492 - Chad Wackerman: Working with Allan Holdsworth, Making a Band Sound Better, Auditioning for Frank Zappa

Working Drummer

Chad Wackerman’s professional career began in 1978 with the Bill Watrous Refuge West Big Band. Since then he has amassed a remarkable body of work including a seven year association with Frank Zappa, with whom he toured the USA and Europe and recorded 27 albums including the London Symphony recordings.

He has also recorded 8 albums and toured with guitar legend Allan Holdsworth, played on the ‘One Voice’ album and video with Barbra Streisand, and recorded albums and toured with artists as diverse as James Taylor, Steve Vai, Andy Summers, Steven Wilson, Men At Work, Ed Mann, Albert Lee, Colin Hay, Dweezil Zappa, Pasqua/Holdsworth/Haslip/Wackerman Group, Terry Bozzio, Carl Verheyen, David Garfield,John Patitucci, Jennifer Batten, Joe Sample, Robbie Kreiger, Banned From Utopia and The World Drummers Ensemble (Bill Bruford, Luis Conte, Dou Dou Ndiaye Rose and Chad Wackerman) .

As a band leader and composer Chad has five critically acclaimed CDs: ‘Forty Reasons’, ‘The View’, ‘Scream’, ‘Legs Eleven’ and his latest release, ‘Dreams Nightmares and Improvisations’. Chad has written music for the television show ‘The Dennis Miller Show’, as well as composing music for Allan Holdsworth’s ‘Secrets’, ‘Wardenclyffe Tower’ and ‘Sixteen Men of Tain’ CDs. His trio has a performance DVD, ‘Hits Live’.

In this episode, Chad talks about:

• Working with Allan Holdsworth
• The amazing story behind recording Allan’s record “Road Games”
• “Improvising at the highest level sounds like composition”
• Interpreting charts efficiently
• Auditioning for Frank Zappa
• How to make a band sound better
• Learning from Murray Spivack
• Figuring out what’s important for each gig and artist