Patrick Berkery
By day, I am the senior newsletter editor for the Pennsylvania-centric news organization The Keystone. We aim to cover all things Pennsylvania, from how the decisions made by state legislators in Harrisburg impact the lives of Pennsylvanians, to all the great things to see, do, and eat throughout the state. It’s a big state with a lot to cover. My responsibilities involve highlighting the most important stuff our readers need to know each day in our newsletter (which you can subscribe to here).
By night, and sometimes during the day, I play drums. I’ve played everywhere from Tallahassee to Tokyo, at rooms so rancid that G.G. Allin would’ve thought twice about using the facilities, along with venues I actually tell my family about like Carnegie Hall. I’ve headlined, I’ve played last. I’ve played to thousands, I’ve played to single digits as though I’m playing to thousands (I adhere to that old showbiz adage ‘Play to 8 the same way you’d play to 13.’) I’ve played internationally renowned music festivals like All Tomorrow's Parties, Austin City Limits, Australia's traveling Harvest Festival, and Spain's Benicassim festival, and I’ve played strip mall sports bars.
I’m also the house drummer for Wesley Stace's long-running, New York-based variety show the Cabinet of Wonders. This very enjoyable assignment has seen me playing Stranglers covers behind comedian Fred Armisen, Velvet Underground and Dylan covers with actor Michael Shannon, and two of the greatest songs ever written, “Local Girls” and “Whole Wide World,” with the artists who authored and recorded them, Graham Parker and Wreckless Eric, respectively. Other towering talents I’ve backed at the Cabinet include Tony-award winning playwright/musician Anais Mitchell, hyphenate Isaac Mizrahi, author Rick Moody, and musicians Ted Leo, Suzanne Vega, G.E. Smith, Steven Page of Barenaked Ladies, Dan Zanes, Juliana Hatfield, Rhett Miller, Lee Ranaldo of Sonic Youth, Kat Edmonson, Steve Forbert, and Ethan Iverson of the Bad Plus.
Back to the writing thing: I was a contributing writer at Modern Drummer magazine for 15 years, writing cover stories and features on many of my drumming heroes like Stan Lynch, Hal Blaine, Mick Fleetwood, James Gadson, Martin Chambers, Pete Thomas, Alex Van Halen, Jay Bellerose, Max Weinberg, and more. My writing has also appeared on Salon, RollingStone.com, Philadelphia Weekly, and in the Philadelphia Inquirer.
