Rashied Ali, free-jazz drummer, dies in NYC at 76

Free-jazz drummer and John Coltrane sideman Rashied Ali has died in New York. He was 76. His wife, Patricia Ali, says he died on Wednesday afternoon at Bellevue Hospital of a blood clot in his lung.

Free-jazz drummer and John Coltrane sideman Rashied Ali has died in New York. He was 76. His wife, Patricia Ali, says he died on Wednesday afternoon at Bellevue Hospital of a blood clot in his lung.

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Ali joined John Coltrane's group in the mid-1960s during the saxophonist's late period of avant-garde jazz experimentation.

He recorded with Coltrane on the 1965 album "Meditations" and on "Interstellar Space" in 1967.

After Coltrane died in 1967, Ali toured Europe before returning to New York.

He ran the jazz club Ali's Alley before it closed in 1979 and continued to perform and record until his death.

Ali was born Robert Patterson on July 1, 1933, to a musical family in Philadelphia.