Horace Silver: siempre Horatio!

i feel that Horace was profoundly committed to melodic beauty, clarity, economy, soul, groove and creative hipness. his music proves exactly what his priorities are, you can ‘drop the needle’ at any point on any Horace Silver record and find these qualities in bright detail. he even named one of his pieces (from the 1975 album ‘Silver ‘N Brass’) ‘The Sophisticated Hippie’, and when i asked the great trumpeter Woody Shaw what it was like for him working with Horace, Woody noted that ‘Horace was like a soulful intellectual’.

i think that sometimes when a Jazz player is steeped in the blues and prioritizes the groove and doesn’t hide it, they can become critically pigeon-holed as being simplistic or not forward-thinking composer-improvisors. and of course nothing could be further from the truth with Horace Silver’s playing and writing – he consistently has something exciting, vital, earthy and inimitably clever for the people, for the musicians, and for the intellectuals all at once. and he does this always with such unaffected joy and uniquely personal humor. amidst it all his voice permeates his staggering recorded legacy and conveys the honest presence of both a spiritual man and a clever punster in all musical moments. never is Horace’s mind and quick-wittedness on auto-pilot. never does he miss a chance to add some ‘grease’ at the right moment, or to ‘spank’ the bottom of the piano in the sassy way only he achieves, to always ‘spark’ the band in the true spirit of the founding central voices of Jazz.

Horace is one of the dedicated geniuses who has made Jazz great, his recorded music lives on to heal and illuminate us forever.

Horace’s piano playing is perfection to me – never ever a ‘bad’ or uninspired note, everything he touches with an all-knowing warmth that imparts the same kind of healing rays as sunshine. Horace is so passionate, so absolutely, perennially in love with music and living wholly in the present moment with everything he comps and every note and phrase he creates. Horace, along with a personal shortlist of Cedar Walton, Sonny Rollins and Charlie Parker, is one of the kings of making hilarious and ingenious ‘quotes’ of sometimes very obscure and older, novelty songs or even radio show themes or commercials, and doing it in such a pure and honest and musically sound way that we love them for it! most ‘quoting’ comes off as redundant or even ‘corny’, yet ‘Bird’, ‘Newk’, Horace and Lord Walton are four Jazz masters who have shown the world a sophistication of humor that the rest of us can only marvel at and respect.

Horace is harmonically impeccable, yet in his autobiography ‘Let’s Get To The Nitty Gritty’, he makes it quite apparent how deeply he looked up to Thelonious Monk in regard to harmony and total musicianship. historically, as Jazz pianist-composers one could say Horace came along after Tadd Dameron and Thelonious Monk and before folks like Bobby Timmons and Cedar Walton.

along with his brilliant writing and arranging for trumpet-tenor saxophone quintets, his very individual sense of orchestration and his warm, dark employment of the middle-register of the piano created a sound and aesthetic upon which the Blue Note label of the 1950’s-’60’s conception was effectively built. Horace loves comping, and as he mentioned to Len Lyons in a published interview, in order to indeed become a great ‘comper’ (Jazz accompanist), one must truly take pleasure in hooking up the rest of the band, helping the rhythm section and the soloists get to ‘the thing’ as a team, not just be waiting their turn to play a solo!

when called upon to do so, i find it can be so difficult to name isolated favorite tracks. these days i find many young people asking to hear examples of some of the players who have inspired me. ‘i’ve heard you mention Sonny Clark. can you play me something of him?’ to a young person who’s never heard a particular one of the arteries of Jazz, my quandary then becomes: am i to recommend something athletic? or weird? something somehow sensational for sake of shock value? when an artist has the expansive emotional range of Horace Silver, it’s a tricky thing to endeavor to call attention to just one or two tunes. Horace is mostly known as a writer and leader of quintets. the thing is, his actual piano playing is incredible, as a piano player myself he is one of my personal favorites and pianistic heroes.

two of my favorite trio tracks of Horace are a swinger from 1959 with 20-year-old Louis Hayes on drums, called ‘The St. Vitus Dance’ from Horace’s Blue Note album ‘Blowin’ The Blues Away’, and also the slow ballad ‘Lonely Woman’ (by Horace, not the Ornette Coleman tune of the same title) from Horace’s 1963 Blue Note album ‘Song For My Father’.

my Dad

my Father introduced me to this music. his name is Bert Green, he was born in pittsburgh, pennsylvania, in 1928. he played the tenor saxophone with all his heart, and while he consistently showed me throughout my precious time with him a selfless admiration for any cat who could really play the horn, his musical hero and prime inspiration was unquestionably Lester Willis Young, ‘Prez’. recordings like the 1936 Count Basie small group session with ‘shoe shine boy’ and ‘lady be good’, his solos with the Basie orchestra in the late 1930’s into the early ’40’s, and most of all the dreamworld realm of Prez’s recordings with Billie Holiday, formed the core foundation for my Father as a tenor player. you could hear and feel it whenever he put that 1938 lacquer-barren selmer balanced-action tenor in his mouth. my Dad. pretty much my Father’s last words to me years later as he was dying in his bed at home, were ‘you’re a beautiful cat’. that’s what my Dad was; a beautiful cat.

he seemed to understand musical expression profoundly as a listener, be it Bartok or Slim and Slam, and as a player he swung and played the blues. he made no secret that he expected authenticity from me as a Jazz musician, as his ‘son-of-the-righthand-man’, which he explained to me is what my name, Benjamin, means.

he always wanted the very best for me. ‘in our household, music comes before medicine’, i clearly remember him telling me when i was around ten years old. he made sure i understood the importance of being able to read music. years later, in 1984 when i was 21 and on my first commercial recording session, i was thanking my Dad silently in my heart for what he’d shown me. i still thank him inside wherever i go to play or teach, he is right inside of me, more than ever before.

when i kept repeatedly coming back to the garage behind our house at the age of 8 or 9, to sit quietly with my dad as he sculpted and listened with an ear-to-ear grin to his Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker and Ray Charles l.p.’s on his portable phonograph, he and i both realized that i was fast getting the ‘bug’. once you have it, nothing can quite get inside you like the feeling of real Jazz, meaning that the improvisation truly swings and has some authentic blues feeling to it, as well as taking chances and spontaneously executing them with virtuosity. there is infinitely more to Jazz than i will ever begin to ‘know’, but i will and DO put my life on the line that with the removal of these essential vertebrae, calling something ‘jazz’ does NOT make it so.

one day, my dear Dad, with such a careful and caring tone which he maintained to me as a musician to the day he died, and honestly i still hear his voice inside me in each day of my life, told me ‘if you’re really interested in this music we’ve been listening to, you should understand that it’s a black people’s music. other people can play it and enjoy it; i do as you can see, but you need to know where it’s coming from’.

Betty Carter is in all truthfulness, whether i remember it in each day or not, effectively my musical mother. Art Blakey, Ray Brown, Oscar Peterson, Milt Jackson and Freddie Hubbard all blessed my life by inviting me to participate in their music, included me on their recordings and live shows, and Art, Ray and Freddie even recorded my original tunes on their records. i have something to share today because i got to play with the hardest swinging bassist and drummer in the history of Jazz; i got to feel this!

i have always wanted to belong and be included and be a part of The Music, black-american music, Jazz. anyone who has ever gotten to know me or been in my home, knows exactly what i’m about. i love classic Blue Note quintet records, and the sound and feeling of a trumpet-saxophone front line like Lee Morgan and Hank Mobley or Kenny Dorham and Jackie McLean, is what i love, and it inspires the music i write. i am a Jazz Messenger, my life is dedicated to Jazz.

losing all of Betty’s piano music

we had a wonderful rehearsal one afternoon, things were going well in the band. it was springtime, and it was a lovefest playing in Betty’s band at this time. in this moment, the band was my new family, my reason for being. my life was simple, i was young.

i was making ‘decent’ but quite steady money with Betty, so i splurged (i hadn’t a clue as to how much ultimately so in entering the taxi) and took a cab across the brooklyn bridge back into the village, thompson and bleeker, the intersection where the Village Gate and Lush Life were, for some reason, although in fact i lived on the upper westside.

just as soon as i closed the taxi door (‘don’t’ slam it, the door works fine!’ or a new york cabby will spurt some language in your direction), the driver briskly whooshed away to points unknown for his next fare.

BAM goes my heart. i feel lighter, i am carrying… nothing!

OH NO!! The Music. Betty’s Music. her piano book; her entire piano book of original big band parts from Gigi Gryce, handwritten charts from John Hicks… all of it –

gone.

no taxi receipt, no name of the driver, no cab number, no recollection of a logo for the company leasing this particular yellow cab.

it’s gone.

there are no words to describe the instantaneous feeling of failure-doom-inability to transcend the outcome of my unforgivable, unredeemable mortal blunder. it was plain and simply not my property to lose in the first place.

I was WRONG, and IT was gone.

nothing, nothing, nothing left to do, but face certain death – firing, some sort of banishment from living in new york, and for that matter, ever continuing my path as a professional musician.

selfish concerns? only that i had never considered that the way my life would end would be Betty Carter physically tearing me limb from limb. this was not going to be a good fate for my life. those were the selfish thoughts, but i honestly felt so overwhelmingly consumed by the worst flood of guilt you can imagine, and i knew that i had to telephone Betty immediately,

face the music of having blown not only my mere life, but of taking Betty Carter’s gift of inclusion in her musical world, and effectively ‘dumped’ all over it, and Her.

oh yes i was shaking. are you kidding?? dropping a quarter into the payphone in the phone booth at Thompson and Bleeker, i reached behind me to partially close the door to filter the noisy traffic.

i dialed 1-718… ‘Hello?’ it’s Her –it’s Betty–, the voice that had become maternal to me.

‘Betty, i’ve done a terrible, terrible thing, i must tell you, it is VERY, very bad and you will not be happy… there is NOTHING i can do, but i must tell you.’ i’m starting to cry a little, but my voice is fairly steady and somehow deeper than usual, from the diaphragm.

Betty: ‘what’s wrong, benny? are you alright?’

me: ‘well, Betty, i’m not alright because i’ve done something terrible that will definitely affect you’. kind of amazing i was able to be this coherent, but you know how things goes to slow motion in a crisis.

now Betty’s silent. ‘i’ve lost your entire piano book. i was in a taxi, i left it in the taxi, and it’s gone, Betty. i have no receipt or cab number, there is NO way for me to get it back. Betty, i am sorry, i know not to say that, but i don’t know what to do, other than to tell you that i am SO, so very sorry and… i don’t know what to do.’ it’s still silent on the other end. ‘i am sorry, Betty. i know there is nothing can say, i know you don’t want to hear my voice now, but i’m sorry. i don’t know’ —

“Are you alright?” says the Enlightened, highest manifestation of universal selfless compassion Betty instantly became. ‘me?’ i say in pure, genuine incredulity. ‘Yes, are You okay, benny?’. ‘well of course i’m NOT okay, because i’ve’ —

“Are you alright physically?”. now i’m the silent one. finally i try to say something in response to this most unexpected response from Betty ‘um, well…’ —

“Listen. if You’re okay, then i’m not worried about those pieces of paper. we’ll put it back together” [we’ll do it, she had said! there was still a ‘we’, oh my God, i’m still in Betty’s life, she’s speaking to me as a son. oh my God, there is salvation for Lois and Bert’s son.]

she continued, she has heeded the call and fully become mother Peace (may i NEVER sign off on another human’s potential character), ‘look, there’s still bass charts, i may have a few things here as copies. you’ll come over to my house, we’ll go case-by-case, and we’ll put the charts back together. as long as you’re alright, benny; Life Goes On’. and she sealed it with a real laugh.

“I Love You, Betty”. first time i’d ever uttered those words. “I Love You too, benny. now you try and relax yourself; go have a nice dinner, okay?’

bless You, Betty. i’m sorry i was not more appreciative of what you gave me. we traveled the world, and you kicked my ass. we played in every tempo and every key. you called me on it if i was falling into a ‘trick bag’ or repeating my licks. you made me THINK. you made me grow. thank you Betty. I Love You, I DO.

Betty or Art?

after that audition in which Betty hired me and changed my life, i had my 20th birthday in april of 1983, and we began rehearsing. She, Lewis Nash and David Penn were very cool to me, they were treating me as part of the family, although i was failing miserably at getting my ‘profile’ together, let alone any attempt of dressing as classy as Lewis Douglas Nash. i always wanted to belong and feel accepted as a part of this music, and i felt like i especially stood out being ‘white’, that i looked different from the people i wanted to be accepted as a brother to.

incredibly, the night before my very first gig with Betty, which was to be at the Tralfamador Cafe in Buffalo, NY, the switchboard operated ‘house telephone’ in my miniature apartment, #202 in bretton hall at broadway and 86th st., rang with opportunity. i didn’t yet have my new yamaha upright that my father paid for, there was only a single-size cot, a small cube refrigerator, a closet, and i shared a bathroom with other tenants (and cockroaches) down the hall. i didn’t mind these conditions in the least, it was liberating having my own space, my own clubhouse for the first time, plus i was living in New York City, with mighty living giants such as Dexter Gordon walking the streets; everything else was gravy, to say the least!

i answer the very short-corded grimy telephone, and the voice on the other end was Art Blakey’s pianist, my dear friend Johnny O’Neal, phoning long distance. Johnny tells me that 1) he’s ‘stranded’ (always a cliff-hanger with my friend) and 2) Art Blakey and the Messengers are playing at Mikell’s (a 12-15 minute walk at most, from my apartment to 97th st. and columbus) and “i’m gonna need you to ‘fill in’ (his words) for me with Bu tonight. can you do it?”.

mr. nubie here, greener than Green, would you believe that my first thought is: i need to have a good night’s sleep and be sure to be on time tomorrow morning at laguardia airport! i’m not kidding, that is what first went through my young mind. thank goodness Johnny was insistent. ‘benny, i really need you to do this for me. you know all the music, and you’ve been wanting to play in the Messengers, and i can’t be there, i need you to do this for me, please benny — i’m begging you” it was sweet of Johnny to throw that in there for good measure, and the man is calling me with a blessing and i’m so wet behind the ears that i’m thinking of being responsible and surprisingly i’m not literally bouncing off the walls that i have a shot to play with Art and Terrence Blanchard and Donald Harrison and Jean Toussaint and Charles Fambrough. instead, i’m thinking of being a good choirboy for my morning flight with Betty. where’s the odds in that? the best odds, i was soon to learn, the best of both worlds…

‘Johnny, you know i want to play with Art. it’s my dream, but i have a gig with Betty tomorrow, and Art might not even want me doing the gig.’

‘benny, i need you to do me this favor (favor?! hahahaha), i’m here in detroit and i need someone to cover for me, and you can do it – you know all the music. you’ll still be able to’ – then i interrupted, i was starting to come to my senses and become excited at the thought of playing with Art and the band. ‘Johnny, can you please call Art and see if it’s alright with him? because i don’t want to show up and then have him not wanting me to play with him, when i should have been in bed getting ‘a good night’s sleep’ haha. this is all real.

‘yes, i’ll call him’ says Johnny. ‘then will you please call me right back to tell me what he says?’ i say. ‘yes i’ll call you right back, benny. now stay near your phone, all right?’ what an angel. and poor johnny was probably running out of quarters, dimes and nickels; there is a strong likelihood that he was calling from a payphone.

ring… Johnny is affecting his most convincing maternal sales-pitch manner ‘benny, i talked with Art and he said he’d love to have you — he said it will probably be a real kick for you! you will have fun, benny!’

OKEY-DOKEY! i shower, gently pushing roach carcasses away with my brown flip-flops, jump into my one suit and tie, and walk briskly 11 blocks uptown and two long blocks east to Mikell’s. I’m going to play with Art! i arrive around 35-40 minutes before showtime, walk past the bar to the elevated stage in the back, where i’ve listened and watched the Messengers playing countless times before, where they were soon to record the album ‘new york scene’ with the great Mulgrew Miller playing the piano. Art is the only one onstage, he’s fine-tuning the positioning of his drums and no one in the club is bothering him. a record is playing quietly in the background, and some folks are just doing their thing at the bar and there are a few people dining in the other adjoining room on the 97th st. side with a huge glass window front. i walk towards Art, but i’m still standing on the floor level, and i just sort of plant myself there and wait for a directive from the man: Abdullah Ibn Buhaina.

he (who could read you like a book in i would say half-a-second) sees my position and demeanor, and gestures with a rather brisk but graceful easy swinging motion of his right arm and hand back to the piano (it’s sort of mounted flush against the back wall on it’s left, flat side and Art’s full drum set is basically in the middle of the small stage, with room for the three horns in front of him and for the bassist to stand sort of between us in the curve of the right side of the piano. Art simply and beautifully says ‘it’s all yours tonight!’ with a big, warm smile!

Welcome.

well, i did know the entire book, but outside of knowing all the arrangements and piano parts in my sleep, i didn’t really know what i was doing or have a clue in terms of comping. i would just sort of try to imitate things i’d heard James Williams and Donald Brown and Johnny do, and hoped it would fit while ‘Duck’ (Donald Harrison) and Terrence and Jean improvised, with mixed interactive results at best, i’d have to say. but just to feel that molten lava all over us and somehow within all of us coming through Art’s drums (he’d be inside you, as i’ve always felt from the records of the band with Lee Morgan, Wayne Shorter, Bobby Timmons and Jymie Merrit. Art would be playing YOU, he’s coming through every instrument in the band), Charles Fambrough’s (‘brosky’, although i never once called him by his nickname) powerful bass with his amp ‘cranked’, and the comet-like energy coming through the air from these three horn soloists — i was elated. all the guys were cool to me, they really were mature about the whole thing and no one ‘vibed’ me out that night, thank goodness.

dear and kind Donald Harrison actually had the thought to lean into the curve of the piano say to me ‘you’re a messenger now, baby’. what a gracious, big thing for him to do for me. thank you Donald.

at the end of this magical night in my life, Art’s wife, Ann Arnold, came to pay me $100, and she said ‘would you like to join the band?’

!!!!!!!!!!!!

i swear on my life, hand-to-God, it did not take me a full two seconds to take in that i’d just been offered to join THE band I’ve always wanted to play with, but that i had not only a commitment, but by now although we had yet to perform publicly, i felt a loving, familial relationship with Betty Carter. all in this split second i felt the miracle of maternal musical Love which Betty had shown my life in the past weeks of rehearsals. ‘thank you’, i say say calmly looking Ann straight in her eyes, ‘there is nothing i want more than to play with Art, but the thing is, i’ve been rehearsing with Betty Carter and tomorrow we’re going to Buffalo and then to Rochester. i’m playing with Betty now, and i can’t do it. but this is what i’ve always wanted, THANK YOU for asking me.’

Ann seemed taken aback, ‘this is the MESSENGERS. i’m offering you the job with Art and the MESSENGERS!’

‘i know’, i said to Ann, ‘but i must go with Betty tomorrow. thank you Ann. this is actually what i’ve always wanted’. ‘well, okay’ she conceded without further urging.

now most importantly i want to say, had i been like the proverbial dog with a bone in his mouth, who drops the bone to attempt to pick up its reflection he’s seeing in the pond below and winds up with no bone, that clearly, had i done the wrong thing and been greedy to play with Art when it was not truly yet my time, and effectively screwed Betty over in the process, i would have wound up with neither gig. instead, first things first and do the right thing, in the time and place intended for my life, i eventually got to play and tour with both incomparable great leaders, and more than just that i got to play with them, i got to learn, lessons which i am barely beginning to realize today in my life, human as well as precious musical examples, 30-plus years later, from both of two of the greatest leaders of young musicians in the history of Jazz.

all i had going for me at this time with Art, was merely that i knew the band’s book. i was not musically ready to be playing with Art, or Terrence, or Donald. i would have ‘covered’ until Johnny came back, been subsequently characterized, ‘photographed’ by my musical adolescence in the moment by Art and the guys, have utterly burned my bridge with Betty, become rather a laughingstock in New York, and i would not be writing this now.

life blessed me with opportunity, i did work hard from my heart for this, but everything we’re living is spiritual, and there is clearly something bigger and more interconnected going on than can be seen with the naked eye – music proves this to be so to me in my life. years later, during a moment when there were rumors during my 2 1/2 year tenure with Art that he was going to fire me, it was Betty Carter who came down to sweet basil’s on 7th avenue in the west village where we were performing, to get ‘up’ in Art’s face and tell him he’d be crazy to fire me. and indeed Art kept me in the band for a good year after that. thank you Betty.

by not being greedy, i got to play and be trained (and paid!) by miss Betty Carter for four glorious, challenging, calorie burning years, and then i got to play with Art. first things first.

what’s natural for Bags

it was the summer of 1978, i was 15, and my wonderful piano teacher at the time was Bill Bell, who had worked for some years as Nancy Wilson’s accompanist, which speaks quite well for him we can agree. Mr. Bell would place quarters on the backs of my hands, if they fell off as i played my scales for him, which would indicate improper motion, he’d slap my hands briskly enough to alert me, without actually constituting grounds for a harassment suit by 21st century standards in which it’s just about federally underwritten that kids govern their instructors. great teacher. i was not and am not a whiz with the scales, but thankfully Mr. Bell focussed primarily on the finer points which even back then my concern was directed towards – the Feeling of this Music.

one day Mr. Bell thought to mention to me that he’d be playing the piano with the GREAT Milt Jackson for an upcoming S.F. club engagement. ‘Bags’ – more than the king of the vibraphone, but one of the elite upper echelon of Soul, creativity, devastating groove, innate virtuosic genius spontaneous inventiveness, the consummate embodiment of phrasing, taste, simplicity and hipness of a divine order, and… what did i leave out? did i already say SOUL?

Mr. Bell informed me that he would in fact be a part of a local, san francisco bay area rhythm section which would accompany the Man at a nightclub in S.F., called ‘Christo’s’.

I WANTED TO GO. i HAD to hear Bags! come on, it was BAGS! in town!

BAGS!

one of of the two records of Milt’s that i’d been listening to at the time was ‘Very Tall’, with Oscar Peterson, Ray Brown and Ed Thigpen. Oscar’s hair was ‘conked’ in the 1961 album photo, it actually looked pretty slick to me and i imagined purple toned stage lights shining off it. the other record was one which my father had bought me, a second-hand copy of one the Modern Jazz Quartet’s greasiest, called ‘Blues At Carnegie Hall’. Milt was the angel masthead at the front of both of those quartet recordings. no one can ‘cut’ Oscar Peterson, yet if you listen not only to ‘Very Tall’, but ‘Reunion Blues’, ‘Two Of The Few’, and ‘Ain’t But A Few Of Us Left’ (one of both Ray Brown and Oscar Peterson’s all-time favorites of their own recordings, which Oscar ALWAYS had playing in his car whenever i was in it), you can see that, basically, Milt didn’t take no ‘stuff’ from Oscar. they were two undefeatable gladiators going at it with joy, class and laughter. Love. that’s what Jazz is. you can practice all day, and yet when all is said and done you play as you are, and how you feel, as Milt characteristically explained in a lot fewer words to me at the end of this story.

my father drove me into S.F. early to see how we could work it, for me to be granted entree to the nightclub as a minor. my dear dad, he flat-out assured me on the way there, that he would get me in to hear Bags, whatever it took. and we did not have a lot of money when i was growing up, so slipping a maitre’d $20 was not a tangible option. but Dad pretty much promised me, that we were going to get in, and that we were going to hear Bags. my dad, he was and is the BEST dad, ever. i come from angels, and just look at who has come into my life along the way…

we entered the street-level doorway. there was a long, straight staircase up to the club and restaurant. the doorman stopped us gently (i suppose a grease pencil mustache wouldn’t have quite gotten me over; i was a little guy). my father calmly and confidently asked the man at the door if the proprietor could please be summoned, to address the issue of me and him attending the show. in no more than a minute, the man who i’m pretty sure was actually ‘Christo’, came to speak with my father. my father explained that i was a student of the pianist who was performing in the club with Milt Jackson for the weekend, and, without even having perused the layout of the venue before, my father fortuitously asked ‘Christo’ if the two of us could lay low in a coat closet (really), and watch through an occasional opening.

kind Mr. Christo was agreeable! he gave us no hassle whatsoever about my dad’s proposed ‘seating arrangement’. even as a kid, i remember that i was totally knocked-out by the humanity. i’m telling you – angels. this guy, this man we’d never met, he must have been a real, genuine Jazz lover, he got the big picture – Milt, my teacher, the Music, me – he was in tune and he knew what was up. i swear, everything is easy with people who understand about Jazz, who really understand what This is.

as i’ve since recounted to Milt’s wife Sandy (S.K.J.) and her daughter Chyrise (Reecie), likely one time too many, my father and i took turns (i’d say 75% of the set he allotted for me), literally bending down and peering through a keyhole in a closet door, with a straight shot view of the very informal stage (area past the bar on the main floor). what struck me immediately about hearing Bags in person, this uniquely warm sound and feeling which like Louis Armstrong, once you’ve heard it, you’ll forever know in a few notes that it’s Bags, was that he swung the whole band and achieved his sound and feeling, which permeated the room, without playing loudly in the least. it seemed to me to be virtually acoustic; unamplified, but resonant like a M.F.! true resonance.

years later, on a cruise ship in 1995, when Milt and Sandy who is one of the most strikingly beautiful women on this planet inside and out (and who also like Milt doesn’t take any ‘stuff’) came to hear my trio and took a seat alongside the piano, Milt clearly found great pleasure (with big, repeated belly laughs which were always a welcome respite from his detroit-street scowl) in taunting me as Oscar Peterson and his angel of a wife and true partner Kelly, entered the room before ‘hit’ time, also to ‘check me out’, in taunted me with, ‘benny, you know that’s OSCAR PETERSON ’bout to listen to you?! hahahaha! that’s OSCAR PETERSON! HAHAHAHAHAHA, benny, OSCAR is gonna listen to YOU play right now, HAHAHA, you ain’t scared, man?! that’s OSCAR out there, man! hahahaha —

thanks, Milt. yeah, the term ‘f***ing with me hard’, would most definitely apply here. but He was one to talk of Oscar; Milt Jackson himself was seated right next to the low end of the piano keyboard. with Milt, Oscar, Ray, Art — people like this, kings like this, it’s all Love in the face of trial by fire.

my first opportunity to play with the great one, Milt Jackson, was at the old Bird Of Paradise club in Ann Arbor, Michigan. we were there with Ray Browns trio, and as Bags was nearby in Detroit, visiting with family in his hometown, someone arranged a funky old rinky-dink set of vibes, practically a xylophone, in hopes that Milt would sit in with us. Ray and Milt were true brothers, from their days together with the incomparable Dizzy Gillespie big band of the 1940’s, and they never looked back. Milt and Ray were, to say the very least, ‘thick as thieves’. Milt sat in with us and man, did it feel GOOD!! oh boy, this is what you live for.

he befriended me, i got to perform with him on numerous occasions, and was blessed and honored not only to be invited to play on his ‘Burnin’ In The Woodhouse’ CD, but that he was amenable to recording a tune i ‘showed’ him that i had heard on a Nat ‘King’ Cole trio recording, called ‘It Only Happens Once’, with an opening cadence akin to ‘I’ll Never Be The Same’.

once, after Milt virtually lit the stage on fire in a guest appearance with Ray’s trio on a concert in Japan, as we walked down a long fluorescently-lit corridor to the dressing room backstage, i was so utterly elated that i said to Milt, somewhat rhetorically, absolutely in awe, ‘Milt, man, i just want to ask you — how does it feel to swing like that?’

Milt turned around, never missing a beat, cool as a cucumber (no, cooler), and replied, ‘Natural’.

Cedar Walton and Dexter Gordon

i didn’t know Dexter Gordon and never got to play with him, but he is nevertheless a significant part of this story for me.

i was most fortunate in being befriended and in getting to know the great Cedar Walton. Jazz Messenger supreme, inarguably he is one of the all-time hippest, slickest, classiest, most brilliantly soulful pianist-composer-arrangers in the history of Jazz. his name and sound are synonymous with this music. he’s one of the people who’s made the music what it is today.

i really blew it, royally, for each of my first two opportunities to speak with the man. my initial faux pas occurred at the Keystone Korner in San Francisco, where i heard Cedar Walton many times, with his quartet, which included Bob Berg, Tony Dumas and Billy Higgins. also i heard Cedar at the Keystone Korner with the Timeless All-Stars, and on a special new year’s eve engagement by an inspired Jazz Messenger reunion: Eddie Henderson, Jackie McLean, Billy Harper, Curtis Fuller, Cedar, Dennis Irwin and Art Blakey.

when i finally gathered the courage to approach him it was probably 1979, so i was 16. on an intermission at the Keystone, Cedar was speaking with a very attractive young woman. i had blinders on to the fact that he was engaged in meaningful discourse, and just walked right up and interrupted ‘do you give lessons?’ – i didn’t even say excuse me or try to introduce myself, just the direct question and looking up at this man hoping for a safe landing.

‘no’.

‘oh… thank you!’ i said and walked quickly back to my seat. it still hadn’t hit me how clumsy and rude i’d been, all i could think was ‘i spoke to Cedar Walton!’

the next time i suppose went better but not by much. it was 1982 and i’d moved to New York a few months earlier. i wore my blue jeans to the Knickerbocker Cafe to nurse one glass of grapefruit juice from the bar all night which got me entre to stand right behind the piano and listen to the Cedar Walton and Ron Carter duo. they had made an album called ‘Heart and Soul’ and were playing much of the same wonderful repertoire and arrangements.

one of the songs they played that night, not on their duo recording, was the standard ‘Wonder Why’. i knew that i had an L.P. of the Jazztet playing the song, one of Cedar’s first recordings as a sideman, from 1959. ‘i’ll mention it to him’, i thought to myself in trying to get my opening line together, hoping for a reasonable excuse to speak with Cedar. really within it all, wanting to get to befriend him and ask him to somehow explain his musical wizardry to me.

i actually introduced myself like an adult, but i just wasn’t making a very good impression with the dirty jeans and self-maintained haircut. so i pulled out my ‘A’ material, ‘i heard you playing ‘Wonder Why’, i have the record of you playing it with the Jazztet, ‘Big City Sounds’.

‘i never recorded that song with the Jazztet’. ‘no, really’ bright boy continued, ‘i have the record, ‘Big City Sounds’, on Argo’.

for the second time, he responded succinctly ‘i never recorded that song with the Jazztet’. i could see that he was becoming annoyed. ‘thank you for the great music’. ‘you’re welcome’.

now here’s where Dexter Gordon helped my standing with Cedar Walton, and as i said earlier, i didn’t even know him –

the same year, i went to the Village Vanguard to hear Dexter Gordon’s quartet, and as was my way, i introduced myself and asked him if i could sit in. yes that was either very nervy or stupid, but i was far too insatiable to play with the real cats to even be afraid. ‘we’ll see how it goes, i’ll let you know’, said Long Tall Dexter to me in the kitchen at the vanguard. i bugged him more on the intermission. same stall from Mr. Gordon, which was graceful of him, when obviously i should have just been glad to be there listening, not pestering the giant to let me jam. but what he finally decided to do about me, proved to be a defining moment in my musical life…

at the end of his second set, i was sitting near the drums. anyone who’s been in the Vanguard know exactly where i’m talking about. Dexter, who was a physical as well as musical giant, comes over to me and he now knows my name – between me saying it each time i asked him if i could play with him, and the fact that Dexter had of course played with my namesake the great trombonist Bennie Green, he had my name in his mind, and he said in his deep voice ‘Benny Green, you want to play the piano?’ enunciating each word. i’m just looking up at him, shaking a little with nervousness (careful what you ask for) and slowly nodding my head.

‘well There It Is…’ says Dexter, motioning with his long left arm back towards the piano. everyone is still in the club. i walked up to the piano, trembling, and managed to play two tame choruses of a song Dexter had played earlier that night, ‘The End of a Love Affair’. i got up from the piano, ‘polite’ applause from the audience, and Dexter, who had stood there the whole time, let me know i was cool with him, ‘Benny Green, you’re gonna be aaaallright’.

Cedar was at the bar. i went once again to try to have a conversation with the guy who was probably my third childhood musical hero after Monk and McCoy Tyner. ‘say young man, you sounded good up there’. from then on, he treated me as a musician and encouraged me.

i asked Cedar for a lesson every chance i had. after repeatedly asking him over the years, once when we were both touring in Japan at the same time and met up backstage in Tokyo, Cedar offered, ‘let’s get together for that lesson you’ve been wanting. when will you next be in Los Angeles?’ he and his dear wife Martha lived on the west coast for a few years in the mid 1990’s. we made plans and he picked me up at the hollywood roosevelt hotel and drove me to his house – which was practically 40 minutes away! he didn’t charge me any money. ‘just watch my hands, and when you see me do something you want to ask me about, just stop me and say ‘that!’ and i’ll show you’. that’s just what we did. sweet Martha prepared broccoli rabe for us, but for some reason i had explained to Cedar earlier that i was going to need to leave soon to be back in L.A. for my show that night. Cedar then drove me all the way back, which meant 2 round-trips for him that day. then he and Martha came and hung out that night at my trio gig at the original Catalina’s bar and grill.

every time i’d see Cedar Walton after that occasion, he’d remind me of how i exited their home apparently oblivious the fact that Martha had actually cooked for us, that somehow he felt my action represented in effect that i was the artiste who was so self-absorbed that he couldn’t sit still for a home cooked meal. he would really let me have it and ‘lay into’ me if an audience of others were around. he’d retell the story to them – i couldn’t escape my history.

when Cedar passed, i phoned Martha. when i finally apologized for my blatant immaturity in having been oblivious to her spiritual and culinary offering on that day so many years ago, she just laughed and said ‘oh, but you were fasting. we understood!’ beautiful people. they really loved each other.

thank goodness for Cedar’s recordings. no one plays or writes so pretty and sexy as he, but we will bask in the light of Cedar Walton’s musical splendor forevermore. by nature of how he thought and lived, his music is forever fresh and filled with sunshine! we need his musical gift of everlasting pure joy and Love now and always, more than ever before.

Bish, my New York Father

my favorite records in the world are the classic era Blue Note records, with the instrumentation of trumpet-saxophone-piano-bass and drums, recorded between the mid-late 1950’s, basically beginning with ‘Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers’, going through around 1968, with what was about the last gasp of this Blue Note quintet era, Lee Morgan’s ‘Caramba’. it’s perfect music for me. when i compose this is often the palette which serves as my muse, imagining Hank Mobley and Lee Morgan in the front line for example, with Billy Higgins’ sizzle cymbal, as my inspiration. it’s reverberating inside me, you are what you eat, and i want to get closer to being inside of this feeling and sound as i grow.

one of these albums i listened to as a teenager in Berkeley was Jackie McLean’s ‘Capuchin Swing’, with Walter Bishop, Jr. playing the piano, contributing two swinging originals for the date. as Miles had done by featuring Red Garland in trio interpreting Ahmad Jamal arrangements, without his trumpet present for tracks on his own trumpet-led recordings, with ‘Ahmad’s Blues’ on ‘Workin’ With The Miles Davis Quintet’ and ‘Billy Boy’ on the ‘Milestones’ album, Jackie featured ‘Bish’ playing his own trio version of ‘Don’t Blame Me’ at the close of side one of the l.p., with no horns — the ultimate show of respect from a horn player on their own date, to their pianist.

i love that track, and i began to consider Walter as a link to Charlie Parker, Miles and Jackie, that he actually comped for them on their records. he was one of the real cats, but he wasn’t coming to California to perform at that time, i couldn’t go hear him at the Keystone Korner in S.F. as i could Cedar Walton and Horace Silver, also living piano exponents of the Blue Note era and sound.

so when i would fantasize about moving back to my hometown of New York City, prior to hearing Art Blakey at the Keystone and instantly KNOWING i’d be moving, i’d imagine looking Walter up somehow, going to hear him play live in a club, meeting him and asking him for piano lessons.

well, fast forward to the late spring of 1982 in New York, at the Jazz Forum, a loft on the corner of Broadway and Bleeker, where my saint of a big brother, the bassist John Donnelly, and i eventually became two-thirds of the house rhythm section for the tuesday jam sessions hosted by Jo Jones, Jr.. Art Blakey, to whom i was soon to be introduced at this club by his pianist, the incomparably gifted Johnny O’Neal, lived around the corner in a building called the ‘bleeker courts’. here it was! my first chance to hear Walter Bishop, Jr. live — my self-slated present link to the past when i had sat in the sun on the grass lawn behind our family’s home in Berkeley, with my walkman headphones on, dreaming of New York back in the day. Walter was playing the piano with the Bill Hardman-Junior Cook quintet, with Paul Brown (‘Bish’ interpreted his initials as ‘perfectly beautiful’) and the drummer was the son of trumpeter Ray Copeland, Keith Copeland; a sweetheart of a gentle soul.

wow, Walter had this big spread to his chord voicings, the very same chords i’d heard him play on Charlie Parker’s ‘My Little Suede Shoes’ — but i was hearing the sound bouncing of the wooden floored, brick-walled loft LIVE, in person! wow wow wow! NEW YORK! BEBOP! HEAVEN! i actually felt so much pure Love for Bish’s piano playing, that i was for once NOT shy to meet someone! i introduced myself during the intermission. Walter was so personable and i immediately wanted to learn to speak just like him. honestly, to this day, people try to ‘place’ my accent, and no one gets it right. in New Orleans, they think i have a Brooklyn accent. in New York, they think i have a New Orleans accent. time to set the record straight: Walter’s West-Indian, Sugar Hill Harlem accent has had more influence on the sound of my speaking voice as a man than my own parents’.

he was agreeable to lessons, and handed me an old-school New York business calling card. i phoned and made an appointment. he said the lesson would be $30, but that he would not watch the clock, that the money would be sufficient re-numeration regardless of how long our lesson became. the day came, and i arrived. Bish lived in the manhattan plaza twin apartment complex’s; his building was the 9th ave. one, at west 43rd st. in hell’s kitchen. his apartment was 33Q. he greeting me at the door, a warm smile but also with a serious vibe. he simply gestured to his upright grand piano, and said ‘play something’.

what in the world ELSE was i going to play BUT his arrangement of ‘Don’t Blame Me’ from ‘Capuchin Swing’. in a much softer, higher pitched voice, he leans over my shoulder,’that’s -‘ ‘i know’, i interrupt his voice, ‘it’s YOUR arrangement, from Jackie’s record’. ‘man, you listen to that?’ he seemed mildly incredulous (i imagined it was because i didn’t play something like ‘maiden voyage’, as much as i showed him instantly more than told him, that i was quite sincere in my interest in HIS music, if you dig me). the lesson sort of flew by. it was in fact the beginning of a loving father-son relationship. he eventually would introduce himself by saying ‘i’m his new york father’ wherever we went clubbing together in new york. Bish.

at the close of my following lesson, when i reached into my right front jeans pocket and pulled out my neatly folded $10 and $20 bill and handed it to him, he gently pushed my hand away, ‘let’s not keep it on this level’, he said. huh? what does that mean, i thought? i don’t understand his syntax here at all, so, i hand it to him again and, my voice shaking a little because i simply don’t comprehend the communication. now Bish looks a bit disturbed, and he raises his voice in slight but distinct first-level anger, ‘I SAID, let’s Not keep it on This Level!’. he refused money from me after our first meeting. he was indeed my link to Bebop and the days when Jazz was the mainstream music of New York. he was my friend and my first living hero after my own biological father. he Loved me, and i Love him. i wish i’d spent more time with Bish once my ‘career’ moved into high gear by the mid ’80’s. i loved Bish and we had the best hangs, but i had not yet lost a beloved friend, and didn’t quite grasp that he’d eventually die. i miss how he treated me. it was pure love. writing this now reminds me to do better with the living angels in my life. i Love You Bish.

Buhaina: entering the club

my first time hearing Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers in New York was in the early summer of 1982, at the Jazz Forum. the place was jam packed with hipsters and elegantly attired folks who seemed so exclusively ‘inside’. a new arrival amidst such established community, i felt quite alone within myself, but i KNEW that just as with putting on a good record at home, as soon as the band started playing, i’d feel connected and that my soul would instantly feel every bit as welcome here as the insiders and musicians in the audience who all seemed to recognize and acknowledge one another conspicuously, making sure everyone could see that THEY were upper crust, and if not onstage with Art, still somehow ‘important’. you could not help but want Art to think you were cool, or at least have everyone believe you were part of his inner circle. if you knew you didn’t have it goin’ on like that, you’d try to stay in the periphery of this strongest of auras. as always at a Messengers show, there was a buzz of unparalleled anticipation throughout the room. it was ALIVE, it was SO alive and potent, this presence, this wholly Jazz atmosphere. oh boy it was a deep thing to be around Art Blakey. there is nothing else like this; i want to say to anyone reading this who wasn’t around in those days, you can trust what i’m saying, it was just about surreal, the vibe in the room before Art even showed up, every time. now when he got there, well, it was ON, everyone knew this; everyone. somehow, every time Art was playing, there was such an unspeakably strong communal feeling in the room, it was somehow collectively felt, understood, that everyone was in store for some mighty powerful magic. no one in the audience seemed to have a particularly casual attitude — it was an event — i swear, there was this anticipation in the air that you immediately submitted to and became a part of. i can honestly say there was an air of Jazz history about to take place, and we were all going to receive this wave of sunlight and be left with a sense of profundity.

when Art would enter the venue, the smell of his ‘Grey Flannel’ cologne would literally fill the air, but you DUG it, you wanted it to overwhelm you, you were there to FEEL something. and there you are, you’re in the magic. you are in the right place at the right time for Jazz. ‘they see you before they hear you’? well, with Art, you’d smell that Grey Flannel and of course it would draw your attention to Art’s dominant presence, but even more than that, if you were at all hip and therefore it was NOT your first time hearing Art live, sense of smell being such an associative memory catalyst, you’d be awakened and even MORE vividly reminded of the truly timeless, thriving Jazz atmosphere you’d been blessed by through Art and the Messengers before, and believe me it was a continuing saga being represented by the Jazz Messengers; you’d feel Clifford Brown and Lee Morgan in the ROOM, man. Art was SO deep. one could fascinate in his most colorful, charismatic personality there ever was, but the MUSIC — with Art and the Messengers, you felt so utterly connected to the greatness of the past as well as witnessing yourself submitting to the unmistakable sense that THIS, the music played tonight, what the cats WITH Art were puttin’ down, was where Jazz was truly happening on the planet tonight. the Messengers show was the ONLY place to be, or you were kind of a loser, Jazz-wise, at least that’s how it was for THIS messenger. playing with Art, you were driven to reach so much deeper to project your sound than you’d thought you had it in you to do with any other drummer, and all the while Art was giving shape and sweeping, glorious dynamics to the tag-team sequence of one soloist’s closing statement giving way to a clarion entrance of the next cat. Art said that our improvised solos should, as in writing a letter, have a declarative opening statement of some sort; a greeting or salutation, this becomes a main body or the core, and then a strong closing which the next cat gets right up in and takes charge from. the thing is this: you’re SAYING something — it’s a MESSAGE. and dare i explain how it swung? Please listen to a Messengers record, listen to “Free For All”, as Art said on more than one occassion, ‘seeing is believing, but HEARING is a M.F.’

somehow i’d arranged with the club owner, Mark Morganelli, that if i stood and left the seating at tables and what i remember as being a particularly long bar (where i’d eventually be introduced to the man himself by his pianist the great Johnny O’Neal – thank you, dear old friend, for this) open for paying customers, i could attend shows at the Forum for free. and you know what? it was always real Jazz in there, Mark actually had exceptional taste in the real deal he brought in the Jazz Forum; strictly the greatest Jazz musicians he could afford, all i would say were branches of the Thelonious Monk-Dizzy Gillespie-Charlie Parker-Bud Powell tree. i arrived early and took my place, a perfect view of the piano keyboard (my appointed eventual destination, that was where my head was already at). oh yeah i was just a punk kid shabbily dressed with no hairstyle or swagger whatsoever, but i tell you i REALLY, really was committed to the marrow of my bones that i would be a messenger one day. so i was there, with my sony walkman bulging out of my down jacket pocket, ready to check and do my homework — profile was not an issue, i was there to be invisible and receive what was for my own self the gospel truth. in hindsight, i will now say that i was already a messenger in my heart, i felt and was deadly serious, yet i was green as a baby tree frog.

there was space for me just past the far end of the bar from the elevator entrance. the Messengers began to show up, mostly individually, maybe there’d be two cats together, but it was pretty much a ‘One By One’ procession of the best dressed young brothers you ever saw. three piece suits, pocket squares, tie bars, italian shoes… what’s funny now as i write this 30 years later, is that us young folks who were showing up to listen and marveling at the entire oeuvre of the Messengers with Art as the generator of this fire, this sophistication, would speak in hushed tones, ‘those cats have $400 suits; they got it like THAT!’.

Betty: how all it began

i was playing with a singer at a club in seaport, long island in february of 1983. she had her very cute daughter in tow. i remember that the girl was named Arlen after the great songwriter, she was just maybe a year younger than i, but she was quite precocious i’m certain of that. as was consistently the case back then, i in fact missed her every clear cue to me. i was a 19-year-old piano nerd, studying with Walter Bishop, Jr. (‘Bish’) and Walter Davis, Jr. (‘Humphrey’) both during the same time frame. how about that? a kid could have piano lessons with some actual beboppers back then, and i DID realize that this was a magical time in my life, i DID pay attention and knew intuitively that i would remember as much about their playing and attitudes, personal style, speech and mannerisms forever. the club was called ‘sonny’s place’.

completely out-of-the-way locale, right? well, somehow, of all things, Betty Carter, who lived on st. felix st. in the ft. greene neighborhood of brooklyn, across the street from the brooklyn academy of music, just happened, miraculously for me, to be hanging out with some friends, driving, and they saw the ‘Live Jazz’ sign on the marquee, and decided to come in, have a couple drinks (i suppose someone other than Betty was the designated driver), and check out the music.

it was a rather modestly-sized, narrow club, with a good vibe; a real ‘joint’, and the small stage had about three wooden steps you had to climb to mount it. they had a pretty fair small brown grand piano; it had a heart to it, and i was having a good time playing with the cats, who happened to be my two roommates in an east greenwich village 6th floor (i believe) walk-up apartment at 13th st. & avenue A. my ‘big brother’ of a friend and such a patient and tolerant person to me, the bassist John Donnelly, had driven me and himself across the country to both move to new york city from berkeley the previous spring. and our illustrious drummer and roomie was Jo Jones, Jr., the son of ‘Papa’ Jo Jones, who virtually invented the hi-hat in Jazz and is the trunk of the tree in the pantheon of playing Jazz brushes. Jo was something; he had been to prison and been a heroin addict and had the best stories and knew ALL the real cats in town and would try to ‘school’ me about how to carry myself on the street, and how to be ‘cool’ with the older cats and not too geeky. all sorts of things Joe tried to help me with, probably as much not to dilute his own profile for associating with me, as to help my ‘game’.

someone definitely came halfway up those steps and leaned in to tell us that Miss Betty Carter was in the audience. as with fair Arlen, i was actually oblivious to this exchange, i was surely making like ‘schroeder’ in the peanuts-charlie brown cartoon; the self-absorbed piano playing kid with the bust of beethoven on his piano with Lucy would constantly break while trying to distract his music passion for amorous endeavor, and never losing the battle to the siren. i had absolute tunnel vision. sometimes i wish i had maintained a bit more of that discipline. but again; hadn’t bitten the apple yet so it was easy, it was just how i was.

but somehow, after we played the next tune, the last of the first set, i did think to make a bee-line for the dressing room sofa and to lock myself in there. i was quite frightened to meet her. finally, someone came and got me; it was time for the second set. i did my best to robotically make a straight and uninterrupted line to those steps, if i could just do that, i figured, i’d be safe. between the second stair step and the stage floor (i’m sure i skipped the top step to get back ‘home’ to the piano bench, someone tapped me on my back, firmly and pointedly enough that i couldn’t play it off.

i turn around, and Betty is behind me (now i’m facing her, having turned around) on the club floor level. i think i can remember verbatum: “hello young man, i’m Betty Carter”. my turn; ‘hello Miss Carter, it’s an honor to meet you. thank you for coming to hear us play’. heart is fluttering. “you sound pretty good. do you have a phone number?”. ‘yes, i obediently replied. i was kind of excited and as well trying to appear professionally poised (in my blue jeans and sneakers!). i actually had business cards which my mother had encouraged me to get and had ordered and paid for before i moved back east, with ‘BENNY GREEN  piano’ written on them, allowing me to write in a current number, in a small soft brown leather card case which she had also bought me. can’t attribute any lack of professional appearance on my part to my mother whatsoever; she has always done her best with her unruly, gotta-do-it-my-own-way son, and is herself a classically stylish dresser. “my secretary will be in touch with you soon. i’ll be auditioning for a new piano player”. wow. i suddenly felt more confident about my playing, and it was an exciting second set for me! don’t remember what became of Arlen that night, but she gave me at least one more chance to at least be a ‘mannish boy’ with her a month later or so, but i only knew how to mess up with girls, never could i even quite figure out how to let a sweet vibe ride its course with the girls back then, only how to broadcast that the piano was my girlfriend.

her secretary phoned and set a date two weeks hence for me to come to Betty’s home in brooklyn. her (maiden) name was Gayle Curry. Gayle was such a stunning knockout and she knew it. she was a year older than me but she was quite a woman. i had a mad crush on her and later on a few occasions she would accompany me to bradley’s to bug the great piano players to let me sit in. and i did get respect from the brothers for her being by my side (b.g. MUST be a bad m.f. for this woman to be giving him the time of day, i liked to imagine the cats were thinking). but she dug Lewis Nash, Betty’s drummer who was soon turning the ripe old, worldly age of 25. with his smooth, vegetarian, eastern meditative ways, vintage tweed jackets, francincense oil and a very masculine confidence unmistakable within his peaceful, gentle demeanor, he was, and IS, so cool. so i suppose i couldn’t blame her. we all dug Gayle, she was a sweet and sexy girl, Betty’s ‘secret weapon’.

i now had two weeks to pool my financial resources of around $50-$60 (which could certainly buy more than half a dozen used l.p.’s in 1983), scout out Betty Carter records, LISTEN and PLAY ALONG. i wanted to do my good work and land the gig. and i had already groomed myself to prioritize and practice with records by then, as i was preparing for my long-term goal of being a Jazz Messenger.

i bought ‘The Audience with Betty Carter’, ‘Whatever Happened to Love’, ‘The Betty Carter Album’, ‘Now It’s MyTurn’ and ‘Inside Betty Carter’. i immediately sensed a powerful energetic battery in the axis of Betty and the very, very great pianist John Hicks on a few of the records. somehow between Betty and John, there was an undeniable spark. ah so — this is the vibe, this is the world i want to enter to connect with Betty musically, i was positive.

the magical day arrived, i took either the #2 or #3 train from 14th street in manhattan to the big hub which includes the long island railroad, the atlantic st. station in brooklyn with the huge clock tower you can see for miles, and walked the block-and-a-half to her brownstone. her music room and piano were on the second floor, you would walk up this beautiful long, creaky brown wood staircase, then make a semicircle to the left, and then you were there. she introduced me to Lewis, who i was already aware of from his great playing on the ‘whatever happened to love?” record, and David Penn, a soft-spoken young gentleman of west indian background i believe. Betty liked her ‘guys’ in the band to dress and behave with dignity. she said ‘why don’t you three play some, i’ll be downstairs making some chicken.’ Lewis soon turned me onto vegetarianism and while Betty accepted his not eating the chicken she would occasionally make at home for rehearsals, she would truly read me the riot act, loudly and dramatically, if i was refraining from meat. i would basically have to eat some bird for fear she’d one day actually hit me.

oh, was it fun jamming with Lewis and David; i had never played with such a hip and crisp rhythm section — they made me wanna PLAY. i think we played Herbie Hancock’s ‘The Eye Of The Hurricane’ from the ‘maiden voyage’ blue note record. my teacher and self-proclaimed ‘new york father’, Walter Bishop, Jr., had a photocopy of Herbie’s original chart for the bright F minor blues, which i had memorized. we played at least one more tune if not two, then Miss B.C. appeared in the room. ‘you guys sound like you’re having fun’ she said, with measured enthusiasm; so far, so good, i thought to myself. i felt that i still had a shot, but of course i’d yet to accompany her for one bar of actual her singing.

‘let’s try reading some things’, she said, and we proceeded. she scoped me out on ‘Tight’ and another tune, then said it was time for a ballad. ‘gentlemen, when we play this next tune, i want you to think about the last time you made luuuuuuv…’ she purred. she turned in my direction, looked me squarely in the eyes, and said ‘You… just use your imagination’!!!!!!!!

after the ballad in which i imagined how it would feel to make love and tried to channel this into the accompaniment, Betty said ‘okay, i’m satisfied. would you like to join the band?’ and that’s when my life truly began.