15 Facts About Jim Chapin

James Forbes Chapin was an American jazz drummer and the author of books about jazz drumming.

Jim Chapin is in the Percussive Arts Society Hall of Fame and was posthumously inducted into the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 2011.

Jim Chapin was born in Manhattan, New York, the son of Abigail Forbes and painter James Ormsbee Jim Chapin.

Jim Chapin did not begin playing the drums until he was 18 years old, after being inspired by drummer Gene Krupa.

Jim Chapin left Bard College in early 1938 after skipping classes regularly in order to obey a massive compulsion to batter a set of drums that a classmate had left set up in the gymnasium.

Jim Chapin was a student of Sanford A Moeller, a rudimentalist who popularized the Moeller method.

Jim Chapin performed on occasion with his sons, Tom, Steve and Harry Chapin who was on a career high as one of the more notable singer-songwriters of the 1970s and a founding member of the World Hunger Year.

Jim Chapin continued traveling around the world teaching and presenting seminars, including teaching Peter Criss, after he left the group Kiss in the early '80s.

Jim Chapin was a fixture at music trade shows and percussion conventions.

In 1994, Jim Chapin received two honors for his contributions to music and education: the American Eagle Award, presented by the National Music Council in Washington and a lifetime achievement award from the Berklee College of Music in Boston.

Jim Chapin was the father of ten children, including musicians Harry, Tom and Steve Chapin, who are the children of Elspeth Hart, the daughter of Kenneth Burke.

Jim Chapin was the grandfather of Jen Chapin and two of the three members of the Chapin Sisters group.

Jim Chapin was the direct descendant of Deacon Samuel Chapin.

Jim Chapin died on July 4,2009, in Florida a few weeks shy of 90 years old.

In 1971, Jim Chapin published Advanced Techniques for the Modern Drummer, Volume II, Independence: The Open End.