Will Calhoun is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 drummer

Drummer

A drummer is a musician who is capable of playing drums, which includes but is not limited to a drum kit and accessory based hardware which includes an assortment of pedals and standing support mechanisms, marching percussion and/or any musical instrument that is struck within the context of a...

, who graduated with honors from Berklee College of Music

Berklee College of Music

Berklee College of Music, located in Boston, Massachusetts, is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known primarily as a school for jazz, rock and popular music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including hip...

.

Career

Calhoun originally comes from the Bronx

The Bronx

The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...

, New York. He moved to Boston

Boston

Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

 to attend the Berklee College of Music

Berklee College of Music

Berklee College of Music, located in Boston, Massachusetts, is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known primarily as a school for jazz, rock and popular music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including hip...

 where he graduated with a degree in music production and engineering. He also received the Buddy Rich

Buddy Rich

Bernard "Buddy" Rich was an American jazz drummer and bandleader. Rich was billed as "the world's greatest drummer" and was known for his virtuosic technique, power, groove, and speed.-Early life:...

 Jazz Masters award for outstanding performance as a drummer whilst there.

Calhoun is best known as the drummer of the funk metal

Funk metal

Funk metal is a subgenre of funk rock that fuses elements of heavy metal and funk. Allmusic has claimed that "funk metal evolved in the mid-'80s when alternative bands like the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Faith No More, Infectious Grooves, Mordred and Fishbone began playing the hybrid with a stronger...

 band Living Colour

Living Colour

Living Colour is an American rock band from New York City, formed in 1984. Stylistically, the band's music is a creative fusion influenced by free jazz, funk, neo-psychedelia, hard rock, and heavy metal...

. He has also played with Jungle Funk and HeadFake, recorded

Sound recording and reproduction

Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...

 several jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 album

Album

An album is a collection of recordings, released as a single package on gramophone record, cassette, compact disc, or via digital distribution. The word derives from the Latin word for list .Vinyl LP records have two sides, each comprising one half of the album...

s as a leader, and has appeared as a sideman

Sideman

A sideman is a professional musician who is hired to perform or record with a group of which he or she is not a regular member. They often tour with solo acts as well as bands and jazz ensembles. Sidemen are generally required to be adaptable to many different styles of music, and so able to fit...

 with a diverse group of acclaimed artists

Musician

A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....

, including Pharoah Sanders

Pharoah Sanders

Pharoah Sanders is a Grammy Award–winning American jazz saxophonist.Saxophonist Ornette Coleman once described him as "probably the best tenor player in the world." Emerging from John Coltrane's groups of the mid-60s Sanders is known for his overblowing, harmonic, and multiphonic techniques on...

, B.B. King, Herb Alpert

Herb Alpert

Herbert "Herb" Alpert is an American musician most associated with the group variously known as Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass, Herb Alpert's Tijuana Brass, or TJB. He is also a recording industry executive — he is the "A" of A&M Records...

, Dr. John

Dr. John

Malcolm John "Mac" Rebennack, Jr. , better known by the stage name Dr. John , is an American singer-songwriter, pianist and guitarist, whose music combines blues, pop, jazz as well as Zydeco, boogie woogie and rock and roll.Active as a session musician since the late 1950s, he came to wider...

, Jaco Pastorius

Jaco Pastorius

John Francis Anthony Pastorius III , known as Jaco Pastorius, was an American jazz musician and composer widely acknowledged as a virtuoso electric bass player....

, Wayne Shorter

Wayne Shorter

Wayne Shorter is an American jazz saxophonist and composer.He is generally acknowledged to be jazz's greatest living composer, and many of his compositions have become standards...

, Marcus Miller

Marcus Miller

Marcus Miller is an American jazz composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist. Miller is best known as a bassist, working with trumpeter Miles Davis, singer Luther Vandross, and saxophonist David Sanborn, as well as maintaining a prolific solo career...

, Public Enemy, and Ronnie Wood. He plays in the song Crimson Deep, from What Lies Beneath album, by the Finnish

Finland

Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

 Symphonic Metal

Symphonic metal

Symphonic metal is a term used to describe heavy metal music that has symphonic elements; that is, elements that are either borrowed from classical music or, as with progressive rock music, create a style reminiscent of it, e.g...

 singer Tarja

Tarja Turunen

Tarja Soile Susanna Turunen Cabuli is a Finnish singer-songwriter and composer. She is a full lyric soprano and has a vocal range of three octaves....

.

He was voted "Best new drummer of 1988" by Modern Drummer

Modern Drummer

Modern Drummer is a monthly publication targeting the interests of on drummers and percussionists. The magazine features interviews, equipment reviews, and columns offering advice on technique, as well as information for the general public...

 Magazine's readers poll, then again as "Number one progressive drummer" three times (1989, 1991 & 1992). He was named "Best Drummer of 1990" by Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...

 Magazine's critics poll. Will has also won two Grammy awards, one in 1989 for Best Hard Rock Performance by a Group

Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance

The Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance was an award presented to recording artists at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, for works containing quality performances in the hard rock music genre...

 while in Living Colour, then again for Best Hard Rock Performance with the band in 1990. Living Colour also won an international rock award in 1991 for Best Rock Band. In addition to drumming, Calhoun also wrote the songs "Pride

Pride (Living Colour song)

"Pride" is a song by Living Colour originally released on their second album Time's Up. It was released as a promo single to support the album...

," featured on Time's Up, and "Nothingness

Nothingness (song)

"Nothingness" is a song by Living Colour and the third single off their third studio album, Stain. The ballad reached #17 on the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart in 1993. It was later included on two greatest hits compilations, Pride and Everything Is Possible: The Very Best of Living Colour...

" from Stain

Stain (album)

Stain is the third album by Living Colour. It was released on March 2, 1993, by Epic Records. It is the first album to feature bassist Doug Wimbish. Stain features a much heavier and aggressive Living Colour, containing elements of thrash metal and industrial music...

.

Calhoun's drumming incorporates many different stylistic influences and various augmenting technologies. With Living Colour, he was one of the first drummers to blend advanced funk

Funk

Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...

 and fusion techniques with elements of hard rock

Hard rock

Hard rock is a loosely defined genre of rock music which has its earliest roots in mid-1960s garage rock, blues rock and psychedelic rock...

 and thrash metal

Thrash metal

Thrash metal is a subgenre of heavy metal that is characterized usually by its fast tempo and aggression. Songs of the genre typically use fast percussive and low-register guitar riffs, overlaid with shredding-style lead work...

. More recently he has integrated Drum and Bass

Drum and bass

Drum and bass is a type of electronic music which emerged in the late 1980s. The genre is characterized by fast breakbeats , with heavy bass and sub-bass lines...

 grooves, ethnic percussion and sampling

Sampling (music)

In music, sampling is the act of taking a portion, or sample, of one sound recording and reusing it as an instrument or a different sound recording of a song or piece. Sampling was originally developed by experimental musicians working with musique concrète and electroacoustic music, who physically...

 into his playing. He is a very physical player, with a broad vocabulary from extremely precise grooves to more free-form avant-funk and jazz approaches. He is also an avid user of the Korg

Korg

is a Japanese multinational corporation that manufactures electronic musical instruments, audio processors and guitar pedals, recording equipment, and electronic tuners...

 Wavedrum, which allows him to integrate banks of effects (including guitar

Guitar

The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

 pedals and other effects not typically associated with percussion instruments) into a single drum. Calhoun has recently added a Mandala Drum into his setup. The Mandala is a dynamic multiple control zone electronic surface that uses sensor technology to detect where and how hard a surface strike occurs.

Calhoun is also a photographer.

Equipment

Will Calhoun plays: Mapex Drums

Mapex Drums

Mapex Drums is a drum brand manufactured by KHS Musical Instruments Company of Taiwan. Mapex has been in the drum making industry for over 18 years.-Products:...

 - Saturn Series (2 inner plies of walnut and 4 exterior plies of maple) and Sabian cymbals. Will also uses Hammerax cymbals.

Cymbals: Vault Mad Hats 14" - Vault Resonating Bells - Prototype Flat Ride 21" - Prototype Crash-Ride 19" - HHX Evolution O-Zone Crash 18" - Prototype Ambient Ride 21" - Alien Disc Percussion 10" - Prototype Hammered Meanie Crash 28" - Prototype Jazz Ride 21" with rivets

He also uses a Sleishman Twin Pedal, notable for its unique design. Will also uses the Thunder Echo Drums Trash Kat.

External links

• GiggingDrummer / Will Calhoun
• Official site
• Will Calhoun @ Myspace
• Official Living Colour myspace
• Head>>Fake site
• Living Colour semi-official blog
• Living Colour official site
• Head>>Fake extended Interview with Doug Wimbish and Will Calhoun for radio orange94.0 stream (October 2008)
• Drummerworld.com
• Will Calhoun video interview at allaboutjazz.com