by A. G. Lafley
It was February 4, 1975, that Jay’s wife, Ada, called. “Pray for Jay,” she said. “He’s in the hospital in critical condition.”
I was shocked when Jay Cole died that night. Felt like a bad dream. Never did find out the cause—he just left suddenly and was gone. And so was a good friend.
Earl Knight took his place in the band for a while, and then I brought in Jimmy Evans.
It was sometime in April that Princess White called again. “I hate to move,” she told me, “but my doctor said it be better not to climb all these stairs. I was hoping you could loan me two hundred dollars to get out. Pay it back when I can.”
“Can’t do that Princess,” I told her, “but know who might. Doc Vollmer got us booked in a few months, and I’ll ask him to put you on the show. If you play that job you could earn the two hundred on your own.”
“Two hundred dollars for one job? In my best days I never made that in a week.”
“Well, that’s what you get now.”
“Honey, who in hell wants to hear a old lady like me sing?”
“You might be older then me,” I said firmly, “but I know later things then you. There’s a damn big audience out there that wasn’t even born when you retired. They don’t know the rep you had and all the shows you been on. They wanna hear good old-timers like you perform. That’s who wants to hear you sing.”
“I wouldn’t know what to sing, no how. I’m not up on the current songs.”
“No, no, Princess,” I interrupted, “you gotta use the songs that made you famous. Like Peepin’ in the Wrong Keyhole.”
“I remember that one. I also did Every Woman’s Blues.”
“That’s it!”
“And Sittin’ on Top of the World.”
“Yeah, that be good, too.”
It was quiet for a while. “Well,” she finally sighed, “hard times make a monkey eat red pepper.”
And so she agreed. I told Doc Vollmer the next day: “If this woman can still sing, we gonna have a sensation.”
While Princess was getting herself ready, I went on a tour to Europe as a sideman with Barry Martyn and his “Night in New Orleans” show for the month of May.
It was a damn good show with some musicians playing solo spots with their trio or mixing together in Martyn’s three bands: the Legends of Jazz, the New Orleans Marching Band, and the New Orleans Society Orchestra. The last was led by trumpet man Leo Dejan, who played old A. J. Piron arrangements. We dressed in different uniforms depending on what band we played in. Barney Bigard was on the show, so was Ralph Sutton, Art Hodes, Cozy Cole, Alton Purnell, Louis Nelson, Wingy Manone, and a whole gang of other musicians.
The people all liked the show. It had so much to offer. We played all over England, Germany, Austria, Holland, and Belgium.
I remember we once worked in a giant circus tent for the Gent Festival in Belgium. It was one of the biggest jazz events in all Europe. Just before the finale, Barry Martyn came over and asked me to fill in with a blues vocal to stretch the program. Got some of the guys together, told them the vamp I wanted, the key, the chords, the changes, and did my 5–10–15 Hours number and almost stopped the show. Man, those Europeans about went crazy.
I saw Barry back there holding up two fingers so I went right into You Don’t Know My Mind. The guys riffed and just followed along—stop-breaks and all. The people thought it was a special arrangement, and I had to bow off or there be no time for the grand finale.
As I walked off stage, I saw Wingy Manone running about. Came right over.
“What in living hell you doing singin’ my goddamn blues?” he shouted as his face all twisted around. Wingy had the reputation as a Southern white that could be loud when he wanted.
Maybe some of those New Orleans boys be scared of him, but not me. “Your blues?” I asked, looking him straight in the eye.
“That’s right, my blues. I invented the blues!”
Now, I don’t know who invented the blues, but I damn well knew it wasn’t him.
“You a damn liar,” I shouted back. Those other New Orleans boys all started coming around, not used to hearing anybody talk to whites like that. Manone didn’t know I had Indian and a few other colors in me, and that’s a mighty combination. I continued hollering: “I was born in the South too, been hearing the blues long before you ever born. Don’t hand me that bullshit.”
For the moment I forgot he was about a year older then me, but he didn’t know that. And I sure didn’t care.
“You understand what I say?” I continued. “And if you don’t like me singing blues, go tell Mr. Barry Martyn. He standing right over there. That man hired me, not you.”
Never had any more trouble on the show. That’s the way you got to treat guys that want to discredit people.
And Barry had me do a vocal number in every show after that for the rest of the tour.
After I returned to the States I went up to Doc Vollmer for band rehearsal along with Miss Rhap and Princess White. That was early in June. When Princess got up to do her number, I thought she sounded just about like I remembered her some forty-two years before—she belted those blues like she never left the business.
We played the Connecticut Traditional Jazz Club concert June twenty-first at the Holiday Inn in Meridan, Connecticut. Princess had on this pretty new purple and black gown she made. Rhap wore her long white silk dress, and I had my white suit with the two pleats in the back and dark brown alligator shoes. Feature performers, all of us, only Princess White wasn’t on the billing. She was to be a surprise walk-on guest.
I sang Tishomingo Blues and Yellow Dog Blues. Rhap did her theme, Brown Gal, and then Bye Bye Baby. The audience showed their appreciation with long, loud applause. The band played a set of jazz, pop, and blues standards, and before each song I mentioned the famous singers I saw that sang them: Ma Rainey, Mamie. Bessie. And I included Princess among the list of names.
When it come time to close the show, I came forward and made this announcement: “Ladies and Gentlemen,” I said, “I have a big surprise for you. In the house tonight is one of the greatest of all blues singers. I been knowing her since I was a boy and she’s still singing today. May I present the legendary, PRINCESS WHITE!”
And up she stood to a round of applause, walked briskly down the aisle and up to the mike.
“Thank you very much,” she said. “This old band leader here thinks you might wanna hear this ninety-four-year-old gal sing some songs.” The audience gasped on hearing her age and gave her a loud cheer of approval. “I been doing this for a living more years then I can call and these boys wanna get me back into it—now I gotta learn it all over again.”
She sang her Peepin’ in the Wrong Keyhole, and man, that woman knew how to work a audience—moving around, shouting, smiling, making them laugh. Pointing with authority. Frowning. Singing lines like she just wrote them the day before. Was like the old days again at the Community Theater in Badin.
When she finished, those people just about went out of their minds. I tell you, she upset that house. Everybody stood up, whistled, stomped, applauded.
Princess couldn’t believe the reaction she was getting. “Wait just a minute,” she hollered over the shouts, “wait a minute. I got one more for you.”
Then she went into Every Woman’s Blues, and that was such a sensation it even woke up the few Negroes sitting there. Her power was everywhere. After another number she closed with Sittin’ on Top of the World to another standing ovation and had to beg off, flashing a big smile across her face.
She got so excited that Rhap had to get her a drink of water as she returned to her table, and Barbara Kukla, Rhap’s friend, kept patting her head with a damp paper napkin. Somebody else was fanning her.
We all came home that night knowing in our hearts the show was a success. The girls took a hotel room up there and came back the next day, just as a precaution for Princess. They tell me a few numbers we did that night came out on the Connecticut Traditional Jazz Club
label, including one by Princess. It was her first recording in almost ninety years of show business.
The Harlem Blues and Jazz Band in rehearsal at the home of Dr. Albert Vollmer, Larchmont, N.Y., 1975. Left to right: Clyde Bernhardt (tb), Doc Cheatham (t), Barbara Dreiwitz (tu), Tommy Benford (d), George James (as), Jimmy Evans (p). (Photo by Andrew Wittenborn; courtesy of Dr. Albert Vollmer.)
After that, she called me almost every day asking about when the next job was coming up. Said she was making more gowns, even taking a new publicity picture of herself. “Honey,” she said, “you gonna be blessed as long as you live for helping out this old person.”
On August 26, we all played before the New York Council for the Performing Arts and then out in Harbor Island in Mamaroneck, New York. Princess got so excited at that show she danced and strutted a whole chorus number up on stage. In November when we did the Overseas Jazz Club in New York’s Hotel Biltmore, she broke out laughing at those old, saucy lyrics she was singing. And she wrote some of them herself some sixty years before. I had to stop the band a few times while she had a good belly laugh.
Everybody went in the studio again for three more record sessions: September 11, 16, and October 9, 1975. Dill Jones came in on piano for the last session.
I’ve heard a lot of critics say there’s no way a white man can play the blues. Or sing the blues. See, I know they’re wrong—guys like Dill Jones, Art Hodes, Jack Teagarden, and many others play more blues then many black guys can. A few years ago I heard a great blues singer down in St. Petersburg, Florida. When the other guys found out he was white, they were damn surprised. I wasn’t. Feelings don’t know no color.
We recorded a gang of songs at those three sessions. Instrumentals and vocals by Princess, Rhap, and myself. All heavy on blues and jump numbers.
I told Doc to change the name of his label to Barron, the name I used on my early singles which went over so big. And I had him print the album in green, my lucky color. He took my advice and the album was a smash. A big seller.
It was nearly Christmas of 1975 when Princess had her heart attack. When I visited her, she was sitting up in a hospital bed in a flowered jacket, hair all made up in a bun, reading glasses hanging around her neck, and was telling off her nurse.
Finally she turned to me. “Honey, pay no mind to all this. It’s not my first heart problem and won’t be my last. This old gal be out of here soon and you can count on me for more jobs.”
Unretouched studio portrait of the legendary Princess White at the age of ninety-four when she joined the Harlem Blues and Jazz Band, New York City, 1975. (Photo courtesy of Sheldon Harris.)
She was in the hospital about a month and stayed at home for a few more.
The Emelin Theater job in Mamaroneck was scheduled for March 21, 1976. I got a call from her about a week before the date.
“What time you gonna pick me up?”
“Now Princess,” I begged, “take it easy. You still weak. Rest up and maybe later I have something for you.”
She didn’t take kindly to that. “No damn snot-nosed rascal,” she shouted, “is gonna tell this woman what she suppose to do and what she not suppose to do.”
I thought I was a little old at seventy to be called a snot-nosed rascal, but I always respected my elders. I let it pass.
She continued: “I want that job, and you or nobody else is gonna tell me no. If the Man upstairs wants me, He take me if I’m working or sitting in a damn old rocker by the window.” And she hung up.
When Doc picked me up for the Emelin date, Princess was in the car. She didn’t say a single word, so I didn’t either.
It was at least a half hour before Doc broke the ice. “Pretty quiet back there,” he said. “Nobody talkin’ to anybody today?”
“Nobody spoke to me when he got in back here,” she said coldly.
“Nobody said hello to me either,” I answered, “and I sure ain’t done nothin’ to nobody for it.”
She laughed. “You sure ain’t, honey. You been good to me all the time I knowed you.” She took my hand. “Hello, Clyde,” she said.
We put on a fine show that night. Rhap was in good form and I did my best blues. Dill Jones was suppose to be on piano, but he got hung up someplace, and Jay McShann, who Doc brought along, filled for him.
When Princess came out to do her numbers, I played her get-on music. Doc put a chair on stage but she stood next to it, erect as always, looking beautiful in her long, fancy gown she made.
“Thank you folks,” she said slowly. “My doc told me to take it easy tonight because I just turned ninety-five.” The audience was shocked because nobody known her true age.
She sang her song firmly, but I thought a little on the weak side. After another song, she looked out over the audience with a faint smile as they kept applauding wildly.
“You have to excuse me,” she said, “but I got these old butterflies in my stomach tonight. I’ll take a short rest and come back and do more for you later.”
As the audience continued to shout and stomp, I played her get-off music, and she slowly walked off stage. Cheers still ringing throughout the theater as I glanced around and noticed she collapsed in Rhap’s arms. In another moment she was flat on her back and Doc Vollmer was giving her mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. People all running about. A ambulance was called. Firemen ran in from across the street with oxygen.
They tell me I kept playing her get-off music all the while, but I don’t remember that. I knew she was gone.
Many people spoke nice things about her at her funeral, but they hadn’t known her more then a year. I read her obituary in the New York Times and in British papers too. They knew her now. Heard people talking about her everywhere—how great a singer she was and how famous she been in her day. And how she almost started a new career. Got standing ovations wherever she went. Made records in her nineties.
I brought her back, just trying to do good. Now she was gone.
Her death took something out of me. All I could think of over and over were her words: “Who wants to hear a old lady like me sing?”
After Princess died I did other jobs with the band. Also went out again with Barry Martyn and his show with tours in England, Belgium, Holland, and Germany.
When I returned, I worked the Philadelphia Folk Festival in August with the Harlem Blues and Jazz Band that was later shown on national television.
It was on September 16, 1976, that the band left from Kennedy Airport for its first European tour. Franc Williams, George James, Tommy Benford, Dill Jones, Barbara Dreiwitz, and myself made up the group. Rhap was our extra added attraction. We were ready for the big test.
We arrived in Hamburg to see a German band waiting for us at the airport playing hot jazz numbers. Flowers for Miss Rhapsody. Newspaper reporters all over the place, asking questions, taking photographs. The next day we were headlines in all three of Hamburg’s leading newspapers. Pictures on the front page and all.
When we played a local jazz club in Hamburg, they had to stop selling tickets it was so packed and jammed. People fighting to get in. From there we went to Copenhagen and worked in and out of town for about ten days. Also did a television show in Copenhagen on September 19 with Wild Bill Davison.
In Stockholm we played about six different concerts at the Atlantic Musikcafe, which was bigger then the Zanzibar or Cotton Club in New York, and it was sold out every night. Bosse Stenhammar, the owner of the place, seemed to like my singing and kept after me and Doc to add more blues to the program. On the way back, we worked some London dates.
Everyone we met over there was so wonderful and appreciative. One man in Sweden showed me a program of Edgar Hayes he saved when I played there in ’38. Was so crazy about that torn paper, wouldn’t let it out of his hands so I could make a copy—scared it might fall apart.
Some of those people seemed to get hysterical during our shows, acted like they were overtaken by our music. Loud jumping up and down, screaming. Some run up while I was singing and s
tart to hugging and kissing me—a few guys on this side and two or three old gals on the other. Could hardly finish my blues. I knew they didn’t mean no harm, but I never been grabbed like that before, and I must say, sometimes I got afraid. But I didn’t let them know that, they were really nice people. Just carried away.
In my whole career I never dreamed someday I would get so much attention from fans wanting to shake my hand, asking for autographs. Invite me to their homes. Knowing about me—even have books with my name in it. They knew me better then anyone in my own country, that’s for certain.
Doc Vollmer was my strength during that first tour. And to the band, also. If he didn’t speak the language, make accommodations, keep guys moving, adjust everything to make it all fit—I couldn’t of gone through the tour. He made it possible for all of us to be the sensation we were—without big problems or even little hassles.
I respect him for that.
From then on, the Harlem Blues and Jazz Band was in demand. Johnny Williams came in on string bass to replace Barbara Dreiwitz, and for the next few years we worked mostly jazz concerts, festivals, college dates, clubs, and dances all over. Played the Glen Island Casino in New Rochelle. Came into New York’s West End Club for a time. Often worked over in New Jersey. Played a lot up in Westchester for private parties and outdoor events.
And every year the band returned to Europe for another long tour, working in and out of England, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Sweden, all through the continent. With some studio recordings, radio, and TV appearances, too.
Whenever the band be laying off back home, I returned to Europe as a soloist, gigging in Belgium and Holland with some of the leading European musicians. Also took some work in Wales that my friend David Griffiths booked for me. And I toured again with Barry Martyn whenever I was available.
The Harlem Blues and Jazz Band appearing at the Pizza Express Jazz Club, London, England, May 16, 1977. Left to right: George James (as), Franc Williams (t), Clyde Bernhardt (ldr/tb/v), Tommy Benford (d), Dill Jones (p), Johnny Williams (sb). (Photo by Sylvia Pitcher; courtesy of Dr. Albert Vollmer.)