Billy Cobham speaks the way he plays drums. Words pour out of him in a great, rhythmic rush, every sentence alive with energy and ideas – and so interviewing him can be as overwhelming as his music sounds. I ask about a recent sojourn to his birth nation of Panama and he’s still answering 15 minutes later, although the topic now is a huge 1973 concert at Yankee Stadium in New York where he played alongside salsa legends Fania All-Stars to 40,000 fans: “All the nations had their flags – and all the gangs were there too!” Cobham describes watching in awe as the greatest congueros alive all played in unison before the frenzied crowd invaded the stage. It’s fascinating, though I begin to fear our allotted time will be taken up by this single sprawling anecdote. “Don’t get me started,” he says, and laughs, kicking back in his book-lined office in Berne, Switzerland.
William Cobham Jr is one of history’s greatest drummers, who, alongside Miles Davis and John McLaughlin helped fuse jazz with rock and funk (he co-founded Mahavishnu Orchestra with the latter). Cobham became an influence on everything from Prince to prog, and has also backed icons across a huge spectrum of music – jazz greats such as Miles Davis and Sonny Rollins but also James Brown, Roberta Flack, Peter Gabriel and more. At 80, he’s just been given a lifetime achievement award at the Jazz FM awards but is still a dynamic, muscular bandleader, with UK gigs coming up at Cheltenham jazz festival and Ronnie Scott’s. “The first time I came to Great Britain was in 1968 with Horace Silver,” he says, “and you know where we played? Ronnie Scott’s!”
