Name/Title
The Drummers (First row) George Wettling and Bud Freeman; (Second row) Jo Jones, Gene Krupa, and Sonny Greer; (Third row) Miff Mole, Zutty Singleton, Red Allen, and Taft Jordan; (Top row) Dickie Wells, Buck Clayton, Benny Golson, Art Farmer, Hilton Jefferson, and Art Blakey, Esquire magazine shoot, Harlem, N.Y.C., c. 1959Description
Title: The Drummers (First row) George Wettling and Bud Freeman; (Second row) Jo Jones, Gene
Krupa, and Sonny Greer; (Third row) Miff Mole, Zutty Singleton, Red Allen, and Taft Jordan; (Top
row) Dickie Wells, Buck Clayton, Benny Golson, Art Farmer, Hilton Jefferson, and Art Blakey, Esquire
magazine shoot, Harlem, N.Y.C., c. 1959
Negative Date: c. 1959
Print Date: 1980-1998 by Robert Asman, Philadelphia
Medium: fiber-based, silver gelatin semi-gloss paper, selenium-toned
Primary Support: unmounted
Dimensions: Image: 13 x 9 inches Paper: 14 x 11 inches
Condition: Excellent
Markings: Verso: Titled, dated, in graphite. Signed in graphite by the photographer, with his signature
‘bass’ mark. Subjects’ identities, in graphite.
Published: Bass Line, page 172
Playing the Changes, page 320 (book jacket) *
Image Exhibited:
Schomburg Center for Research on Black Culture, 1992
Flushing Town Hall, Queens, NY, 1998
Fullerton Museum Center, 2001 Hofstra University, 2002
Dickinson College, 2005
National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, Cinn, OH, 2006
Jacksonville Jazz Festival, FL, 2007 We Always Swing, Columbia, MO, 2006 Jacob Burns Film Center,
2008 Westport Arts Center, CT, 2009
Allen Museum of American Art, Oberlin, OH, 2014
Beck Center for the Arts, Lakewood, OH, 2017
Notes: “The shot I got that day of some of the greatest drummers in jazz is one
of my favorites. Just being able to capture Jo Jones, Gene Krupa, George
Wettling, Zutty Singleton, Sonny Greer, and Art Blakey all together was the
chance of a lifetime.” - “In 1958, Esquire magazine invited practically every living
jazz musician to pose for a picture up in Harlem… I don’t think the Esquire people had any idea about
the importance of the gathering. All they seemed to want was a perfect shot of the whole group posed
on the stoop of a brownstone…“Fortunately, I had enough sense to bring [three cameras]…”