Swingin’ Traps Man

Look at the first entries under “L” in the New Grove Dictionary of Jazz and you’ll immediately see a listing for “LaBarbera: Family of Musicians.” The LaBarberas include Pat, a saxophonist, John, a composer and arranger, and Joe, a drummer.

“As kids, we used to go to the library and check out (the late Times jazz critic) Leonard Feather’s Encyclopedia of Jazz and see the names of famous brothers, so I’m extremely proud to see our name in the Grove,” said Joe LaBarbera. He plays Friday with pianist Bill Cunliffe and guitarist Ron Eschete at Chadney’s.

Evincing a crisp, energetic yet efficient style representative of such personal heroes as Shelly Manne and Philly Joe Jones, LaBarbera is a top-level traps man who has earned this bit of self-regard.

While his brothers have performed with or written for drum masters Elvin Jones and Buddy Rich, Joe LaBarbera has graced ensembles led by saxophonist Phil Woods, guitarist Jim Hall, trumpeters Art Farmer and Chuck Mangione and Tony Bennett.

But the 49-year-old drummer, who lives in Reseda, said bandleader Woody Herman and pianist Bill Evans were his most important associations. He felt fortunate when he joined the Herman band in the early ‘70s, after attending Berklee College of Music.

“He was the greatest bandleader,” said LaBarbera. “He had a bunch of kids who all thought they were the Second Coming, but he had the ability to put up with them, let them work their stuff out, so he could get an end result.”

Before he moved to New York in 1977, where he became a member of Evans’ trio, LaBarbera spent five years with Mangione, a jazzman he had heard as a teenager in upstate New York. He recorded several albums with the trumpeter, including the hit “Chase the Clouds Away.”

“I joined Chuck when he was making a transition from jazz to a pop thing,” said LaBarbera, “and I liked the pop stuff because it allowed us to reach a larger audience and still play jazz clubs.”

In Manhattan, LaBarbera really came into his own. “I was accepted as a local rhythm player on the scene and I got to play jazz full time in town with great players,” he said. “That gradually grew into the Bill Evans gig.”

LaBarbera played for two years with Evans, whom many consider the finest of modern jazz pianists, until the artist’s death in September 1980, at age 51. He recorded numerous albums, among them Evans’ final studio session, “We Will Meet Again,” and the recently issued “Turn Out the Stars,” a six-CD set recorded live at New York’s Village Vanguard.

It was during a 12-year hitch with Tony Bennett that LaBarbera, in 1987, moved to Los Angeles, where things have turned out well. “I wanted to play good music with good guys,” he said, and he has. He leads a quintet that features sax man Bob Sheppard, trumpeter Clay Jenkins, bassist Tom Warrington and pianist Cunliffe (the band plays Club Brasserie in West Hollywood on Sept. 16).

LaBarbera particularly enjoys backing Cunliffe, especially when he plays keyboard with an organ sound, as he will at Chadney’s.

“It’s a ball,” LaBarbera said of the threesome, which worked Chadney’s last month. “And I like the drummer’s role, too. I have to put a lot of bottom in the sound and yet keep it swinging.”

Over the years, jazz has become his life. “I really wake up every day with a passion for the drums and for music,” said LaBarbera, who teaches drums and jazz history at CalArts in Valencia. “I am constantly looking forward to the next opportunity to play.”

BE THERE

Joe LaBarbera plays with Bill Cunliffe and Ron Eschete on Friday, 9 p.m.-1 a.m., at Chadney’s, 3000 W. Olive St., Burbank. No cover, one-drink minimum per show. (818) 843-5333.