesthetic was indeed delightfully complex and, after leaving Davis, he was signed to ECM Records. In 1976 he issued Untitled, a energetic five-piece record, but also Pictures in which he performed on multiple instruments, and collaborated on several pieces with guitarist John Abercrombie, an album that was minimalist and stripped-down in contrast to Untitled.

Landmark Collaborations and Key Albums

His 1981 ECM album with saxophonist John Surman, The Amazing Adventures of Simon Simon, emerged as a pivotal point for both musicians, and a highly regarded work too. Surman and DeJohnette played their usual instruments while also doubling on keyboards and synthesisers, subsuming their own identities inside richly arranged compositions of pastoral tones. A further critical record was Oneness, recorded in 1997, which presented expansive forms with pieces such as “Free Above Sea” and “Priestesses of the Mist,” their titles reflecting the primal energy unleashed by the music. Hearing that work around the time of its release, I was reminded of an previous experience with DeJohnette, when I listened to his band Special Edition play in Leeds during the late 1980s. This performance was in no hurry to stake out its terrain, as atmospheric, gradual developments slowly condensed towards rhythmic blows.

Reflective Thoughts on Music and Life

Conversing with DeJohnette much later, these ideas of pushing structural boundaries became clearer. He explained that he loved playing those funk figurations with Davis because “I could immerse in rhythms and allow them to envelop me,” but also mentioned his aim to create broader auditory landscapes, always unrestricted and therefore beneficial for the mind. He cited the “safe confines” of pop music with its recurring motifs. “With improvisation, though,” he said, “you’re open to a complete spectrum of options. Individuals have the ability for very creative yet often only access their potential during crises. But if people were more aware of our place within nature, ceased harming the planet and put things back into it, we would have a healthier environment and society.”

Undoubtedly DeJohnette heard his music as reflecting those utopian goals. “Art is the spiritual equivalent of that purification, which is transmitted as vitality – and all artists must tap into that source.”