Indian tabla maestro Badal Roy passed away on January 18, 2022. Badal Roy was a pioneer who introduced tabla into jazz and improvisational music over several decades. An innovative percussionist, he performed with many of the leading names in jazz, including Miles Davis, Ornette Coleman, John McLaughlin, Dave Liebman, Pharoah Sanders, Herbie Hancock and Herbie Mann. He also recorded with Yoko Ono and Richie Havens, and gave presentations around the world.
Born in what is now Bangladesh, Badal Roy arrived in New York in 1968 with only a few dollars in his pocket. He had studied accounting in India and he came to America to further his studies and secure a new future in America.
To make ends meet as he became settled, he worked as a kitchen assistant at the automated food restaurant Horn & Hardart, and as a waiter at an Indian restaurant. One evening, when the tabla player failed to show up at the restaurant, Badal mentioned to the manager that he also played tabla. The manager asked him to stop waiting tables for the evening, and to sit in with the sitar player instead, and that is how his performance career began. He later went on to play at many Indian restaurants in Manhattan, including Raga, Nirvana, and Taste of India.
According to Badal, one evening an African American man approached the stage as he was leaving the restaurant. In a raspy voice, he invited Badal to a paid recording session, and asked him to call by telephone the following day. He left his business card, and as the man left the restaurant, Badal turned to the other musician and asked: “Who is Miles Davis?”
Badal went on to record on Miles’ classic “On the Corner,” and on other albums, as well as live concerts. On another occasion, a man with a British accent approached the stage and asked if he could sit in and play guitar with Badal for a few numbers. It was John McLaughlin, who later asked him to record on the album “My Goal’s Beyond.”
Robert Browning began to feature Badal in concerts of Indian music and fusion at the Alternative Center for International Arts, which later became the World Music Institute. Robert and his wife Helene presented Badal in concert over 30 times beginning in the mid-70s, in collaboration with jazz, world music and fusion artists such as Steve Gorn, Don Cherry, Dave Liebman, Nana Vasconcelos, Arooj Lazewal, Perry Robinson, Purna Das Baul, Adam Rudolph, Amit Chatterjee, Pharoah Sanders, Mike Richmond, Glen Velez, and many others.
Badal made several recordings with producer Bob Haddad for the Music of the World and Nomad labels, including “Asian Journal”; “Yantra” (with Steve Gorn); “Songs for Sitar & Tabla” (with Arooj Lazewal); and his only headliner CD, “One in the Pocket,” featuring Steve Gorn, Mike Richmond, Glen Velez, Amit Chatterjee, Jim Bowie, and Duofel, a Brazilian guitar duo.
Badal was a loving, funny and gentle soul who helped his fellow musicians (especially those in India) to make connections with presenters and record labels. He will be remembered by his friends, family and all those who knew him.
(headline image: Badal Roy – photo by Greg Plachta, courtesy Music of the World)
Author: Music of the World
Music of the World was formed in New York in the early 1980s by Bob Haddad to promote and produce musicians from diverse traditional backgrounds. The company began by presenting traditional musicians in concert, and by recording high quality cassettes which were used for promotional purposes and sold at performances. In 1989, Haddad relocated the label from Brooklyn, New York to Chapel Hill, North Carolina. The label released nearly 90 CD albums with artists from North America, Africa, India, Asia, Europe, and Latin America.