Artist: Bill Stewart

William Harris Stewart is an American jazz drummer.

He has performed with Maceo Parker, John Scofield, Joe Lovano, Michael Brecker, Pat Metheny, Lonnie Smith, Nicholas Payton, Bill Carrothers, Steve Wilson, Seamus Blake, Larry Goldings and Peter Bernstein, and Jim Hall. 

Stewart grew up in Des Moines, Iowa, and attended William Paterson University. After college, Stewart moved to New York, gaining wider recognition in John Scofield's quartet with pianist Michael Eckroth and bassist Ben Street and in a trio with Larry Goldings and Peter Bernstein.

Stewart worked with Parker from 1990 to 1991, touring and recording on three of Parker's albums. The association led to Stewart's gig with James Brown, who, upon learning where Stewart grew up, told him there "Ain't no funk in Iowa!” Another close associate is pianist Kevin Hays, with whom he performs, along with fellow WPC graduate, bassist Doug Weiss. The Kevin Hays trio has recorded five CDs and toured internationally. Musical associations with Lee Konitz, Michael Brecker, Pat Metheny and many other jazz musicians have followed. 

Stewart has a considerable output as a leader, beginning with 1989's Think Before You Think, with bassist Dave Holland, pianist Marc Copland, and saxophonist Joe Lovano, on which the drummer led a session of originals and standards, including one of his own compositions. 

In his next outing as a leader, Stewart assembled trumpeter Eddie Henderson, saxophonist Lovano, pianist Bill Carrothers and bassist Larry Grenadier for an entire record of Stewart compositions, Snide Remarks, which was chosen as one of the top ten jazz CDs of the year by Peter Watrous of The New York Times. 

The second Blue Note album to be released under Stewart's name was 1997's Telepathy, featuring Carrothers and Grenadier along with saxophonists Steve Wilson and Seamus Blake.