Hal Blaine

Hal Blaine was an American drummer and session musician of Jewish descent, with a career that lasted about 70 years. He was born in 1929 as "Harold Simon Belsky", son to Meyer Belsky and Rose Silverman. Both of his parents were immigrants from Eastern Europe. Blaine was born in Holyoke, Massachusetts, a planned city that was once famed for its paper mills. He became interested in music as a child, and started playing drums as a hobby when 8-years-old. In 1943, the 14-year-old Blaine and his family moved to California. From 1949 to 1952, received lessons in drumming by Roy Knapp, the same music teacher who had trained the famed jazz drummer Gene Krupa (1909-1973). Meanwhile, Blaine started performing professionally in Chicago strip clubs. He worked on improving his sight-reading skills, reading and performing of pieces of music or songs in music notation that the performer has not seen before. He started out as a jazz musician. He served for a while in the big band of Count Basie (190