Drummers, Trios

I'm probably way behind on this, but I recently found out that there's a trio featuring drummers Eric McPherson and Nasheet Waits (the other member is Abraham Burton on tenor).   As it happens, these are also the drummers on two new piano trio albums that I've been listening to a lot lately, Fred Hersch's Whirl (McPherson) and Jason Moran's Ten (Waits).  Whirl and Ten really showcase Hersch and Moran's strengths, with major, distinctive, and highly collaborative contributions from McPherson and Waits.  Both of these albums would be excellent "start here" recommendations for new listeners, which is saying something considering that both Hersch and Moran have extensive catalogs (especially Hersch, who, as far as I can tell, has put out close to 30 discs as a leader).  If you hadn't heard a note of their music, these new albums would give you a pretty clear idea of what these guys are about.

Bonus Links
Waits gives an insightful tour through the Max Roach discography, along with some personal reminiscences, here.  Unless you are some kind of world-class percussion master or scholar, you will learn some things about drums reading this.  After I read it, I was inspired to pick up a couple of Max Roach albums from a vendor at the Brooklyn Flea on Saturday, The Max Roach 4 Plays Charlie Parker and The Many Sides of Max Roach.  They were from a cheap, not attractively packaged, reissue series, but they sound OK and the music is definitely more than OK.  Many Sides is perhaps the more interesting recording.  There's no way for Max Roach Plays Charlie Parker to improve on Max Roach playing with Charlie Parker (even with Kenny Dorham on the session); Many Sides has Booker Little on trumpet and a nicely eclectic group of compositions, including tunes by Bill (father of Spike, bassist on Bringing It All Back Home) Lee, a young Muhal Richard Abrams (so young that he's referred to as just Richard Abrams on the sleeve), and Consuela (aunt of Spike) Lee Morehead.