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Arts & Entertainment

Steely Dan Drummer Keith Carlock Connects With Fans

Drummer-heavy crowd of 150 attended area studio's first drum clinic.

Keith Carlock is a giant in the music industry, but on Wednesday night at , he played the drums like a high school kid in his basement.

The Steely Dan drummer, dressed in a plain green tee-shirt, jeans and Converse All Stars entertained a mesmerized drummer-heavy crowd of about 150 at the SBM Charitable Foundation Auditorium.

Carlock, who was introduced by his high former roommate at North Texas University, Jay Wood, performed a 20-minute solo to start the show before playing along with several tracks. He followed by a tour of the equipment explanation of the sounds he extracted from them.

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Carlock, who plays Gretch drums with Remo heads, Vic Firth sticks and Zildjian cymbals, has toured with industry heavies such as Sting, John Mayer and Faith Hill, but enjoyed the freedom of playing without a script in front of a small and attentive audience. He let the tension off the bass drum to give it an “open, old school sound, huge sound - I like the drums to ring out as much as possible,” Carlock said.

The show, sponsored by in cooperation with Drum Village and Manchester Community College was Carlock’s first Connecticut clinic and the first drum clinic put on by the diverse Main Street music school.

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“I was thrilled the way the whole thing turned out,” Summit Studio’s Tom Deffenbaugh said. “It’s a perfect example of the community college working with us and helping to make that night happen. It was really refreshing for me to meet somebody like Keith, who has performed on all of the big stages and the big names he has played with, as such the nicest, most simple, easy to talk to person you can imagine.”

Carlock, 40, related well with his audience, carefully explained how he developed drum parts in a casual, easy to understand way.

“I was keeping eight-bar phrases and didn’t really know where I was going,” Carlock told the audience after playing a track that featured guitar work by Oz Noy. “I just went into a repetitive thing and let it develop into a story. It’s always a fun challenge to find new grooves.”

“He was practical,” Deffenbaugh said. “He wasn’t playing 5/4 in his right foot and 7/8 in his right foot. What he was talking about is what 99 percent of us are playing anyway.”

The New York and Nashville based drummer held a casual question and answer session, emphasizing that there is no right or wrong way of playing and advising players “young, old and medium” to learn how to keep time first, then to go out and find their own voice. He mentioned his influences – Keith Moon, Mitch Mitchell, John Bohnham, Tony Williams among others – but said that he had been playing in bands since he was 10 years old and tried to create his own sound from the beginning.

“I was pretty blown away by how it all came together,” said Wood, who is a drum instructor at Summit Studios and plays in several area bands including Brothers of the Low End and The Gaslight Arkestra. “I don’t think it could have gone any better as far as the room, the sound, the drums. And Keith really brought it.”

Carlock will appear at Infinity Hall with the Oz Noy Trio on June 1 at 8 p.m. and will tour Europe with Rudder in July.

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