Legendary Jazz Drummer Jimmy Cobb Dies at 91

Cobb was the last surviving member of Miles Davis's 'Kind of Blue' band
Legendary Jazz Drummer Jimmy Cobb Dies at 91
By Calum Slingerland
Published May 25, 2020
Jimmy Cobb — a legendary American jazz drummer known best for playing on Miles Davis's seminal 1959 album Kind of Blue — has died. Cobb's wife, Eleana Tee Cobb, confirmed the artist passed at his home in Manhattan yesterday (May 24) from lung cancer. He was 91.

Cobb was the last surviving member of Miles Davis's acclaimed sextet that also featured saxophonists John Coltrane and Julian "Cannonball" Adderley, pianist Bill Evans, and bassist Paul Chambers.

In addition to Kind of Blue, Cobb's playing also appears on Davis albums Sketches of Spain, Someday My Prince Will Come, Porgy and Bess, and Sorcerer.

Born James Wilbur Cobb in 1929, the artist worked as a busboy to save money for his first drumkit and began performing regularly soon after. Gigs with Earl Bostic and Dinah Washington led to work with Cannonball Adderley, ahead of taking his spot behind the kit in Davis's sextet.

Cobb's credits as a sideman also include work with Coltrane, Wes Montgomery, Art Pepper, Wayne Shorter, Wynton Kelly, Sarah Vaughan and many more.

He made his debut as a bandleader with 1983's So Nobody Else Can Hear and continued to perform and teach until the end of his life. Cobb's most recent album, This I Dig of You, arrived last year.

Find tributes to Cobb below.