UPDATE: Farewell to Louis – hosted by Ogun Records
- A memorial concert and fundraiser for the great South African drummer will be held on 27 August 2025 at The 100 Club, 100 Oxford Street, London W1.
- Appearing will be: Claude Deppa and friends/ Viva La Black featuring Alexander Hawkins, Jason Yarde and Shabaka and many more!
- Hosted by Ogun Records
=================================
Jon Turney writes: Many others will be moved to pay tribute to the great drummer Louis Moholo-Moholo, who died in South Africa on 13 June. A few of the early ones are sampled below. I hardly have words to convey my admiration for the life he led, or the music he made, so let me offer some from others who heard him.
If I cast my mind back to the Bracknell Festivals of the 1970s and ‘80s, Moholo, in exile from his home country, was a regular inspiration. It’s usual to say he was the last surviving member of the legendary Blue Notes, but there were so many other astonishing bands, often as the house drummer for Ogun Records. A quote from Steve Lake in the festival programme for 1979, when he led Spirits Rejoice, sums up his qualities well:
“To my mind the most beautiful ‘time’ player to have emerged since Elvin Jones first set the John Coltrane Quartet on fire in the early Sixties, Louis draws rhythms out of nowhere, brings a sense of cohesion and righteous logic to the most uncompromising free blowing, even while stoking the excitement to almost unbelievable plateaux of intensity. His intuitive balance – between control and intensity is very rare: most drummers possess either one quality or the other.”
That’s the mesmerising presence that, like the man himself, endured: evident from other Bracknell sets back in the day – with Ninesense, Keith Tippett, Mike Osborne and, memorably, in duo with Andrew Cyrille – a small selection of what grew into a vast array of collaborations but a reminder of how central he was to the UK scene at that time; and still evident the last time I heard Louis play, at the helm of the Dedication Orchestra at the QEH in 2014.
Just look at the personnel of that extraordinary ensemble to see how they brought together a diversity of playing styles and generations, united in their devotion to the band’s music. Impossible to imagine their sound with anyone else on the drum stool. A drummer of the highest quality can be judged by the way they make everyone who plays with them sound better. He certainly made every single orchestra member sound brilliant that evening a decade ago.
The balance Steve Lake highlights strikes nearly everyone. South African jazz writer and historian Gwen Ansell’s expansive valediction highlights how he could, and did, play from the powerhouse, but was also
“…capable of delicate, intricate fretworks, subtle pulses, gentle conversations with other, quieter instruments. He was a drummer who listened intently to what his comrades on the stand were doing, and offered what they needed as well as what he must say.”
As John Law, who toured and recorded a piano duo album with Moholo-Moholo in the ‘90s, recalled, he had
“the most delicate touch on the cymbals imaginable”.
Richard Williams, though, on The Blue Moment emphasises how exhilarating the high energy side of his playing was:
“Until you saw him play live, you could have only the haziest impression of his invigorating and sometimes electrifying effect on those around him”.
Mike Westbrook, too, recalls the intensity in his tribute :
“Once in the middle of a quartet gig with Mike Osborne, Harry Miller and a dep drummer I was suddenly aware of a great surge of energy behind my back. In an instant the playing switched to a higher, more intense level. The reason? Louis Moholo Moholo had taken over on the drums.”
That is the effect we’ll not experience again. It prompts me to repeat a phrase of my own, in a piece for this site about the Blue Notes :
“The more you have to celebrate when someone dies, the more also you have lost.”
RIP Louis.
One Response
There’s a tribute on the website of The Vortex, where we were lucky that he played so regularly. https://www.vortexjazz.co.uk/2025/06/14/louis-moholo-moholo-1940-2025/