The Barabanoff Drum Shop in Queens is pleased to announce that they’ll be hosting a free drum clinic on August 15th at 1:30 PM, run by the most legendary drummer you’ve never heard of before: Davy McConnell.
In the early days of country music and rock n’ roll, drummers were often looked down upon. Up until the 1970s, the Grand Ole Opry didn’t even allow drums on their stage! Nonetheless, many of the musicians from the 1950s loved the sound of drums, so they would hire a drummer and put him in the recording without actually giving him credit. These “ghost drummers” would get producing credits for the songs so that they could collect royalties, but their names would often go unsung. One of the tragically forgotten names from this era was multi-instrumentalist Davy McConnell, one of the great unsung heroes of early rock n’ roll.
Davy was born in Longview, Washington, in 1936, to a family of Dust Bowl migrants. He dropped out of school at the age of 15 so he could work to provide for the family, but quickly grew to despise the working life. So he picked up a guitar and a pair of drumsticks, kissed his parents goodbye, and left the next morning for Tennessee to start a career as a professional musician.
In the conservative world of Nashville country music, Davy’s mixed race (his maternal grandmother was Cherokee) meant that he suffered a large amount of discrimination. He became a session musician at Sun Records, recording for Johnny Cash, Charlie Feathers, Carl Perkins and Elvis Presley, among others. Davy’s work as a drummer earned the attention of promoters, and he was hired to perform for a leg of the fateful “Winter Dance Party tour” of 1959. This venture was cut short, however, when three of the headers for the tour died in a tragic plane crash.
Disillusioned with his work as a session drummer, Davy moved to New York City, where he was involved in the Greenwich Village folk scene. While he recorded a handful of albums during this time, none of them had any commercial success, and Davy instead chose to open a music store in the East Village, which served as a popular stop for musicians, including Kiss, the New York Dolls and the Ramones. Yet in the famed 1977 blackout that hit New York City, Davy’s store was looted, and he was forced to start over again.
Hopping in-between ventures that ranged from dive bars to exotic animal dealerships, Davy has yet to leave New York City. He’s lived in the East Village since 1969, where he’s often found at music clubs mentoring young musicians.
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