Mickey Hart (born Michael Steven Hartman, September 11, 1943) is an American percussionist. He is best known as one of the two drummers of the rock band Grateful Dead. He was a member of the Grateful Dead from September 1967 until February 1971, and again from October 1974 until their final show in July 1995. He and fellow Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann earned the nickname "the rhythm devils".
Michael Steven Hartman was born in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, New York. He was raised in the nearby suburban community of Inwood, New York by his mother, Leah, a drummer, gown maker and bookkeeper. His father Lenny Hart, a champion rudimental drummer, had abandoned his family when the younger Hart was a toddler. Although Hart (who was hyperactive and not academically inclined) became interested in percussion as a grade school student, his interest intensified after seeing his father's picture in a newsreel documenting the 1939 World's Fair. Shortly thereafter, he discovered a practice pad and a pair of snakewood sticks that belonged to his father. "From the age of ten," he recalled, "all I did was drum."[1]
He attended Lawrence High School in Cedarhurst, New York. Hart would later recall that many champion rudimental drummers attended his high school; this inspired him to ascend to the first chair in the All State Band as a pupil of Arthur Jones, who served as a father figure to him and ensured that he was not suspended for neglecting his other classes.[2][3]
While employed as a soda jerk at El Patio, a jazz club in Atlantic Beach, New York, he was influenced by Tito Puente's regular appearances. A few months out of high school, he discovered the work of Nigerian drummer Babatunde Olatunji, another formative influence.[4] Olatunji later taught and collaborated with Hart.[5]
For three and a half years, he was stationed throughout Europe, where he also claimed to have taught "combative measures" (most notably judo, in which he had attained a black belt) to units of the Strategic Air Command and other units in Europe and Africa. During a tour in Spain, he reportedly sat in with a variety of notable jazz musicians (including Gerry Mulligan and Count Basie) in addition to performing in various ensembles (spanning the gamut from small jazz combos to marching bands) and on recording sessions for local pop stars. Hart would later intimate in a 1972 interview that his Airmen of Note assignment served as a "cover" for his instructive duties.[3] While in the Air Force, he co-founded Joe and the Jaguars (alternatively billed as The Jaguars) with a fellow serviceman, guitarist Joe Bennett.[citation needed] Following his 1965 discharge, Hart briefly returned to the New York metropolitan area, where he filled in for the regular drummer in a "staid fox-trot band" as a member of the local musician's union.[7]
While stationed in southern California, he had discovered that his father (by now employed as a savings and loan association executive in Los Angeles) was still involved in the drumming community as an endorser for Remo. Founder Remo Belli facilitated an introduction before Hart was reassigned to Spain, but the elder Hart soon disappeared. A post-discharge reconciliation attempt (also mediated by Belli) proved to be more successful. Shortly thereafter, father and son established the Hart Music Center in San Carlos, California. In late 1965 or early 1966, Hart performed in an early iteration of William Penn and His Pals prior to Gregg Rolie's membership and the recording of the garage rock classic "Swami." Later in 1966, Hart and Bennett briefly resumed their collaboration before the latter reenlisted for a tour of duty in Vietnam.[citation needed]
By the end of the year, Hart had moved in with Michael Hinton, a student and friend who would accompany him to a Count Basie Orchestra performance at The Fillmore in mid-1967. At the concert, Hart help fulfill Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann's request to meet Basie Orchestra drummer Sonny Payne, leading to an informal tutorial between Hart and Kreutzmann and his eventual introduction to the Grateful Dead.[7]
Career
Hart joined the Grateful Dead in September 1967. His interests in polyrhythmic rudiments and exotic percussion were integral to the band's arrangements in the period that archivist Dick Latvala would subsequently characterize as the "primal Dead era" of 1968–1969. However, he left by mutual agreement in February 1971, extricating himself after his father (who briefly managed the group) embezzled $70,000 from the band.[8] In his 2015 memoir, Kreutzmann divulged that Hart's use of heroin and other "dark drugs" had accelerated in the wake of the embezzlement and impacted his contributions to the group, also contributing to his departure: "Mickey wasn't able to play at the level he was capable of and it was beginning to affect our performances. He was getting really spacey and just getting so far out there that he wasn't able to deliver the music. It became impossible for me to play with him. It wasn't out of anger or meanness, but we had to address it and deal with it. So our brother Mickey left the band and retreated to his ranch in Novato and it really strained our relationship for a while, sad to say."[9]
During his sabbatical, he released the album Rolling Thunder in 1972. Two additional solo albums (including an ambient music project that was envisaged as the soundtrack for The Silent Flute, a screenplay co-written by Bruce Lee, James Coburn and Stirling Silliphant that was ultimately filmed in 1978 as the David Carradine vehicle Circle of Iron) were completed but rejected by Warner Brothers due to the label's increasingly strained relationship with the Grateful Dead.[10] Hart's home recording studio proved to be a haven for the more idiosyncratic endeavors pursued by various band members, and he continued to collaborate with his former bandmates on various projects, most notably Robert Hunter's Tales of the Great Rum Runners (1974) and Ned Lagin's Seastones (1975).[10]
He returned to the Dead for their final pre-hiatus concert in October 1974 and was formally reinstated by the beginning of the group's 1976 tour. He remained with the group until their official dissolution in 1995. Hart's collaboration with the remaining members of the Grateful Dead has continued with The Other Ones, The Dead and Dead & Company.
Alongside his work with the Grateful Dead, Hart has performed as a solo artist, percussionist, and the author of several books. In these endeavors he has pursued a lifelong interest in ethnomusicology and world music.[11]
Hart was influential in recording global musical traditions on the verge of possible extinction, working with archivists and ethnomusicologists at both the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress and the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage at the Smithsonian Institution. He is on the Board of Trustees of the American Folklife Center and has been a spokesperson for the "Save Our Sounds" audio preservation initiative. He also serves on the Library of Congress National Recorded Sound Preservation Board and is known for reissues and other recordings with historical and cultural value.
In 1991, Hart produced the album Planet Drum, which remained at #1 on the Billboard World Music chart for 26 weeks,[12] and received the first ever Grammy Award for Best World Music Album.[13]
Hart has written books on the history and traditions of drumming throughout history. His solo recordings (featuring a variety of guest musicians) are percussive but verge on New Age.
In 2000, Hart became a member of the board of directors of the Institute for Music and Neurologic Function, a nonprofit organization that studies the healing power of music[15] – continuing his investigation into the connection between healing and rhythm, and the neural basis of rhythm. In 2003, he was honored with the organization's Music Has Power Award, recognizing his advocacy and continuous commitment to raising public awareness of the positive effect of music.[16]
Mickey Hart (in background, playing drums) and Bob Weir (playing guitar) performing at the Mid-Atlantic Inaugural Ball during the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama, January 20, 2009Tipper Gore and Mickey Hart playing drums together during a The Dead concert in April 2009
Hart was also a judge for the 3rd annual Independent Music Awards to support independent artists' careers.[17]
After the death of Jerry Garcia and the consequent dissolution of the Grateful Dead in 1995, Hart continued to play music with various groups including members of the Grateful Dead. In the 1996 Furthur Festival, Mickey Hart's Mystery Box played, as did Bob Weir's band, Ratdog.
In 2005, Hart and the members of the band Particle joined to create the Hydra Project.
During 2006, Hart teamed up with fellow Grateful Dead bandmate Bill Kreutzmann, Phish bassist Mike Gordon and former Other Ones lead guitarist Steve Kimock, to form the Rhythm Devils, a nickname that refers to Hart and Kreutzmann's drum duets and improvisation. The band features songs from their respective repertoires as well as new songs written by Jerry Garcia's songwriting companion Robert Hunter. The Rhythm Devils announced their first tour in 2006, which ended at the popular Vegoose festival in Las Vegas, Nevada over the Halloween weekend.
In 2010 Hart debuted "Rhythms of the Universe," a composition based on a variety of astrophysical data. The composition represents a collaboration between scientist and artist, using their own sophisticated tools. Nobel Laureate in physics George Smoot from the University of California, Berkeley, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), and Keith Jackson, a computer scientist and musician also from LBNL, are providing some of the data for the project. The final result will be a "musical history of the universe", from the Big Bang onwards through galaxy and star formation, up until modern times, including images from the Hubble Space Telescope and rhythms derived from the cosmic microwave background radiation, supernovae, quasars, and many other astrophysical phenomena. The work premiered at the conference "Cosmology on the Beach" in Playa del Carmen in January 2010.[20]
The Rhythm Devils did only one show in 2011, at the Gathering of the Vibes Music Festival in Bridgeport, Connecticut. This version of the band was Hart, Kreutzmann, Keller Williams, Sikiru, Steve Kimock and Reed Mathis of Tea Leaf Green on bass.[22]
In 2011 Hart debuted a new version of the Mickey Hart Band.[23] This lineup included Tim Hockenberry (vocals, keyboards, trombone, saxophone, other instruments), Crystal Monee Hall (vocals, guitar, hand percussion), Ben Yonas (keyboards), Gawain Mathews (guitar), Sikiru Adepoju (talking drum, djembe, shakers), Ian "Inkx" Herman (drums), Greg Ellis (percussion), Vir McCoy (bass). The band played a few shows in August 2011 on the east and west coasts of the United States. In November and December 2011, the Mickey Hart Band did a 17-date tour with a slightly modified lineup. McCoy and Ellis were not in this lineup, and Widespread Panic band member Dave Schools joined the band as their bass player for the tour.[24][25]
In August 2013, the Mickey Hart Band embarked upon a tour with the Tea Leaf Trio, which includes three members of the band Tea Leaf Green, in support of the band's album Superorganism.[27]
On September 29, 2013, the completed version of his and George Smoot's film Rhythms of the Universe premiered at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.[28]
In the summer of 2015, the surviving members of the Grateful Dead (Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart), joined by Trey Anastasio, Bruce Hornsby and Jeff Chimenti, performed a series of concerts to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Grateful Dead. The performances took place at Santa Clara's Levi Stadium on June 27 and 28, 2015 and Chicago's Soldier Field on July 3, 4 and 5, 2015. These performances marked the first time Weir, Lesh, Kreutzmann and Hart performed together since the Dead's 2009 tour and was publicized as the final time the musicians will all perform together.[29]
Also in 2015, Hart began touring with Dead & Company, a band consisting of former Grateful Dead members Weir, Hart and Kreutzmann, along with John Mayer (guitar), Oteil Burbridge (bass), and Jeff Chimenti (keyboards). The band began touring in late 2015 and have conducted multiple tours since then. In 2017, he released RAMU, which featured contributions from both his long-time collaborators Steve Kimock and Sikiru Adepoju as well as Avey Tare and Tank Ball, among others.[30]
Hart has been married since 1990 to lawyer, environmental activist and former Sonoma County (California) Regional Parks Director Caryl Ohrbach Hart, with whom he has a daughter Reya. Hart also has a son Taro (born January 13, 1983) from his previous marriage to Mary Holloway.[33] He had Taro's heartbeat recorded in utero and used as the basis for the album Music to Be Born By. He lives in Occidental, California.[34] Hart is the only Jewish member of the Grateful Dead.[35][36]
Works
Audiobooks
Aladdin and the Magic Lamp. Rabbit Ears Entertainment LLC. 1994.[37]
↑ Kreutzmann, Bill; Eisen, Benjy (2015). Deal: My Three Decades of Drumming, Dreams, and Drugs with the Grateful Dead. New York: S. Martin's Press. p.152. ISBN978-1-250-03379-6.
↑ Cohen, Debra Nussbaum (March 22, 1996). "Jews mythologize Grateful Dead seder". Jweekly.com. San Francisco Jewish Community Publications Inc. Retrieved April 6, 2015.
Ustad Zakir Hussain is an Indian tabla player, composer, percussionist, music producer and film actor. He is the eldest son of tabla player Alla Rakha. He is widely considered as one of the greatest tabla players of all time.
William Kreutzmann Jr. is an American drummer and founding member of the rock band Grateful Dead. He played with the band for its entire thirty-year career, usually alongside fellow drummer Mickey Hart, and has continued to perform with former members of the Grateful Dead in various lineups, and with his own bands BK3, 7 Walkers and Billy & the Kids.
Sikiru Adepoju is a Nigerian percussionist and recording artist, primarily in the genres of traditional African music and world music. He plays a variety of instruments and styles.
The Rhythm Devils is a percussion-based rock band led by former Grateful Dead drummers Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart.
The Strange Remain is a live album by the rock band the Other Ones. It was recorded live on the Furthur Festival tour in 1998 and released in 1999. The album reached number one on Billboard's Top Heatseekers chart and number 112 on the Billboard 200.
Reed Mathis is a bassist, producer, singer, and guitarist who is best known for his 15-year stint as co-leader of the Tulsa progressive jazz band Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey. The Bay Area rooted player has also notably worked with Grateful Dead members Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann. He played with Steve Kimock Band, and is a former member of Tea Leaf Green.
Planet Drum is a world music album by Mickey Hart, a musician and musicologist who was a member of the rock band the Grateful Dead.
The Rhythm Devils Concert Experience is a 2008 two-disc DVD concert film and documentary of the Rhythm Devils 2006 tour, featuring members of the Grateful Dead, Phish, The Other Ones, and Deep Banana Blackout. The name "Rhythm Devils" was originally a nickname for Dead drummers Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann. Hart and Kreutzmann formed the band in 2006 and used the name as the group's moniker.
The Grateful Dead were an American rock band known for their lengthy, partially improvised performances, as well as for a loyal fan base who often followed the band for several shows or entire tours. They disbanded in 1995, following the death of de facto bandleader Jerry Garcia. Since then remaining members have reunited for a number of concert tours and one-off performances, often in very different configurations. The following is a list of instances where former Grateful Dead members have reunited.
Mysterium Tremendum is an album by the Mickey Hart Band, a musical group led by former Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart. It was released by 360° Productions on April 10, 2012.
Global Drum Project is an album by Mickey Hart, Zakir Hussain, Sikiru Adepoju, and Giovanni Hidalgo. It was released by Shout! Factory on October 2, 2007.
Supralingua is an album by former Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart and his percussion ensemble Planet Drum. It was released on CD by Rykodisc Records on August 4, 1998.
The Apocalypse Now Sessions is an album by the Rhythm Devils. Subtitled The Rhythm Devils Play River Music, and sometimes referred to by that name, it contains music that was recorded for the soundtrack of the film Apocalypse Now. It was released by Passport Records as a vinyl LP in 1980. It was remastered and released on CD in somewhat expanded form by Rykodisc Records in 1990.
The Best of Mickey Hart: Over the Edge and Back is a retrospective album by Mickey Hart. It was released by Rykodisc Records on April 23, 2002, in two formats — CD, and DVD-Audio. It contains music excerpted from six of Hart's albums – Diga (1976), The Apocalypse Now Sessions (1980), At the Edge (1990), Planet Drum (1991), Mickey Hart's Mystery Box (1996), and Supralingua (1998). It also contains one previously unreleased track.
Mickey Hart's Mystery Box is an album by former Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart. It was released on CD and cassette by Rykodisc Records on June 11, 1996. The album combines Hart's percussion-based world music with the vocal harmonies of the British singing sextet the Mint Juleps. Robert Hunter wrote the lyrics for all the songs.
At the Edge is a percussion-based world music album by Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart. It was released on CD and cassette by Rykodisc Records on September 18, 1990. It was Hart's first album with the multi-national percussion ensemble that would later be called Planet Drum.
Dave's Picks Volume 7 is a three-CD live album by the rock band the Grateful Dead. It contains the complete concert from April 24, 1978, at the Horton Field House, Illinois State University, in Normal, Illinois. It was produced as a limited edition of 13,000 numbered copies, and was released on August 1, 2013.
Superorganism is an album by the Mickey Hart Band, a musical group led by former Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart. It was released by 360° Productions on August 13, 2013.
RAMU is an album by drummer Mickey Hart. It combines traditional drums, electronic percussion, sampled sounds, and vocals. It was released on November 10, 2017.
In the Groove is an album by Planet Drum, a percussion-based world music ensemble led by Mickey Hart, Zakir Hussain, Sikiru Adepoju, and Giovanni Hidalgo. It was released on August 5, 2022.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
