Specs Powell

Specs Powell Specs Powell American jazz musician (1922 – 2007) Gordon "Specs" Powell (June 5, 1922 – September 15, 2007) was an American jazz drummer who began performing in the swing era. Career Specs was the first black staff musician hired by CBS in 1943. Born in New York City, he started on piano but became exclusively a drummer in the late 1930s. He worked with Edgar Hayes (1939), Benny Carter (1941–42), and Ben Webster. He played percussion on the Ed Sullivan Show in the early 1960s and remained active professionally until the 1970s. At some point in the early 1960s he approached the Latin percussion maker Martin Cohen and had Cohen make for him an early (perhaps the first)…

GENRES: Jazz, Drums