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Tom Donlinger

Tom Donlinger was born in an industrial, "low-end" section of the south side of Chicago; two blocks from a steel mill. It had a constant incessant hammering day and night that Tom felt could be the reason his timing developed early on. At the age of 12, Tom would take a train to downtown Chicago every Saturday to study with jazz drummer, [a135899]. His early music education also came from his older brother Jim (who uses the name [a108869]) who became a successful solo guitarist/singer/songwriter in his own right, with five albums on Columbia and Caribou Records. Right out of high school, Tom toured and recorded two albums with Chess Records' [a8286], featuring [a61686] and producers [a271718] and [a195568]. Then at the age of 19, Tom joined [a390619], a Columbia Records rock group, replacing Billy Herman. Tom and his new band toured behind two albums doing pop festivals with Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Creedence-Clearwater, and the like. While recording and touring with Rotary Connection and Aorta, he earned a Bachelor's of Music degree in Percussion from The American Conservatory of Music in Chicago. He would have been the first to tell you it took years to unlearn some of his classical habits. After a stint with another Columbia group, [a849505], Tom was invited to relocate to Marin County California to join a Bill Graham backed group, [a2539865]. After an unsuccessful album, Tom moved to Los Angeles to fully embrace the music business. He did many projects in his three years there, including [a283842] (a Columbia one-hit wonder) and worked out of numerous studios. Eventually, Tom was invited back to the San Francisco area to work with a growing music scene that fit his musical tastes. In his first year, Tom worked with [a259913], [a274439], [a258121], and [a718937] and [a718936] (from the Grateful Dead) and James Vincent. At the same time he attended San Francisco State University to finish his Master's Degree in Percussion Performance. As things settled down, Tom committed a year to touring and recording with [a30185], a master B-3 organist. Shortly, thereafter he was invited to audition for [a255411]; a musical relationship that lasted for five years and five albums. This included working with one of Van's finest collection of musicians, including [a49223], [a74213], and [a295862]. At the end of this period, Tom chose to stay in-town more and focus on teaching and drum clinics in the area, working out of Drummers Tradition, Just Percussion, and Marin Music in Marin County to focus on raising his son and enjoy not sitting in airports and waiting for sound checks. A few years later, after sensing a need for change, Tom moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico for a year, and later moved to the Denver, Colorado area where he started working on his own African-Brazilian influenced CD geared towards drummer-percussionists and featuring a variety of guest artist collaborations. Following a long battle with pancreatic cancer, Tom passed away on April 20, 2012. He was 63. Tom's ability to change styles from R&B to jazz to fusion to C&W over the years made him a valuable commodity and he constantly proved his ability to be flexible and easy to work with, without sacrificing his own creativity on projects. Additionally, Tom is remembered by those who met him as a truly kind and friendly person and an incredibly patient and knowledgeable teacher.