By Elizabeth Farina
efarina@midlothianexchange.com

There is a rhythmic beat to life and Kip Williams has found it, literally. 

The local jazz musician, 55, has been playing the drums since he was nine.  After selling Richmond Music Center, Williams zeroed in on his passion of playing. Although the Powhatan resident was active in the music scene even while operating the retail business, he now dedicates all of his time pursuing the music.  “I’ve been playing pretty active even when I owned the store; I just wasn’t playing at the intensity I’m playing now, which is great,” Williams said. “Richmond’s always been a pretty good town for jazz, and for most music, really.”

Williams created his first CD, “Time,” featuring amazing talent from three separate bands he’s played with in the past.  “The CD was put together over a couple of years and just released July 5. I had pretty much recorded most of it before I went to Cuba. The next one will have more influence of Cuba,” Williams said.

Williams, who is humble about his own talent and knowledge of drums and percussions, invested in an eight-day trip last fall to Havana with friend, teacher and author Chuck Silverman.  The trip brought him the opportunity to focus on the rhythmic Cuban pattern “clave.”

“It helped my playing a whole bunch,” Williams said. “Here in the United States, we’re used to four-four time signature and hearing backbeats on two and four… you know, pop music, all of it has a backbeat on two and four and it has a straight beat like that,” he said, while clapping his hands.

For five hours each day, Williams studied with a Cuban drummer and drum set, soaking in the different patterns of son clave, and rumba clave. “We learned how that [clave] works in their music and it really puts a whole new spin on everything,” he said.  “You can add this stuff to the tool box. It’s like a carpenter having a different chisel or hammer.”

That new tool is something Williams looks to add on the second CD. Right now, he’s enjoying his second career as a full-time musician. “I play pretty much everything. I like Jazz because you have the freedom. You can play the same song two nights in a row and it’s going to sound a little bit different each night,” he said. “It’s still the same tune, but we mix it up and it’s more challenging,”

The first recording set shares that freedom. “Time” showcases tunes that lock listeners into an album-length instrumental conversation that is mesmerizing. “When you play with good people – everybody on my CD is awesome – it makes you play better. It forces you to kick it up a notch, which is kind of cool,” he said.

Williams on drums and percussion, Kevin Davis on percussion, Grammy nominee James Gates and Skip Gailes on saxophones, piano players Steve Kessler and Chad Gustafason, and bass players Matt Hall, Keith Horne, and Carl Lester reveal an audible tapestry that holds the listener in a long, comforting embrace.  For example, Williams on the drums emphasizes, but doesn’t overwhelm, the exchange between Gustafson on piano and Lester on bass in the song titled “Fragile.” 

“It does have a flow to it. It took me a long time to organize the order of the tunes,” he said.

Where most CD tracks have a brief silent pause between songs, Williams inserts transitional drum and percussion sets that are more than “small talk” rhythm.  “Putting that wacky drum stuff in between it, it makes it totally different than anything you’ve ever heard. It kind of cleans the slate before you get to the next tune,” Williams said. “It’s like a little intermission.”

Kip Williams with BopNation featuring Skip Gailes, Wade Short and Mike Ess, will be playing tonight (Thurs., Aug. 26) at the Ashland Coffee & Tea, located at 100 N. Railroad Ave., at 8 p.m.  Tickets for the show are $8.

The “Time” CD is available locally at BK Music, Plan 9 Music, Richmond Music Center, Just Drums, and online at iTunes, CD Baby, Amazon, Rhapsody, and Williams’ website, kipwilliams.net.