Philip John Albert "Jon" Hiseman (21 June 1944 – 12 June 2018) was an English drummer,

recording engineer An audio engineer (also known as a sound engineer or recording engineer) helps to produce a recording or a live performance, balancing and adjusting sound sources using equalization, dynamics processing and audio effects, mixing, reproducti ...

record producer A record producer or music producer is a music creating project's overall supervisor whose responsibilities can involve a range of creative and technical leadership roles. Typically the job involves hands-on oversight of recording sessions; ensu ...

, and

music publisher A music publisher is a type of publisher that specializes in distributing music. Music publishers originally published sheet music. When copyright became legally protected, music publishers began to play a role in the management of the intellectu ...

. He played with the Graham Bond Organisation, with

John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers were an English blues rock band led by multi-instrumentalist, singer and songwriter John Mayall. The band has been influential as an incubator for British rock and blues musicians. Many of the best known bands t ...

and later formed what has been described as the "seminal"

jazz rock Jazz fusion (also known as jazz rock, jazz-rock fusion, or simply fusion) is a popular music Music genre, genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and jazz improvisation, improvisation with rock music, funk, a ...

progressive rock Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog) is a broad genre of rock music that primarily developed in the United Kingdom through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early-to-mid-1970s. Initially termed " progressive pop", the ...

band,

Colosseum The Colosseum ( ; , ultimately from Ancient Greek word "kolossos" meaning a large statue or giant) is an Ellipse, elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, just east of the Roman Forum. It is the largest ancient amphi ...

. He later formed Colosseum II in 1975. He was married to saxophonist Barbara Thompson from 1967 until his death in 2018, following surgery to remove a

brain tumor A brain tumor (sometimes referred to as brain cancer) occurs when a group of cells within the Human brain, brain turn cancerous and grow out of control, creating a mass. There are two main types of tumors: malignant (cancerous) tumors and benign ...

Early life

Hiseman was born in

Woolwich Woolwich () is a town in South London, southeast London, England, within the Royal Borough of Greenwich. The district's location on the River Thames led to its status as an important naval, military and industrial area; a role that was mainta ...

, south-east London, to Lily (née Spratt) and Philip Hiseman. His mother worked at the

Bank of England The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom and the model on which most modern central banks have been based. Established in 1694 to act as the Kingdom of England, English Government's banker and debt manager, and still one ...

and his father was a lecturer at the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts. His family included musicians, and his mother played piano and flute. Hiseman studied at the Addey and Stanhope School. He initially studied violin and piano, but eventually focused on the drums. In school, he played in a trio with classmates Dave Greenslade on piano and Tony Reeves on double bass.

Career

In the mid-1960s, Hiseman played in sessions such as the early Arthur Brown single, "Devil's Grip". He was in a band humorously named the "Wes Minster Five", and, with Neil Ardley, helped found the New Jazz Orchestra. In 1966, he replaced

Ginger Baker Peter Edward "Ginger" Baker (19 August 1939 – 6 October 2019) was an English drummer. His work in the 1960s and 1970s earned him the reputation of "rock's first superstar drummer", for a style that melded jazz and Music of Africa, Africa ...

in the Graham Bond Organisation and also played for a brief spell with Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames. In 1964, ''

Melody Maker ''Melody Maker'' was a British weekly music magazine, one of the world's earliest music weeklies; according to its publisher, IPC Media, the earliest. In January 2001, it was merged into "long-standing rival" (and IPC Media sister publicatio ...

'' magazine wrote his name as "Jon", and he decided to adopt that spelling. He then joined

in 1968 playing on ''

Bare Wires ''Bare Wires'' is a studio album by John Mayall's Bluesbreakers, featuring Mick Taylor on guitar, Chris Mercer and Dick Heckstall-Smith on saxophones, Jon Hiseman on drums, Henry Lowther on cornet and violin, and Tony Reeves on bass. It ...

''. In April 1968, he left to form what has been described as the "seminal"

band,

. Colosseum disbanded in November 1971, although Hiseman later formed Colosseum II with

Don Airey Donald Smith Airey (born 21 June 1948) is an English musician. He came to prominence as the keyboardist of the rock band Rainbow during 1979–1982. He has been the keyboardist of Deep Purple, the band from which Rainbow was a spinoff, since 2 ...

and

Gary Moore Robert William Gary Moore (4 April 19526 February 2011) was a Northern Irish musician. Over the course of his career, he played in various groups and performed a range of music including blues, blues rock, hard rock, Heavy metal music, heavy ...

in 1975. Between these two versions of Colosseum, Hiseman formed the band Tempest with

Allan Holdsworth Allan Holdsworth (6 August 1946 – 15 April 2017) was a British jazz and rock music, rock guitarist, violinist and composer. He contributed to numerous bands, including Soft Machine, U.K. (band), U.K., The Tony Williams Lifetime, Pierre Moerl ...

, Paul Williams and Colosseum bandmate Mark Clarke.

Ollie Halsall Peter John "Ollie" Halsall (14 March 1949 – 29 May 1992) was an English guitarist, songwriter, and singer, best known for his role in the Rutles, the bands Patto, Timebox (band), Timebox, and Boxer (band), Boxer, and for his contribution to t ...

joined the band temporarily making the band a quintet but Holdsworth left the group along with Williams, leaving Halsall to handle all guitar and vocal duties. In the mid 1970s, Hiseman played with Dave Greenslade when he toured the album '' Cactus Choir''. Hiseman subsequently played in

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...

groups, notably with his wife,

saxophonist The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of Single-reed instrument, single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed (mouthpi ...

Barbara Thompson, with whom he recorded and produced more than 15 albums.

Andrew Lloyd Webber Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber (born 22 March 1948) is an English composer and impresario of musical theatre. Several of his musicals have run for more than a decade both in the West End theatre, West End and on Broadway theatre, Broad ...

, searching for a "sound" for an album to feature his brother Julian on

cello The violoncello ( , ), commonly abbreviated as cello ( ), is a middle pitched bowed (sometimes pizzicato, plucked and occasionally col legno, hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually intonation (music), tuned i ...

, stumbled upon Colosseum II by accident and imported the whole band into his "Variations" project. This was the start of a ten-year relationship with Hiseman, whose drumming features on recordings, TV specials and

musicals Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance. The story and emotional content of a musical – humor, pathos, love, anger – are communicated through words, music, movement ...

. In 1982 Hiseman built what was at the time a state-of-the-art

recording studio A recording studio is a specialized facility for Sound recording and reproduction, recording and Audio mixing, mixing of instrumental or vocal musical performances, spoken words, and other sounds. They range in size from a small in-home proje ...

next to his home, and together with the compositional skills of Barbara Thompson produced many recordings for film and television

soundtrack A soundtrack is a recorded audio signal accompanying and synchronised to the images of a book, drama, motion picture, radio program, television show, television program, or video game; colloquially, a commercially released soundtrack album of m ...

s. Hiseman was a founding member of the United Jazz and Rock Ensemble, a German-based "Band of Band Leaders", along with Barbara Thompson. Colosseum reunited in June 1994 with the same line-up of musicians as when they broke up 23 years earlier. They played the Freiburg Zelt Musik Festival and followed it up with a German TV Special ( WDR Cologne) in October, which was recorded and released as a CD and a VHS video; a DVD version followed in 2003. Several new studio releases also followed, as well as four expanded editions of ''Valentyne Suite'' and ''Colosseum Live'', plus several compilation boxed sets. Barbara Thompson joined the band on various occasions before the death of Dick Heckstall-Smith in 2004 and since then was a permanent member of the band. Colosseum played its farewell concert on 28 February 2015. JonHisemann2010

In October 2010 a biography of Hiseman, titled ''Playing the Band'', was published. It was written by Martyn Hanson and edited by original Colosseum manager, Colin Richardson. In 2017 Hiseman formed a new trio band called JCM with guitarist/vocalist Clem Clempson and bass player/vocalist Mark Clarke. The band recorded an album ''Heroes'' late in 2017 which was released in April 2018. JCM began touring on 7 April.

Personal life and death

He was married to saxophonist Barbara Thompson from 1967. In May 2018 Hiseman's family reported that he was struggling with a

brain tumour A brain tumor (sometimes referred to as brain cancer) occurs when a group of cells within the brain turn cancerous and grow out of control, creating a mass. There are two main types of tumors: malignant (cancerous) tumors and benign (non-cancero ...

. He died at the age of 73 on 12 June 2018 in

Sutton, London Sutton is a town in the London Borough of Sutton in South London, England. It is the administrative headquarters of the Outer London borough, on the lower slopes of the North Downs. It is south-southwest of Charing Cross, one of the fourteen ...

, England from a brain haemorrhage, following surgery to remove the tumour.

Selected discography

* ''A Night in the Sun'' (1982) * ''About Time Too!'' (1991) With Jack Bruce * '' Songs for a Tailor'' (1969) * '' Things We Like'' (recorded 1968, released 1970) With Colosseum * '' Those Who Are About to Die Salute You'' (1969) * '' Valentyne Suite'' (1969) * ''

The Grass Is Greener ''The Grass Is Greener'' is a 1960 British romantic comedy film starring Cary Grant, Deborah Kerr, Robert Mitchum, and Jean Simmons. It was directed by Stanley Donen, with a screenplay adapted by Hugh Williams and Margaret Vyner from t ...

'' (1970) * '' Daughter of Time'' (1970) * '' Colosseum Live'' (1971) * ''Colosseum Live – The Reunion Concerts'' (1994) * ''Colosseum Live – Live Cologne'' (1994) * ''The Complete Reunion Concert - Cologne'' (1994) (DVD) * '' Bread and Circuses'' (1997) * '' Tomorrow's Blues'' (2003) * ''Live05'' (2005) * ''Time On Our Side'' (2014) With Colosseum II * ''Strange New Flesh'' (1976) * ''Electric Savage'' (1977) * '' War Dance'' (1977) With JCM * ''Heroes'' (2018) With Tempest * '' Tempest'' (1973) * '' Living in Fear'' (1974) * ''Under The Blossom: The Anthology'' (2005) ncludes both albums + BBC session recordings Tribute * ''Mike Taylor Remembered'' (1973), a tribute to Mike Taylor with Ian Carr, Barbara Thompson, Tony Reeves (2007) With United Jazz + Rock Ensemble * ''Live Im Schützenhaus'' (1977) * ''Teamwork (album), Teamwork'' (1978) * ''The Break Even Point'' (1979) * ''Live in Berlin'' (1981) * ''United Live Opus Sechs'' (1984) * ''Highlights'' (1984) * ''Round Seven'' (1987) * ''Na Endlich!'' (1992) * ''Highlights II'' (1994) * ''Die Neunte Von United'' (1996) * ''The UJRE plays Albert Mangelsdorff'' (1998) * ''X'' (1999) * ''The UJRE plays Wolfgang Dauner'' (2002) * ''The UJRE plays Volker Kriegel'' (2002) With John Mayall * ''Bare Wires'' (1968) With Peter Lemer Quintet *''Local Colour'' (1968, recorded 1966)

References

External links