Kansas City Lightning
Page 33
westerns enjoyed by, 70–72
Parker, Charles, Sr. (father), 42–45, 48, 106, 264, 308, 318, 328
death of, 317–18, 321
Parker, Doris (third wife), 212, 269, 270
Parker, Francis Leon (son), 232–33, 236, 244, 249, 253, 254, 256, 285, 318–22
birth of, 231–32
Parker, John “Ikey” (half-brother), 43–46, 48, 55, 106
Parker, Peter Christopher (grandfather), 42–43, 311
Parker, Rebecca Ruffin (first wife), 50–57, 59, 63, 68–71, 76–78, 81–83, 88, 91–95, 104–9, 116, 147–48, 164–72, 185, 229–36, 244, 249, 256–57, 264, 285, 311, 318–20, 322
Charlie divorced by, 319–20
Charlie’s leaving of, 253–56
Charlie’s marriage to, 104–5
Charlie’s visit to, 320–22
Francis’s birth and, 231–32
Geraldine letter and, 170–72, 229–30, 233
loss of second child, 233–36, 257, 321
move back with family, 320-22
pregnancies of, 167, 230, 231, 233–35
Pasler, Bus, 205–6, 218
Payne, Felix, 64
Pearl Harbor, 7
Pendergast, Tom, 6, 16, 42, 59, 64, 65, 68, 161, 163, 164, 267, 293, 317
Poitier, Sidney, 75
Porter, Cole, 213, 323
Pretty Boy (Wallis), 63
Q
Queen City Concert Band, 131
R
ragtime, 61, 123, 128–32, 135, 137 railroads, see trains
Ramey, Eugene Glasco, 7, 11, 21, 22, 24, 25, 30, 31, 33, 121–22, 152–55, 186, 223, 242, 246–49, 280–81, 328
Redcross, Bob, 119–20, 277–79, 329–30
Reeves, Edward, 44–46, 48, 50, 64–65, 87
Reisner, Robert, 47, 82, 83, 214, 227, 249, 308
Reno Club, 148–55, 161, 186, 204–6, 239, 249, 332
Renoir, Jean, 113, 303
Roach, Max, 325
Rodney, Red, 313
Rogers, T. D., 309
Roosevelt, Eleanor, 16, 283–84
Roosevelt, Franklin D., 8, 16, 284
Ross, James, 86, 94
Rowland, Beryl, ix
Ruffin, Daddy, 49–52, 55
Ruffin, Dorothy, 50, 53
Ruffin, Fanny “Birdy,” 49–54, 57, 59, 69–70, 76–77, 89, 91–94, 105, 230, 234, 319, 320, 322
Ruffin, Octavia, 50, 53, 77, 93–94
Ruffin, Ophelia, 50, 52, 54, 77, 91–92, 256, 322
Ruffin, Rebecca, see Parker, Rebecca Ruffin
Ruffin, Winfrey, 50, 53, 77, 92, 320
Rushing, Jimmy, 62, 141–43, 149, 179, 200
Russell, Ross, 85, 139, 140, 193–94, 241
S
sampling, 286
Savoy Ballroom, 8–9, 13–14, 16–17, 20–35, 292
Savoy Sultans, 23–24, 35, 301
Sax, Adolphe, 61
saxophone, 61–62
Schaap, Phil, 310–11
Schmeling, Max, 95, 96, 102–4
Schultz, Dutch, 293
segregation, 76, 80, 129, 196
Sign of Four, The (Doyle), 214–16
Simpson, Robert, 88–89, 94, 107, 147, 150, 163
death of, 147–48
slavery, 38, 124, 127, 129, 130, 133
Underground Railroad and, 262, 264
Smith, Bessie, 138
Smith, Buster, 60, 62, 141, 145, 149, 150, 155, 156, 186–93, 195–206, 209–13, 216–17, 219–21, 223–28, 240–43, 245, 249–52, 255, 256, 267, 274, 313, 332
move to New York, 250–52, 270
in New York, 286–87, 289–91, 295–96, 301, 307
Smith, Carl “Tatti,” 149
Smith, Jabbo, 182
Smith, N. Clark, 85–86, 140, 241
Smith, Tab, 228–29
Smith, Willie “The Lion,” 89, 185, 311 smokers, 218–19
Sousa, John Philip, 132
Southern, Eileen, 123
Southwest, 41–42 spook breakfasts, 218, 257
Stearns, Marshall, 87
Stewart, Dee, 223
Stewart, Rex, 24
Stomping the Blues (Murray), 311
Story of Philosophy, The (Durant), 278
Sulieman, Idrees, 316
Swing Rendezvous, 304
T
Tatum, Art, 38, 155, 184–85, 309–13
They All Played Ragtime (Blesh and Janis), 130, 131
Thompson, Big Bill, 118
Thompson, J. R., 234–35, 321
Tin Pan Alley, 289, 311, 323
“To a Dark Girl” (Bennett), 79–80
Todd, Oliver, 27, 88, 89, 94, 107, 115, 143–44, 146–47, 206–7, 209
Towles, Nat, 6
trains, 43, 129, 261–65
riding on boxcars, 201, 255–56, 269–70
Trent, Alphonso, 149, 190
Trumbauer, Frankie, 156, 157, 160, 211
Tumino, John, 22, 25, 26, 60
Turf Club, 292–93
Turner, Joe, 60, 61, 223
U
Underground Railroad, 262, 264
Unforgivable Blackness (Ward), 104
V
Valentino, Rudolph, 222
Victoria, Queen, 125
W
Waller, Fats, 109, 185, 200, 251, 311
Wallis, Michael, 63
Ward, Geoffrey, 104
Ware, Efferge, 223
Washington, Booker T., 85
Washington, Jack, 27, 62, 149, 150, 241
Webb, Walter Prescott, 40
Webster, Ben, 27, 62, 158, 305, 310
Wess, Frank, 161, 299–300, 315–16
West, Wild, 37–38, 42, 43, 126, 161
Parker and, 70–72
Wheatley, Phillis, 78
White, Voddie, 189
Wilder, Joe, 313–16
Wilkerson, George, 164
Wilkins, Barron, 293–94
Willard, Jess, 103
Williams, Bert, 119
Williams, Cootie, 35, 118
Williams, Fess, 100
Williams, Junior, 243–45, 270, 290
Williams, Mary Lou, 152
Williams, “Red” Rudy, 301, 302
Wilson, Dick, 62, 158
Wilson, Teddy, 310
Woideck, Carl, 330
Woodruff, Georgia, 309–10
Woodside Hotel, 12, 14–16, 18–20, 250–51, 290, 291, 307–8, 310
World War I, 275
World War II, 8, 283
Y
Young, Lester, 16, 27, 30, 62, 145, 149–50, 155–61, 179, 181, 185, 186, 193, 195, 198, 200, 202, 205, 211, 241, 242, 245–46, 248, 252, 253, 255, 270, 291, 296, 310, 312, 313, 327, 332
Young, Willis, 157
Z
Zephyr (neighborhood girl), 56–57, 92
Photo Insert
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
“A clean little Bird”: Kansas City, Kansas, early 1920s.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Charlie Parker, the young lord of Kansas City.
Courtesy Llew Walker at the Bird Lives website, www.birdlives.co.uk
Charlie’s mother, Addie Parker, who spoiled and protected him—even after he married, when he and his first wife continued to live under her roof.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Charlie with his half brother, John “Ikey” Parker.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Charlie with a neighbor, before the move across the river to Missouri.
Courtesy Llew Walker at the Bird Lives website, www.birdlives.co.uk
Rebecca Ruffin, who moved into the Parker house in 1934. When she first laid eyes on Charlie, she said, “I knew there was going to be trouble. I knew I was in love with him.”
Courtesy Llew Walker at the Bird Lives website, www.birdlives.co.uk
Lincoln High School, where Charlie played several instrum
ents in the orchestra before taking up the saxophone. “Charlie was looking for what he wanted to play,” Rebecca remembered. “He needed a feeling of what he had to do.”
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Bennie Moten (above right, and inset) and his Kansas City Orchestra in the summer of 1929, including vocalist Jimmy Rushing (left), pianist Bill Basie (fourth from left), and saxophonist Harlan Leonard (fourth from right).
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Walter Page’s Blue Devils, the Oklahoma City band that rivaled Moten’s organization in the early 1930s. This 1931 iteration of the band included bassist and bandleader Page (front row center, with trumpet), trumpeter Oran “Hot Lips” Page (front row, third from right), and saxophonist Buster Smith (back row, second from right), who became Charlie’s mentor.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Reno Club “spook breakfast” ad courtesy University of Missouri/Kansas City Special Collections and the Club Kaycee website, http://library.umkc.edu/spec-col/club-kaycee/JAZZSPOT/spook_01.htm.
The Reno Club on Twelfth Street and Cherry, November 1936. The Bus Moten band, led by Bennie’s nephew (left), is in attendance, Hot Lips Page at the microphone.
An invitation to the “spook breakfasts” at the Reno. Count Basie presiding.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
By 1938, Count Basie and his Orchestra had made it to New York. Here they are at the Famous Door on Fifty-Second Street that July: (left to right) Walter Page, Jo Jones, Freddie Green, Count Basie, Benny Morton, Herschel Evans, Buck Clayton, Dicky Wells, Earl Warren Ed Lewis, Harry Edison, Jade Washington, and Lester Young.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Jack Johnson, whose tenure as Heavyweight Champion of the World was complicated by his disregard for other people’s opinions.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Joe Louis, who cut a different figure when he claimed the title thirty years later, on the night Charlie and Rebecca were engaged.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Four saxophonists who paved the way for Charlie Parker (above and following): Coleman Hawkins
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Lester Young
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Chu Berry
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Buster Smith, Charlie’s mentor
Courtesy Llew Walker at the Bird Lives website, www.birdlives.co.uk.
Bandleader and saxophonist Tommy Douglas
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Trumpeter Roy Eldridge
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Pianist Art Tatum
Courtesy of James H. Fleet and Bird Lives.
Guitarist Biddy Fleet, who helped Charlie map the harmonic terrain of bebop.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Duke Ellington in 1931. “Bird was totally influenced by Duke,” said singer Billy Eckstine. “He could say things in a classy way and they worked. Duke made everybody want to have more class.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Singer Billy Eckstine
Courtesy Dwight Weaver/Miller County Museum, Miller County, Missouri.
Courtesy Dwight Weaver/Miller County Museum, Miller County, Missouri.
Courtesy Dwight Weaver/Miller County Museum, Miller County, Missouri.
Musser’s Ozark Tavern, the Pendergast-backed resort where Charlie worked several stints starting in late 1936. It was while working in the Ozarks that Charlie started to transform his sound.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Trumpeter Orville “Piggy” Minor, who observed Charlie at close range throughout his Kansas City years. Together they played in Buster Smith's band at the Antlers Club.
1940 tax photo, courtesy John Simonson, http://paris-of-the-plains.blogspot.com.
The Antlers Club. Musicians would take in the “freak shows” upstairs after hours.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Skinny in his high-waisted pants, just turning eighteen, Charlie (right) clowns around with drummer Jesse Price, who helped persuade Buster Smith to hire him.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Charlie with Gene Ramey, his frequent bandmate and traveling buddy in the Kansas City years.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Jay McShann, photographed on his trip through Chicago in 1939. Charlie had blown through town not long before; locals were still talking about him when McShann arrived.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
The McShann sax section at the Savoy Ballroom, New York City. Left to right: Bob Mabane (tenor); Charlie Parker (alto); John Jackson (alto); Freddie Culliver (tenor).
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
The Savoy Ballroom, the “home of happy feet” and the beating heart of Harlem, 1940.
Courtesy of the Frank Driggs Collection at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Charlie Parker in a photo booth in Kansas City, 1940.
About the Author
STANLEY CROUCH has been writing about jazz music and the American experience for more than forty years. He has twice been nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award, for his essay collections Notes of a Hanging Judge and The All-American Skin Game. His other books include Always in Pursuit, The Artificial White Man, and the novel Don’t the Moon Look Lonesome. His writing has appeared in Harper’s, The New Yorker, Vogue, Downbeat, Partisan Review, the New Republic, the New York Times, and elsewhere. Since 1987 he has served on and off as artistic consultant for jazz programming at Lincoln Center and is a founder of the jazz department known as Jazz at Lincoln Center. He is also executive vice president of the Louis Armstrong Educational Foundation. A recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, he is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a regular columnist for the New York Daily News.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.
Also by Stanley Crouch
NONFICTION
Considering Genius: Writings on Jazz
The Artificial White Man: Essays on Authenticity
Reconsidering the Souls of Black Folk: Thoughts on the Groundbreaking Classic Works of W. E. B. DuBois
One Shot Harris: The Photographs of Charles “Teenie” Harris
Always in Pursuit: Fresh American Perspectives, 1995–1997
The All-American Skin Game, or, The Decoy of Race: The Long and the Short of It, 1990–1994
Notes of a Hanging Judge: Essays and Reviews, 1979–1989
FICTION
Don’t the Moon Look Lonesome?: A Novel in Blues and Swing
Copyright
KANSAS CITY LIGHTNING. Copyright © 2013 by Stanley Crouch. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Grateful acknowledg
ment is made for permission to reprint the following:
“Hometown Blues,” lyrics by Jay McShann, courtesy of Hal Leonard Corporation
“To a Dark Girl,” poem by Gwendolyn Bennett, Courtesy of the Literary Representative for the Works of Gwendolyn Bennett, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations
“I, Too,” poem by Langston Hughes, courtesy of Random House
FIRST EDITION
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Crouch, Stanley.
Kansas City lightning : the rise and times of Charlie Parker / Stanley Crouch. — First edition.
pages cm
ISBN 978-0-06-200559-5
1. Parker, Charlie, 1920-1955. 2. Jazz musicians—United States—Biography. I. Title.
ML419.P4C76 2013
788.7’3165092—dc23
[B]
2013015773
EPub Edition October 2013 ISBN 9780062314062
13 14 15 16 17 OV/RRD 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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