Bruce Springsteen Forum

Max Weinberg talks drums, The Boss & Conan
You might not expect the famed rock drummer from Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band to quote jazz pioneer Duke Ellington in an interview. But Max Weinberg, who on Saturday opens the Poway Center for the Performing Arts’ new season and spent 16 years as the musical director on TV’s “Late Night with Conan O’Brien,” is not a typical famous rock drummer.
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Where most of the other E Street members at the time were scuffling, along with The Boss, to earn a living, Weinberg was making a good salary drumming in the Broadway production of the rock musical “Godspell.”
“It was a big show, so I was making pretty decent money,” said the dapper drummer, who by day was then a business major at Seaton Hall University.
That all changed 37 years ago, when New Jersey native Weinberg successfully auditioned for the Springsteen-led E Street Band. The group’s breakthrough album, “Born To Run,” was still a year away. Times were hard.
“I took a huge pay-cut, but that was OK,” Weinberg said.
“When I auditioned for Bruce it was one of the most miraculous moments in my life. I’ve read where people with the Chicago Bulls or the New York Yankees would say how playing with Michael Jordan or Derek Jeter would raise your game, and Bruce is like that. He makes you do things you never thought you could so. So when I played with him that first night, in August of 1974, I found what I was looking for, in so many ways.”
Fondly introduced by Springsteen at concerts as “Mighty Max Weinberg,” the drummer simultaneously anchored and drove the E Street Band until it broke up in 1989. From 1993 until 2009, he did the same as the band leader and musical director for “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” and, briefly, on the ill-fated “The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien.” He balanced his TV show duties with touring, after Springsteen reunited the E Street Band in 1999.
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There is no doubt Weinberg takes enormous pride in his contributions to the E Street Band. But the only time the otherwise affable drummer sounded evasive in a nearly hour-long phone interview was when asked if the Springsteen-led band would continue, in the wake of the June death of band saxophonist Clarence Clemons.
“One of the great things is that we stayed together, mostly intact, Of course, we’ve lost two crucial members in the last few years, (keyboardist) Danny (Federici) and Clarence,” Weinberg said.
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