Biography
David Getz joined Big Brother & the Holding Company as its final recruit on drums, and he alone among the members had already built a thriving livelihood outside music. A native New Yorker, he spent his childhood in Brooklyn’s Flatbush neighborhood, where exposure to Alan Freed’s broadcasts sparked an early passion for rock & roll during his early teens. Deeply engaged with Native American traditions at the same time, Getz discovered that his pronounced aptitude for drumming bridged the two realms. By fifteen he was already a working, card-carrying union musician who performed across every style, among them Dixieland jazz. Parallel to these gigs he honed his visual-art skills at Cooper Union and additional institutions in New York, ultimately receiving fine-arts degrees from the San Francisco Art Institute well before any professional music work. He nevertheless maintained an active jazz schedule in off-hours, even traveling to Poland for study.
While employed as a teacher, Getz received the invitation to replace the band’s first drummer, Chuck Jones. For the next two and a half years he drummed through Big Brother’s ascent, marked by San Francisco engagements, subsequent East Coast dates, a Mainstream Records contract, and the eventual Columbia signing that delivered national prominence. Following the departure of Janis Joplin, he experienced the group’s decline, later spending a period with Country Joe & the Fish. Throughout, he kept his visual-arts vocation in view. After devoting most of the 1970s to assorted musical projects—including a cabaret duo with his wife—he redirected his primary focus to painting and related media in the decades that followed. Occasional appearances with Country Joe McDonald, Barry Melton, and others have continued, along with tours by the reunited Big Brother, even as his studio work in the visual arts remains ongoing.
While employed as a teacher, Getz received the invitation to replace the band’s first drummer, Chuck Jones. For the next two and a half years he drummed through Big Brother’s ascent, marked by San Francisco engagements, subsequent East Coast dates, a Mainstream Records contract, and the eventual Columbia signing that delivered national prominence. Following the departure of Janis Joplin, he experienced the group’s decline, later spending a period with Country Joe & the Fish. Throughout, he kept his visual-arts vocation in view. After devoting most of the 1970s to assorted musical projects—including a cabaret duo with his wife—he redirected his primary focus to painting and related media in the decades that followed. Occasional appearances with Country Joe McDonald, Barry Melton, and others have continued, along with tours by the reunited Big Brother, even as his studio work in the visual arts remains ongoing.
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