Ian Paice

Ian Anderson Paice (born June 29, 1948) made his name as drummer with seminal heavy rock band Deep Purple. As of Jon Lord's departure in 2002, he is the only original member of the band still performing with the group.

It's a fact that the key element underpinning the whole development of heavy rock was the rhythm section and, along with a few others, Ian Paice can lay claim to have been right at the forefront of this movement. It has been said that Deep Purple set new standards for heavy rock bands and much of the credit for that achievement must go to Ian whose style became one of the most influential in rock drumming.

Heavily influenced by Buddy Rich, Ian is one of the few hard rock drummers who uses swing and jazz inflections in his powerhouse style. He is also left-handed, being one of the few who play on a totally left-handed drum setup(another example is Phil Collins). Many left-handers either learn to play right-handed (e.g. Ringo Starr) or adapt their technique to suit a right-handed kit.

He brought forward from a previous generation of rock drummers the tight, precise playing and crisp, clean sound of the best of his predecessors but added power, formidable speed and technique to create a unique style and sound giving the best of both worlds. His fills on the single "Black Night" led the song to Number 2 in the UK Singles Chart in late September 1970.

Ian is also one of the few rock drummers who has mastered the one handed roll.

Deep Purple

Born in Nottingham, England his family moved to Bicester in Oxfordshire. He was the drummer in a local Bicester group called "Georgie and the Rave ons". The group later changed their name to "The Shindigs". Ian left the "shindigs" to join a group called "MI5" later renamed "The Maze". He played alongside Rod Evans in The Maze. After this, at 19, he helped create Deep Purple in 1968, one of the heaviest rock bands of the 1960s and 1970s. He participated in the 80s 'Super Drumming' event. He is the only one who has been in every Deep Purple lineup until the present. He has also played with Paice, Ashton & Lord, Whitesnake, and Gary Moore.

A devotee of Ludwig kits during the seventies, he switched to Pearl in the 1980's, which he still plays. He also prefers a single bass drum set-up, both live and in the studio. One of the few exceptions is on the Paice tour-de-force and Purple charting single 'Fireball', probably the finest example of Ian's virtuoso technique. Recommended albums that best display Paice's talents are Deep Purple's 'Live in Japan' and 'Machine Head'.

A recent highlight was guesting on Paul McCartney's (former Beatles) Run Devil Run (1999) rock'n'roll album. Steve Morse says about Ian Paice: "He's like a real heavy Ringo. He's just so good on the drums, but doesn't want to make a big deal about it."

Ian has also just released a new solo DVD which is aimed at drummers and music fans alike.

External links

[Ian Paice - Drumsolo in Montreux 2005]

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.