by A. G. Lafley
The Zanzibar was very beautiful, and it had class. At night they dim the lights down. There was a lot of mirrors in there, and all the reflections looked pretty. Famous black talent like Bill Robinson, Ethel Waters, Bill Bailey, the Peter Sisters, the Nicholas Brothers, and Cab Calloway worked there often. Chappie Willet wrote the floor show as he did at the Ubangi.
Blacks were allowed to come in the Zanzibar, but they couldn’t get a ringside table unless they had a big name—like Joe Louis or somebody in that category. White sports people, movie stars, politicians, and money big shots always came in there. But no Lindy Hopper dancers. It was strictly the fox-trot crowd.
Most of the time ordinary people like tourists, servicemen, and office workers lined up outside a block long, but the place was sold out every night. When we took our intermission break and go downstairs to the Turf Grill, the people we saw early in the afternoon still be waiting to get in. Some never did get in. But the big shots—they got ushered right through—never a line for them.
Of the band members I remember, Kenneth Roane was on first trumpet—I worked with him in Cecil Scott’s band. Was one of those guys you had to be on your P’s and Q’s all the time. Very precise.
Lammar Wright was on third trumpet, and John Letman came in later on second. Lammar was playing even better then when he was with the Missourians. Very loose. James Whitney and Sandy Williams on trombones, but Wilber De Paris took over for Whitney later, and then Ed Cuffee replaced him.
Pinky Williams took baritone and his brother Skippy, tenor; Joe Garland, tenor; and John brown, string bass. Wilbert Kirk, a hell of a drummer, was in there, too, one of the best in New York. Claude was on piano—a total of sixteen pieces in the group. Benny Carter did some of the arrangements.
I joined Claude Hopkins at the Zanzibar, one of the biggest night clubs in Times Square, Nov. 1944. (Photo courtesy of Frank Driggs collection.)
My two months with Claude Hopkins was clean—no luggage problems, no schedules, no worries—just steady local work. A lot of guys told me Hopkins was very hard and outspoken, but I knew he was a Virgo, and Virgo people are very critical. If you do something wrong, he tell you about it. That’s for sure. I thought he was one of the nicest men I ever worked for.
In late December, when he cut down to six pieces because of that damn amusement tax, I took odd pickup jobs around town but returned to Hopkins at the Zanzibar many times during 1945 when he augmented.
Joe Glaser started getting after me again for some Louis Armstrong road work. But I wasn’t ready. Old Doc Desmond told me to rest, didn’t he?
25. The Bascomb Brothers’ Orchestra, 1945
I been thinking of making another test record for myself for a long time. Jay McShann was in town looking to line up some work and agreed to back me. Charlie Parker came along, and I also got drummer Gus Johnson and Gene Ramey on string bass. Went down to the Nola Studios, located on Broadway between 51st and 52d, across from Roseland. A lot of musicians always went there to make their tests.
I paid old man Nola for a two-hour studio session, but Jay, Charlie, and the others wouldn’t take money from me. I knew plenty musicians not half as good that wouldn’t cross the street without some bread first. I was going to call us Clyde Bernhardt and His Kansas City Buddies—because that’s just what they were.
We recorded my own vocal numbers: Triflin’ Woman Blues; Would You Do Me a Favor? and Lay Your Habits Down. Things were going along good until old man Nola started giving Charlie trouble on the fourth number, So Good This Morning. First he said he was too loud, then he was too close to the microphone. Finally asked Charlie to turn his back to the mike. Charlie got steamed right in the middle of that last number—told the man exactly what he thought of him. In detail.
That’s when Nola got real nasty and threw us all out. Handed me the glass disc, and we were finished. I paid for two hours but barely worked a hour, and the man wouldn’t give me no money back. Was damn unfair, and I knew I been cheated—worked my mind for months after that. Never could do anything with that test and it ended up in my drawer with the others.
I knew it might of been a big record for me, but it wasn’t to be.
After the New Year, I began to work steady with the Bascomb Brothers’ orchestra up in the Savoy for a good location job. Paul Bascomb was a top tenor player and highly rated. His brother Dud was on trumpet but usually stood out front and directed. He was quiet as a mouse. They were from Birmingham, Alabama.
Russell Gillum and a guy we called Popeye were in the trumpet section along with a white player, Larry Salerno. Bill Swindell, from Baltimore, Maryland, was alto and Johnny Hartzfield, tenor; James Whitney and Steve Pulliam, trombones.
I think Robert Harley was on piano. Isaac MaFadden was guitar and Nick Fenton, bass, both out of the Sunset Royals. Sammy Banks was drums, and Dave McRae, the section baritone, also handled the business for the band. It was sixteen pieces, but with guys all coming and going, I can’t call them all.
Later the band went under the name of Dud Bascomb—I think the Gale office changed it.
I remember one time, Russell Gillum and Popeye got to arguing bad on the bandstand. Now, the Savoy didn’t take kindly to trouble, from customers or band members. When they fell out on the dance floor, rolling around, punching out each other’s teeth, Jack LaRue ran over and grabbed them both. The guys thought they were tough but hadn’t met up with this giant bouncer. He booted their butts hard, picked them up, and tossed them down the stairs. Those notoriety boys never did come back to the Savoy. Or the band. Dud brought in Kenny Dorham and another trumpet the next night.
During March, the Brothers laid off like a lot of other bands was doing, so I took some short road-jobs with Jay McShann and his new band. Some public dances as far down as Washington, D.C. Still had good musicians in there, but it wasn’t like his ’43 band—didn’t have that Kansas City sound. All New York boys now.
When Jay laid off, I came back with the Brothers. Dud lined up a record date with Joe Leibowitz of DeLuxe Records that had offices out in Linden, New Jersey. The session took place in the WOR radio studios, 1440 Broadway in New York, in the later part of May, as I recall. Dud said he was going to record me doing one of my vocal numbers, but a few days before the date I got a call.
Dud Bascomb and his orchestra at the Savoy Ballroom, Jan. 1945. Left to right: Kenny Preston (v), Dud Bascomb (t), Courtney Williams (t), Russell Gillum (t), unknown, unknown, Popeye (t), Bill Swindell (as), Steve Pulliam (tb), Paul Bascomb (ts), James Whitney (tb), Clyde Bernhardt (tb), Dave McRae (bs). (Photo courtesy of Frank Driggs collection.)
“Clyde,” he said, “I got a hell of a number here that Dan Burley wrote. Likes your singing and wants you to do his song.” I was a little disappointed that he changed his mind. “I’m giving you the choice,” Dud continued, “but if I was you, I do Burley’s number. He can do a hell of a lot for you.”
Well, I always been a person that liked to please everyone, so I agreed. The number was Somebody’s Knockin’, and like Dud told me, it did very well.
Dan Burley was the theatrical editor for the New York Amsterdam News and a damn good blues pianist. He just came back from India and Burma and was playing my record of his song all over the place. Also got good air play around New York.
September 2, 1945, was VJ Day and the end of the war with Japan. I was playing a special broadcast that night with Claude Hopkins at the Zanzibar. Cab Calloway was the feature band and a act by himself. Dorothy Donegan did her piano act, and Pearl Bailey was the star attraction. It was a night to remember.
But I always thought it a strange coincidence that I was with Pearl the very day the war ended—and also started. A strange coincidence.
The Bascombs took the band on a good six-week location job in September to the Club Riviera in St. Louis, Missouri. Was the biggest black club in St. Louis, owned by Jordan Chambers, and was class all the way. Played the acts and dance sets.
When we got back, the Gale office wanted to take
me and James Whitney out to the Far East with the Jeter-Pillars band. Jimmy Jeter and Charley Pillars had this terrific orchestra, but I wouldn’t go. No sir. The war was supposed to be over, but I heard some of them Japs was still shooting our boys. I was scared and told them so—I never went out.
I got a call in October from Leonard Feather, the noted jazz writer and producer. Told me he liked that Dan Burley number I did on DeLuxe and wanted to do something for me. We met later at the Famous Door on the Street—West 52d Street, that is.
Gene Ramey and Ben Webster was working there, and Feather asked me to sing a number. When I finished, the club owner offered me a job, but the Bascombs had a good tour coming up so I turned him down. Feather promised to call as soon as he lined up something special.
The Bascombs were booked into Unit 259 on the United Service Organization circuit sometime in October, playing U.S. Army, Navy, and Marine theaters down the East Coast. We got paid over union scale, and our money came in every Saturday noon, wherever we were. If the bank was closed, somebody opened it up just to pay us.
We traveled by train, and when we got to where we were going, government busses picked us up. All reservations made by the USO. Stayed right in the officers’ quarters on the Marine bases, and our food was free in the officers’ mess hall. A good deal all around.
Besides the full Bascomb band, the feature singer on the tour was Rosa Brown, who been big in the “Hot Mikado” show in New York. Her material was somewhere between blues, jazz, and gospel, and I thought she was a hell of a entertainer. George Williams of the old George Williams–Bessie Brown vaude team was along, working with Smiles, a tall, brownskin guy. He was half the Smiles and Smiles team. They also had Strawberry Russell doing a novelty act, playing something like a cigar box. There was others on the bill, and we had a damn good show.
Late in November I got a call from Leonard Feather to do his Musicraft record date. The USO unit was in Richmond, Virginia, at the time, so I rushed down to the railroad station after the Saturday show and caught a train for New York. By 6 P.M. Sunday I was at Feather’s home going over his numbers. The session took place at 9 the next morning, November 26. It was a pickup group with top-name musicians, with Feather on piano and me on trombone and vocals. We did four songs, all Feather originals, and he featured my name large over the band on the record label. I helped him with some lyrics on Lost Weekend Blues, and he also gave me co-composer credit.
We finished by 1 P.M., and I was back in Richmond the next day. Didn’t get there in time to work the Monday night show, but Dud covered for me—told the road manager I was sick, or I been docked a day’s pay.
The USO tour ended in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, right after Christmas. I was glad it was over, because the weather was so damn cold—it was hellish. Dud wanted to play some dances in West Virginia, but I wouldn’t go. Georgia maybe, but not West Virginia—that was even colder.
When I returned to New York dead tired, something told me to go up to the Savoy and check things out. Right that very night. When I walked in the hall, Cecil Scott’s orchestra was just finishing a set. I went over to say my hellos to the fellows.
“Man, look who’s here,” said Henry Goodwin, “it’s old Clyde Bernhardt.” And all the guys came crowding around, smiling, patting my back, slapping skin. I couldn’t figure out why they so happy to see me—I knew how to get along, but they all treating me like family.
“Clyde, when you get back from that USO tour?” asked Cecil. In those days, everybody knew everybody else’s business. It was in all the trades.
“Came in on my own tonight,” I said. “They all still out there.”
“Got anything lined up?”
“No.”
“Good. We gonna have a opening right now.”
And Cecil turned around to Jonas Walker, his first trombone. “Walker, you on a two-week notice from now. And I’m paying you off, so this is your last night.”
I started backing off, because I didn’t care to take nobody else’s chair, but everybody stopped me. Told me this guy been giving all the fellows trouble and was hard to get along with, always drunk and evil, telling everybody to kiss his so and so. Just the night before, he and the other trombone, George Wilson, had a devil of a fight right out there on 140th near Lenox. Even though George beat the living hell out of him, Cecil didn’t like that kind of stuff, but good trombones was hard to find. So everyone was damn happy to see me.
All except Jonas Walker. He was the same guy that wanted to fight when Oliver took me over him. “He just a goddamn little slick-ass nigger always stealin’ my job,” he kept mumbling.
The next night I took over for him working a solid three-month location job. All because I had this feeling to check out the Savoy that very night.
26. The Blue Blazers, 1946–1948
Leonard Feather called me for a Pete Johnson record date he was supervising on January 2, 1946. We did five numbers up in the National Studios on 57th and Broadway. I was only a sideman this time, and Etta Jones took the vocals. The following month, Feather had me in on another session, this time for Musicraft.
It was April when Cecil Scott left the Savoy. Business was slowing down, and he started laying off like so many other bands were doing.
Times were changing—clubs closing, money was low. The soldiers all gone. Working people let out of defense jobs. Bands dropping men and cutting down to small groups. Guys all jumping bands. Even Cab Calloway—and he had one of the most popular bands around—wasn’t working steady. As good a band as Jimmie Lunceford had, he wasn’t working most of the time either. Not even Duke—I heard when he was suppose to be out on the road he was really laying off in Atlanta.
It was a changing time—for everybody. I scuffled around for any job I could scrape up. Even went with Jonas Walker when he needed a second horn on a job. Called me and I grabbed it. That’s the way musicians are.
One day I went down to the Gale office to see if they might need a horn player.
“We been watchin’ your records, Clyde,” said Ralph Cooper, who was booking bands out of Gale during the day. “Musicraft is promoting and they gettin’ good air play.” I knew that and was glad he did also. “Man,” he said, “I’d like you to put a small group together, maybe seven or eight experienced men, work up some special arrangements, and I think I can find you some work.”
Now, that surprised hell out of me. I thought about Harold Oxley in ’38 asking me to do the same thing, and how Louis Jordan kept trying to push me. Damn, I never wanted to be a boss—just too many problems. I saw hateful guys doing mean things to leaders. Keep trying them. Cuss them out. And if they did it to them, I damn well knew they do it to me. I was no better.
But this was 1946. New York City. Job offers getting less and less. I had to eat, and I was too proud to go on relief.
I liked playing in a smaller band—a guy has to be a better musician. Use more solo space. So I formed the Blue Blazers. I thought that was a hell of a name—a blue flame is hotter then a red one, and it sounded so damn good.
I got Joe Allston on alto; Freddie Williams came in on tenor, and then Stafford “Pazuza” Simon came in after him. He’s another that always twisted my name around. Liked to call me Heartburn. But if that made him happy, then I laughed also.
My trumpet was young George Scott, and after he went back with Luis Russell, I got Willie Moore out of the Erskine Hawkins Band; Horace Brown was piano; Joe Scott on bass (no relation to George), and Clay Burt on drums—all damn good readers.
Howard Biggs, who was arranging for Luis Russell, made up some hot arrangements for me. Knew how to make seven pieces sound like fourteen. Howard “Swan” Johnson did others, and Franz Jackson, Skippa Hall, and John Drummond arranged the rest.
Then I filled in with stock small-band numbers from the Music Exchange Store in the Brill Building. All kinds, not only jazz and blues, but new fox trots, standard waltzes, rhumbas, cha-chas, and other Latin numbers that was popular then. I bought some maracas and c
hop sticks, and Clay Burt put in a set of tom-toms. It cost me for all that, but I wanted it to be a all-around band, have something for everyone.
If a song was popular, we were going to play it. I eventually had over three hundred titles in my book.
We rehearsed every day beginning Monday, May 13, and I did what I could to make the fellows happy and keep harmony.
I would tell them: “If any of you boys think you can improve a number, let’s give it a try. We all gonna work together ’cause everybody’s important here. Just because the name Clyde Bernhardt is up front doesn’t mean I’m takin’ all the solos, like Louis Jordan. In my band, everybody gets a taste.”
I learned that from King Oliver. When musicians feel they are wanted and know their leader is a regular guy, that makes them relaxed. And better players. That’s what I was looking for.
When Willie Moore came in, he had the reputation as liking to bulldoze people—especially at the wrong time. But he was a Aries, and I knew Aries needed to get their credit. So I had a solution.
“Fellows,” I said, “I got a lot of things on my mind. Can’t think of everything and need your help.”
“What’s that, Clyde?”
“If you guys don’t mind,” I said, “I’m gonna put Willie Moore in charge of the brass section.”
“What?” Everybody laughed. There was only Willie and me in brass.
“Willie,” I said, “you a damn good blower. You got ideas, and I wanna give you a chance to bring them out. You can set your riffs, make your own changes, take your own solos—man, you in charge of brass!”
Willie was all smiles. “That’s it, man,” he shouted, “we gonna get this band goin’ now!”
Since that worked so good, I put Joe Allston in charge of reeds. That was him and Freddie Williams.