Dear Ted, Thank you so much for the braided layers of emotion, aesthetics and intellect you bring to the first-person narrative genre of Musical Memoirs as carefully crafted after heated bouts of spontaneity by rootsy innovator-human navigator-poet turned performer turned professor collaboratively transformed with neighboring East Bay colleague Ishmael Reed into indie co-publisher championing those without heed of Market Forces and later ripened into novelist while earning his nut professing comparative lit at U.C.-Berkeley, Al Young.
I also very much appreciate your restraint from letting any judgment issue forth projected onto clearly terminally under-valued muse and artist Dupree Bolton, who I'd surely never been aware of until your first Substack essay brought him to my attention. Were you rolling audio (or video) tape of your interviews and meetings with Dupree Bolton and are the transcripts available anywhere for longer-form musical and other memoirs?
Mitch, you rock bro. The God in you speaks to me and I don't know if you've got to your last stop which is Jesus yet but bro, there is raw truth in you. I'm here for it.
This is the first experience I've had of the man whose name I first thought was AI (Artificial Intelligence) Young until I noticed that what I saw as an upper case i was actually an l (as in Al). I'm truly amazed by this man's writing about Coleman Hawkins - like, he's riffing with the Bean. And finally, tonight I saw this on Monk in, 'Drowning in the Sea of Love' - and I'm going to sleep happy.
"Thelonious Monk was as much a part of me then as he is now. All kids who listen to Monk's music seem to love it at once. It's a child-like music; compelling and attractive in a fundamental way. There's no way, really, to put this all in language (spoken luggage), but when has being at a loss for words ever stopped a writer? On one of those nights, one crazier than usual, I spent a rapt three sets at the Gallery with my guitar buddy Perry Lederman and with Gordon Hope, a drinker with writing ambitions. We had put away a gang of ale and cheese, crackers and onions over at McSorley's Irish Saloon, and now we were checking out Monk, who had Coltrane with him just then. It was also a night when Steve Lacy was sitting in with the group on soprano saxophone. Charlie Rouse was the other hornman. Actually, Monk and Trane were being featured separately as a double bill, but Trane's energy level was such at the time that he managed to ease in on Monk's sets with no apparent strain."
As a trumpet player I find it sad that he did not own one at death. To be able to blow through the scales, the rhythm, the intensity of breathing through the instrument, to let go and let the instrument be your momentary sound, no matter if it's harsh, rash or melodious is just sad to me. He died repressed. That is heartbreaking for such a legend.
Ted, with your extensive knowledge of jazz, it would be interesting if you did a piece on musicians with a drug habit, and the myth of whether it is actually helpful to producing good music. Could probably argue that it is not helpful? how many great musicians didn't have a drug habit?
There isn't a player alive who's used drugs, who will tell you that it made him a better player. At best, it allowed him to forget about himself and be the music. But be a better player, never.
yeah, drugs is always romanticized when related to art. But JK Rowlings of Harry Potter fame, was poor when she was a child. She says 'poverty is romantized only by fools" that probably applies to drugs and music as well
But is it really that often romanticized? I hear nothing but sad tales about wasted talent and wasted years. Never heard any musician who survived it (like Anita O'Day) say it improved anything at all about their music, their life, or their experience of either.
I too met Dupree on the streets in Chinatown San Francisco. In 1982 or 83’. My trumpet teacher, John Coppola, was a fan of The Fox and I loved that LP. I heard Dupree was on the streets, so I found him playing. I requested “The Fox” and he played it for me and my two friends. It was amazing and he was shocked that a young person like myself knew of him. I gave him a $20 bill and I told him that I played trumpet. He then invited me to his house, so he could show me” how to play fast”. I drove out to Oakland and the neighborhood was very scary to me, so I bailed. Pretty amazing!
The loss of gifts of the spirit produces a kind of wrenching of the soul. There is no redemption in the story of Dupree Bolton, only pain without absolution. Perhaps this is the fundamental tragedy of the human condition.
The 50s seemed to be an era of Jazz junkies. I knew Frank Morgan and Frank Butler and they were sweet guys who would steal your underwear to buy junk. Great players and miserable people. Morgan eventually got straight, left L.A. for New York, where he died. The last time I saw Frank Butler was at a gig in Ventura, Calif. His skin was grey and he was rail thin. He had no energy in his playing. I sat in for a set and when Frank came back for the next set, he saw it as a challenge and the real Frank Butler came back to life. He died shortly after.
Sad, so, so very sad, but it’s also a reminder to do what little we may while we are on this planet. Thank you for what we have left of your gift to us.
I’m sad that those final recordings were destroyed. Perhaps that search for delicate beauty in the melodic lines might have taught us something about instrospection as older musicians that youthful fire knows nothing of.
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." To be listened to, heard, paid attention to. Compared with the all-too-common condition of the anonymous human condition; neglect. Paying attention and caring enough to be curious about what has taken root and sprouted within each of us seems to honor the high value commandment above. R-E-S-P-E-C-T seems rooted in these commemorative cultural retrieval essays of Ted Gioia. I honor such impulse, care and follow-through....
Tio Mitchito\Paradigm Sifters, Code Shifters, PsalmSong Chasers
Lay-Low Studios, Ore-Wa (Refuge of Atonement Seekers)
Bro, yes sir! That is all I can say here. If music, which modern music starts here but it goes to the classics doesn't it, doesn't get you in the gulliver then why read Ted, bc he feels it and conveys it and if you love music then you just know that Ted, is real shit. Period.
It's easy enough to decline an interview; someone may not wish to be a public figure, but even still be open to sharing their life and thoughts with a thoughtful, intelligent, respecful interviewer. As obviously was the case here.
Dear Ted, Thank you so much for the braided layers of emotion, aesthetics and intellect you bring to the first-person narrative genre of Musical Memoirs as carefully crafted after heated bouts of spontaneity by rootsy innovator-human navigator-poet turned performer turned professor collaboratively transformed with neighboring East Bay colleague Ishmael Reed into indie co-publisher championing those without heed of Market Forces and later ripened into novelist while earning his nut professing comparative lit at U.C.-Berkeley, Al Young.
https://neglectedbooks.com/?p=205
1 thought on “Al Young’s Musical Memoirs”
I also very much appreciate your restraint from letting any judgment issue forth projected onto clearly terminally under-valued muse and artist Dupree Bolton, who I'd surely never been aware of until your first Substack essay brought him to my attention. Were you rolling audio (or video) tape of your interviews and meetings with Dupree Bolton and are the transcripts available anywhere for longer-form musical and other memoirs?
Keep on doing.
Health and balance.
Appreciatively and respectfully yours,
Mitch Ritter\Paradigm Sifters, Code Shifters, PsalmSong Chasers
Lay-Low Studios, Ore-Wa (Refuge of Atonement Seekers)
Media Discussion List\LookseeInnerEarsHearHere
Mitch, you rock bro. The God in you speaks to me and I don't know if you've got to your last stop which is Jesus yet but bro, there is raw truth in you. I'm here for it.
This is the first experience I've had of the man whose name I first thought was AI (Artificial Intelligence) Young until I noticed that what I saw as an upper case i was actually an l (as in Al). I'm truly amazed by this man's writing about Coleman Hawkins - like, he's riffing with the Bean. And finally, tonight I saw this on Monk in, 'Drowning in the Sea of Love' - and I'm going to sleep happy.
"Thelonious Monk was as much a part of me then as he is now. All kids who listen to Monk's music seem to love it at once. It's a child-like music; compelling and attractive in a fundamental way. There's no way, really, to put this all in language (spoken luggage), but when has being at a loss for words ever stopped a writer? On one of those nights, one crazier than usual, I spent a rapt three sets at the Gallery with my guitar buddy Perry Lederman and with Gordon Hope, a drinker with writing ambitions. We had put away a gang of ale and cheese, crackers and onions over at McSorley's Irish Saloon, and now we were checking out Monk, who had Coltrane with him just then. It was also a night when Steve Lacy was sitting in with the group on soprano saxophone. Charlie Rouse was the other hornman. Actually, Monk and Trane were being featured separately as a double bill, but Trane's energy level was such at the time that he managed to ease in on Monk's sets with no apparent strain."
Unbearably sad
But his playing on those two LP's-the original 'Brother from Another Planet'!
As a trumpet player I find it sad that he did not own one at death. To be able to blow through the scales, the rhythm, the intensity of breathing through the instrument, to let go and let the instrument be your momentary sound, no matter if it's harsh, rash or melodious is just sad to me. He died repressed. That is heartbreaking for such a legend.
Ted, with your extensive knowledge of jazz, it would be interesting if you did a piece on musicians with a drug habit, and the myth of whether it is actually helpful to producing good music. Could probably argue that it is not helpful? how many great musicians didn't have a drug habit?
There isn't a player alive who's used drugs, who will tell you that it made him a better player. At best, it allowed him to forget about himself and be the music. But be a better player, never.
yeah, drugs is always romanticized when related to art. But JK Rowlings of Harry Potter fame, was poor when she was a child. She says 'poverty is romantized only by fools" that probably applies to drugs and music as well
But is it really that often romanticized? I hear nothing but sad tales about wasted talent and wasted years. Never heard any musician who survived it (like Anita O'Day) say it improved anything at all about their music, their life, or their experience of either.
She's correct. I grew up in poverty; it sucks.
I too met Dupree on the streets in Chinatown San Francisco. In 1982 or 83’. My trumpet teacher, John Coppola, was a fan of The Fox and I loved that LP. I heard Dupree was on the streets, so I found him playing. I requested “The Fox” and he played it for me and my two friends. It was amazing and he was shocked that a young person like myself knew of him. I gave him a $20 bill and I told him that I played trumpet. He then invited me to his house, so he could show me” how to play fast”. I drove out to Oakland and the neighborhood was very scary to me, so I bailed. Pretty amazing!
The loss of gifts of the spirit produces a kind of wrenching of the soul. There is no redemption in the story of Dupree Bolton, only pain without absolution. Perhaps this is the fundamental tragedy of the human condition.
A beautiful tribute.
The 50s seemed to be an era of Jazz junkies. I knew Frank Morgan and Frank Butler and they were sweet guys who would steal your underwear to buy junk. Great players and miserable people. Morgan eventually got straight, left L.A. for New York, where he died. The last time I saw Frank Butler was at a gig in Ventura, Calif. His skin was grey and he was rail thin. He had no energy in his playing. I sat in for a set and when Frank came back for the next set, he saw it as a challenge and the real Frank Butler came back to life. He died shortly after.
Thank you… always
Sad, so, so very sad, but it’s also a reminder to do what little we may while we are on this planet. Thank you for what we have left of your gift to us.
This is so good, thank you sir for making it public and no paywall. I just love your writing.
I’m sad that those final recordings were destroyed. Perhaps that search for delicate beauty in the melodic lines might have taught us something about instrospection as older musicians that youthful fire knows nothing of.
Thanks for this Ted. You mentioned that Mr. Bolton's first recordings were under an assumed
name. Do you ever find those..? and were they made in New York or California ?
Just before posting these questions I was thinking of Jessica Williams and was more than
surprised to see comments by Jessica J ( Thanks Jess, I check your substack) . As you know,
this superlative pianist used her full name (?) Jessica Jennifer Williams on her early recordings.
I am looking at the notes to "Ergonomic Music" as I write this. Perhaps someday you could
share something about her . Although not a near-unknown artist like Dupree , her recordings
attest that she should have been better known and appreciated.
Thanks again Ted and thanks to all these artists who help us keep our heads straight in a
perplexing world. Talk about "Healing Songs" !!!
Tragic story, thanks for a great story!
Should one search out people who do not want to be found?
Yes, bc they really do.
To be known is part of the human condition especially for an artist.
I don’t buy it.
“Finding” someone can be terribly disrespectful, especially since it’s mostly—if not all—about the finder.
Why were they hiding? Love averse after the trauma? Needing to be pulled out of the mire?
Fear. Of what isn't important. Fear transfers to anything. Their are only two emotions; Love and Fear. All the others are offshoots of those two.
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." To be listened to, heard, paid attention to. Compared with the all-too-common condition of the anonymous human condition; neglect. Paying attention and caring enough to be curious about what has taken root and sprouted within each of us seems to honor the high value commandment above. R-E-S-P-E-C-T seems rooted in these commemorative cultural retrieval essays of Ted Gioia. I honor such impulse, care and follow-through....
Tio Mitchito\Paradigm Sifters, Code Shifters, PsalmSong Chasers
Lay-Low Studios, Ore-Wa (Refuge of Atonement Seekers)
Media Discussion List\LookseeInnerEarsHearHere
Bro, yes sir! That is all I can say here. If music, which modern music starts here but it goes to the classics doesn't it, doesn't get you in the gulliver then why read Ted, bc he feels it and conveys it and if you love music then you just know that Ted, is real shit. Period.
“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
Exactly my point.
No way. Not all.
It's easy enough to decline an interview; someone may not wish to be a public figure, but even still be open to sharing their life and thoughts with a thoughtful, intelligent, respecful interviewer. As obviously was the case here.
Hi, and thanks for the story. I justo found this on youtube
https://youtu.be/U3s-Vaa4H4I?si=pkWLMUNrWaIWaSo4