Arnold David Clapman  

Equally at home playing Jazz, folk music, latino, salsa, AfroCuban, Gospel, R & B or Rock 'n Roll, Arnie's style blended traditional ethnic rhythms with his roots in 70's Fusion and Funk. He studied with noted drummers: Sabu Martinez, Julio Mendez and Babatunde Olatunji. He also was a resident drummer at the Katherine Dunham School of African Dance in NYC for a few months.

In recording studios, he rarely needed more than 1-2 takes and was always a quick study when rehearsal time was not possible. His career has spanned a gamut of musical genres from avant garde jazz with Abdul Hannan's "Third World", featuring David Ware, and Baird Hersey's "The Year of The Ear" to his Santa Cruz rock 'n roll bands, "Rico and the Rockets" and "Crazy Heart".

In the 1980's Arnie played with Ritchie Havens, accompanying him at venues such as the original Hard Rock Cafe, Studio 54 and Tom Snyder's Tomorrow Show on CBS. After moving to Santa Cruz Arnie continued to play with Ritchie at the most prestigeous clubs whenever he came to town.

At the present time, Arnie is playing modern Jewish music with noted Baltimore singer/songwriter Avraham Rosenblum and their band "the Brisket Brothers" as well as playing with the talented local young musicians like Avrami Finkelstein, David "DJ" Joseph and Betzalel Ben Huff.