Remembering Tootie Heath

Taos Jazz Bebop Society & the Harwood Museum of Art present

Remembering Tootie Heath

FREE

Taos Jazz Bebop Society will present a free event in celebration of the life and music of the late, great drummer, Tootie Heath. The program will feature a video montage of selected interviews and clips of Tootie performing over the years with members of jazz “royalty”. There will also be a performance by New Mexico jazz elder statesman Pete Amahl, and 17 year old drummer Luca Boyles, who was blessed to be taken under Tootie’s wing and mentored during the last year of Tootie’s life.

Tootie Heath played with so many jazz giants that it would be a short list of those he didn’t perform or record with. He was the drummer on “Coltrane”, John Coltrane’s first recording as a leader. He also played on Nina Simone’s first album, “Little Girl Blue”. The list goes on to include Wes Montgomery, Art Farmer, Cedar Walton, Bobby Timmons, Kenny Drew, Sonny Rollins, Dexter Gordon, Johnny Griffin, Herbie Hancock, among many more. Tootie was also a devoted educator. For more than twenty years he taught at the Stanford Jazz Camp West and numerous mentorship programs. Hundreds of young musicians have benefitted from his expertise. They’ve also been charmed and dazzled by his personality and mischievous sense of humor. In fact, many who knew him said he could have been every bit as successful as a stand up comedian as he was a drummer.