Chief Bey

James Hawthorne Bey (April 17, 1913 – April 8, 2004) was an American jazz percussionist and African folklorist. He played under the name of Chief Bey.

Born in Yemassee, South Carolina, Bey moved with his family to Brooklyn and then to Harlem, where he began playing drums and singing in church choirs. He also served in the Navy during World War II conflict and later attended cosmetology school.

In the 1950s, Bey performed in an international tour of Porgy and Bess starring Leontyne Price and Cab Calloway. Besides this, he began a busy recording career performing on Herbie Mann's At the Village Gate (1961), Art Blakey's The African Beat (1962), Ahmed Abdul-Malik's Sounds of Africa (New Jazz, 1961), as well as albums by Harry Belafonte, Miriam Makeba and Pharoah Sanders, among others. He took his stage name after joining the Moorish Science Temple of America, a Muslim sect. Then he taught the shekere, a West African percussion instrument, at the Griot Institute at Intermediate School 246 in Brooklyn.

Bey died at his home in Brooklyn of stomach cancer at the age of 90.

Fact

His widow, Barbara Kenyatta Bey (born Barbara Ann Coleman in Harlem on June 9, 1944), was a priestess of Yemaja in the Yoruba religion. She collapsed at his funeral and died nine days after his passing on April 17. April 17 would not only have been Bey's 91st birthday, but the couple's 31st wedding anniversary.

Discography

With Hamiet Bluiett

• Dangerously Suite (Soul Note, 1981)

With Herbie Mann

• Herbie Mann at the Village Gate (Atlantic, 1961)
• Herbie Mann Returns to the Village Gate (Atlantic, 1961 [1963])

With Pharoah Sanders

• Izipho Zam (My Gifts) (Strata-East, 1969 [1973])

Sources

• JazzHouse.com – Master of African drums, by Todd S. Jenkins
• Obituary, at New York Times
• Discogs.com – Chief Bey discography