Mickey Sheen; the Drumbeat Behind Major Figures of Jazz

Mickey Sheen, a drummer who worked with many of the major jazz figures of the last 40 years, has died. He was 59 when he died Wednesday of a heart attack at his home in Dix Hills on Long Island.

In the 1940s and ‘50s Sheen worked with the Benny Goodman and Coleman Hawkins bands and accompanied singers such as Peggy Lee, Vikki Carr, Barbra Streisand, Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher.

While in the service in 1946, Sheen was sent to Germany to join the Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band. In the late ‘40s, Sheen and Cy Coleman performed on as many as 11 television shows a week for NBC while also making recordings, commercials, sound tracks, charity performances and radio spots.

Sheen also worked with Roy Eldridge, Charlie Shavers, Bud Freeman, Marty Napoleon, Ben Webster, Lester Young, Dizzy Gillespie and recorded with Shavers and Sol Yaged.