Jazz drummer Rayford Griffin is an adept studio musician as well as bandleader who has worked with such musical luminaries as saxophonist Gerald Albright, vocalist Will Downing, and percussionist Bill Summers. Born February 6, 1958, in Indianapolis, IN, Griffin gained his love of music and discipline to practice from his minister father and Howard University music major graduate mother. However, most of Griffin's early musical guidance came from the recorded legacy of his late uncle, trumpeter Clifford Brown. Specifically, it was the drumming of Art Blakey on many of Brown's records that first inspired Griffin to become a drummer. From eighth grade through high school, he studied percussion with Tom Akins, principle timpanist for the Indianapolis Symphony, and by his late teens Griffin had developed a keen technical ability with all aspects of drumming. This, combined with a steady diet of everything from Blue Note recordings and the jazz-rock fusion of Billy Cobham to Jimi Hendrix made Griffin an already accomplished performing musician.