Ted Sirota Music

I started playing the drums in 1980 at the age of 10. I started teaching drum lessons in 1991. Like many people, I started playing the drums in my school band and continued on through high school. Around the age of fifteen, I was fortunate enough to hear the legendary jazz drummer Max Roach play with his band at the Jazz Showcase in Chicago. This was one of many key experiences that lead to my decision to pursue a career in music.

In 1987 I left Chicago to attend Berklee College of Music/a in Boston, MA. While in Boston I had the fortune to study with two Boston drum legends that left a lasting impression on me – a Alan Dawson and Joe Hunt. While at Berklee I jammed regularly with many of today’s young jazz greats – Roy Hargrove, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Joshua Redman, Mark Turner, Lalah Hathaway, Chris Cheek, Seamus Blake and Antonio Hart to name a few. I graduated Magna Cum Laude (much to my parents satisfaction) from Berklee in 1991. I stayed in Boston for another year and racked up some experience playing in the local Reggae, Jazz and Blues scenes.

In 1992 I moved to Chicago with my fellow band mates from the Last Kwartet (Jeff Parker, Sara P. Smith and Chris Lopes). In Chicago I have made many lasting musical and personal relationships over the years. Although the Last Kwartet disbanded in 1994, I formed my own band, which included Jeff Parker on guitar, shortly thereafter. Ted Sirota’s Rebel Souls have since recorded five critically acclaimed CD’s for the Naim and Delmark record labels. The latest, “Seize the Time”, was released by Naim in 2008.

Many people know me from my steady gig with Sabertooth at Chicago’s world famous jazz club the Green Mill. I’ve been playing drums with Sabertooth every Saturday night from Midnight – 5:00am since the winter of 1994! I’ve also worked frequently with many of the finest musicians in Chicago (some no longer with us), including Rob Mazurek, Von Freeman, Jodie Christian, Bobby Broom, Lin Halliday, Ron Perillo, Fred Hopkins and hundreds more. I’ve also worked with many artists based outside of Chicago like Greg Osby, Phil Upchurch, Christopher Hollyday, Eddie Kirkland, Johnny Adams, Ted Nash and many others.

I have played in just about every kind of venue one could possibly imagine – from the most exclusive private clubs to minimum security prisons, giant outdoor festivals to pre-school classes and everywhere in between. I’ve toured extensively in the U.S. and also have played in Europe and Singapore for extended periods.

I’ve lived in the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago since 1995, where I’ve raised my two beautiful, brilliant, kind, and talented daughters ages 17 amp; 13. I live with with my incredible girlfriend Yanira and her 9 year old (going on 40) son.

All Music Guide Bio – by Alex Henderson

In Chicago’s jazz scene, drummer/composer/producer Ted Sirota is perhaps best known for his extensive work with guitarist Jeff Parker and for leading his avant-garde/post-bop band the Rebel Souls. The politically outspoken Sirota is not the sort of avant-garde improviser who plays atonal music exclusively-far from it. Sirota has favored an inside/outside approach, and while he can be abstract, intellectual, angular, or cerebral, the Midwesterner can also be quite musical and melodic. Compositionally, Sirota brings a long list of influences to his recordings-a list that includes, among others, Ornette Coleman, Charlie Haden, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, reggae icon Bob Marley, and the late Nigerian star Fela Kuti (who was greatly influenced by modal jazz). And as a drummer, Sirota has been affected by explorers who range from Ed Blackwell, Andrew Cyrille, and Rashied Ali to Elvin Jones and Max Roach. Although jazz-oriented, Sirota is far from an elitist jazz snob. He has gladly acknowledged the influence of reggae, calypso, soca, and African music, and the drummer spent two years backing veteran blues singer Eddie Kirkland; also, he has done studio work for Chicago-based rappers Longshot and Diverse.Sirota was born in Champaign, IL, on May 3, 1969, but spent most of his pre-adult years in the Chicago suburbs. He began studying the drums when he was 11 in 1980, and at 18 Sirota moved to Boston to attend the well-known Berklee College of Music. The drummer spent half a decade in Boston, where he graduated from Berklee in 1991 and was a member of an avant-garde jazz group called the Last Kwartet (which also included trombonist Sara P. Smith, bassist Chris Lopes, and frequent companion Jeff Parker). Sirota didn’t play jazz exclusively in Boston; he also played in various soca and reggae bands in that New England city. Although Boston has long had a healthy and attractive music scene, Sirota opted to move back to Chicago in 1992-and the other members of the Last Kwartet moved there with him (Parker and Smith in ’91, Lopes in ’92). Sirota’s two-year association with Eddie Kirkland began in 1993, and in 1995, he became a member of a Chicago-based outfit called the Sabertooth Jazz Quartet (which frequently appeared at the Green Mill, one of the Windy City’s best known jazz clubs).
It was in 1996 that Sirota formed his group Ted Sirota’s Rebel Souls, which sounds like the name of a reggae band but specializes in instrumental avant-garde and post-bop jazz. The band has had different lineups along the way; the members have included Parker, tenor saxophonist Geof Bradfield, cornetist Rob Mazurek, trombonist Jeb Bishop, and bassists Noel Kupersmith, Josh Abrams, and Clark Sommers. Sirota’s first album with his Rebel Souls, Rebel Roots, was recorded for the British Naim label in 1996; that CD was followed by Propaganda (a 1998 release on Naim) and Ted Sirota’s Rebel Souls vs. the Forces of Evil (a 2001 release). In 2003, Sirota and the Rebel Souls recorded Breeding Resistance for Chicago’s long-lasting Delmark label.