Russ Kunkel

He was born in Pittsburgh on September 27, 1948, and moved with his family to Long Beach, California, at nine. He played in school orchestra and in local bands at dances, played jazz in his last years at Long Beach Polytechnic High School, from which he graduated in 1966, and worked for John Stewart. In 1966 he moved to Los Angeles, and in the summer of 1968 his band Things to Come opened for 19 weeks at the Whisky a Go Go.

Through the producer Peter Asher he came to James Taylor’s sessions, where he played brushes on “Fire and Rain” and went on to drum on the rest of Sweet Baby James (1970) and on much of Taylor’s later catalog, including “Country Road.” In 1971 he played on Tapestry, and in 1971 and 1972 on Mitchell’s Blue and For the Roses. With Sklar, Kortchmar and Doerge he formed the Section in 1972; the group recorded three albums of its own before it wound down in 1977. Through the 1970s he was the studio and touring drummer for David Crosby and Graham Nash and played on all four of their studio albums.

His work from those years also includes Dan Fogelberg’s Souvenirs (1974), produced by Joe Walsh, on which he played drums on every track but one; Browne’s Running on Empty (1977) and the tour behind it; and Stevie Nicks’s Bella Donna (1981), on seven of its ten tracks. In 1984 he appeared in This Is Spinal Tap as the drummer “Stumpy Joe” Childs. On Trio, produced by George Massenburg and released by Warner Bros. in March 1987, he played drums on six tracks, including “Making Plans” and “Wildflowers.”

He has also worked as a producer, notably for Jimmy Buffett, and in 2004 he drummed on and co-produced the album Crosby & Nash. In 2010 he toured with Taylor and King on their Troubadour Reunion tour. In 2018 he, Kortchmar and Sklar joined the guitarists Waddy Wachtel and Steve Postell in the Immediate Family, which released Honey Don’t Leave L.A. that May, and he has played with Lyle Lovett. He is known among drummers for his clinics and workshops.