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Ed Shaughnessy, the drummer for nearly three decades with NBC's The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson has died.
AP reports that the jazz drummer who anchored the rhythm section of Doc Severinsen's Tonight Show band, died at his home in Calabasas on May 24.
William Selditz, a close family friend, told the Los Angeles Times that the 84-year-old suffered a heart attack.
Shaughnessy beggan his career playing with Billie Holiday, Benny Goodman and Count Basie. He replaced Buddy Rich, who called Shaughnessy "one of my all-time favorite drummers," in Tommy Dorsey's band.
From 1963 to 1992, Shaughnessy was a late-night TV fixture as part of the house band on The Tonight Show. Over his long career, he performed with Aretha Franklin, Jimi Hendrix, Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic, and George Balanchine and the New York City Ballet.
