TOM COHEN
Genres: Post Bop, Latin Jazz, Hard Bop, 21st Century Modern • United States

Tom Cohen was born on May 7, 1954 in Newark, New Jersey. He started playing drums in third grade and also briefly played violin—too briefly for his “heartbroken” instructor Judith Eisner, principal violinist in the New Jersey Symphony, who saw promise in his playing. For his tenth birthday, his mother took him to hear the Dave Brubeck Quartet, whose classic album Take Five he had “worn out,” at the American Shakespeare Theater in Connecticut. Meeting Brubeck’s great drummer Joe Morello after the show only added to his love of the music, with its odd time signatures. From a young age, Cohen made tapes of himself practicing and playing along with various albums including ones by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. He dragged his reel-to-reel recorder to high school gigs to tape his fusion band. “It’s pretty amazing listening to those tapes,” he says. “You can really see read more...