My thanks to Randi for inviting me to play with the big kids. My thanks to you if you continue reading. All errors are mine, some may even be intentional. This story is relatively short, so set yourself a comfortable reading font, and enjoy.
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I lit a cigarette, wedged it into the ashtray, and watched the tendril of smoke rise straight up. It wavered a little, then wavered more before becoming a chaotic swirling cloud. Gazing at the expanding cloud I took a deep breath and as I exhaled I retraced the living smoke back to its source.
At my age, that's as close to smoking a cigarette as I get. Suppose it's more a meditation than a medication. Down to one drink a day too, save that until I'm home. No need to list all the parts that don't work, won't work, or just seen better days.
I did my smoke meditation again and lifted my hands to the keyboard. My fingers pressed down on the keys and I began some simple warm ups. Scales followed until an old standard 'April in Paris' found its way out my fingers. I played as Gershwin intended, then gave it a Count Basie swing, and finished with a gently percussive Thelonious Monk rendition. Old habits people, old habits.
I been working on a new song, or more correctly a new songs been working on me. Notes and chords were acting like kids at a junior high dance, they want to get together, but just can't quite make the connection.
I'd been at for a few of hours when I heard someone opening the studio door - that was not supposed to happen on a Sunday.
"He's right here, honey. C'mon in, come on."
Shit. Fucking Irving was trying to drop another singer on me. Shit, shit, shit. Irving's my manager and he has been on me to sing some duets, "Oh man, it's a thing right now, easy money, easy money." Yeah, easy money for Irving, seventh level of misery for me.I don't sing. I can sing, but I don't do it as part of my music. Nope, that is just not happening.
"Hey, Jimmy, hey good to see ya man, good to see you." Irv was laying it on thick, as if we hadn't seen one another in a long time. Hell, we'd been playing cards at his place until two this very morning. "Got someone I'd like you to meet."
As much as I wanted to do otherwise, the lessons in gentlemanly conduct that were drilled into me as a young man by Ms Ketchum came to the fore. I stood slowly, one hand on the piano, the other slowly moving the bench back, and walked carefully around it.
Irving Thaler Jr was smiling, he looked like he'd just come from the golf course, which upon second thought was a very likely occurrence. Beside him, maybe half a step behind him was a young woman; beautiful, tall, willowy. Irv was gently moving her forward. "Jimmy, Jimmy, I'd like to introduce Ms Sophia Miranda. Ms Miranda, this is James 'Kid' Rollins."
In a manner that Ms Ketchum would have critiqued as 'not completely hopeless' I smiled, extended my hand, and when she took it, I said, "It's a pleasure to meet you Ms Miranda."
"The pleasure is mine Mr Rollins, an honor...really." She held and shook my hand and kept holding and shaking my hand until I gently pulled it back. "Oh...oh...I'm so sorry."
"It's just that I've heard so much about you, your music, well...um...everything really. My nana played your music all the time. She talked about your composition and way you would take a simple melody and...and, oh there I go, I'm so sorry." Ms Miranda produced an expression that was undeniably charming, with just a hint of something hauntingly familiar. "I must sound like a stalker or some kind of crazy person."
"No, not at all, it's rather encouraging actually, especially from someone so young. Now if your grandma was here ..."
"Great Grandma really, but from when I was little I always called her aunt-wan, like Antoine. That was the name of her last husband. Besides being 'nana' she was Wanda Antoine. Lord, I'm babbling again, but when she was younger, you would have known her as Wanda Harrison. Oh, you do remember her."
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In the late 50's I was doing a lot of session work, I was "the Fixer" or "Jimmy the Kid." For someone my age, and pretty much for anyone in my profession, I was making good money. The downside is that being "the Fixer" meant trying to pull someone else's tune out of the fire, or give it musical CPR. A busy time, a profitable time, but not a lot of my time. My great talent and my great burden was I could play any style and I could mimic any artist. "We need a Oscar-like fill here" or "can you massage this into a Nat kinda thing, or a McCoy thing" basically I could be and was paid quite well to be anyone but me.
But you've got to pay the bills and I liked feeling secure. Then there was the fact that I got to meet a lot of musicians, great musicians. And if the studio work ended early enough I'd head out and check out the action at the clubs. Sometimes, I'd get an invite to sit in, or even substitute for a night or two if a player was ill. This didn't happen often, but when it did it was fun. It's like this, an hour or two in front of a paying audience is not the same and in no way comparable to sitting in an otherwise empty studio, talking through a window to a couple of guys in a darken room where the conversation between us is more along the lines of "can we do that last part again? The levels were a little inconsistent."
As regards Wanda I'd been working (I was "the Fixer" in this case) with Lester Johns on a portion of a soundtrack for a movie and the score for a crucial scene just wasn't working. We'd approached the problem from several different ways and had little success. It was less shitty, but just that. Lester said he'd asked a friend to drop by and lend an ear. I was shocked when Jerome Harrison walked through the security door. Jerome was a giant of the bass, one of the premier players. He'd played with most of the greats but had a decades long gig with Giles. Giles (no one ever used his last name, but you know who I'm talking about) had just put out a new album (for the really young readers out there a quick history lesson, before streaming was MP3, then CD, then cassette/8 track/4 track, and finally long playing 33-1/3 vinyl albums or 'LP's. Not gonna even bother telling you about 78's!) A new album also meant that Giles was going out on extended tour in the not too distant future.
There are touring musicians who look at studio/session musicians as 'less than.' Add in my youth, and my 'fixer' rep and there were times (mercifully few) when I was on the receiving end of either 'what the fuck do you know' or 'don't fuck with my music asshole' and sometimes both. Jerome was the exact opposite, he was incredibly gracious and included me in every discussion, and actually listened to what I heard and suggested.
Rather than jump straight into the problem, Jerome suggested we play a few of the completed scenes - which we did. Then we played the problem piece as we currently had it charted. Suddenly the solution just jumped up and solved itself. Lester looked at Jerome, they looked at me - we nailed it. Lester decided to call it a night and cut me loose. Jerome said he was off to do a gig and asked if I wanted to come along. I had nothing else going so off we went.
The taxi dropped us off at a well known club, the marquee said "Tonite Only" but there was no mention of a band. We walked around to the service door, knocked and waited. Jerome had a grin that wouldn't stop. I finally had to ask, "Okay, what's going on?"
The grin grew as he shook his head, "Don't know what you mean kid."
Right. Then the door opened and we were waved in. I stepped inside and stopped. Giles was leaning against the far wall smoking a cigarette. He acknowledged Jerome with as subtle a nod as I had ever seen. I was simply looked at, that was it, just one long look. Giles peeled off the wall and walked into a dressing room, Jerome started to follow, stopped, and turned to me, "Just go down that hall and through the door, you'll see a small table off to the left, near the piano. It'll probably have a young woman at it, sit anyway, she's my youngest...good luck."
I knew enough not to go where I wasn't invited, so I sought out the table with Jerome's daughter sitting at it. Where it became clear I was similarly uninvited, for there sat a gorgeous young woman, stylishly dress for a night on the town who looked at me in my tattered jeans, Chuck Taylors, simple black t-shirt, and a scruffy three day growth of facial hair and said, "This is a jazz club, the dive bar is a couple blocks that way."
Ouch.
