The record changer (Jan 1955-Dec 1957)

5 It isn't bad enough they got to tear down Washington Square, where we were always going to live if we ever got the money. They're getting rid of Fifty-second Street where we used to go even when we didn't have the money. Let's get the times straight. The Famous Door was on the uptown side near Fifth, and there was a famous door, and there was Louis Prima and Martha Raye was singing — marrone, ow and gewalt how she was singing— and then, or before, they had Bunny and a man named Forrest Crawford who played tenor and everybody had to go hear him fast because he had the con and wasn't going to last long. And he didn't, but while he was playing, it was all the good I ever wanted. And the Onyx was on the other side and other end of the street, and I don't think there was an orange juice stand on the corner— though there was later when Billie was singing Billie's Blues and whatever happened to that record with Israel opening up with all that bass? I didn't have the jack, nor am I sure I even knew about the Onyx when it was a speak. My recollection is the first time it was the Five Spirits of Rhythm — or was it Six — and they rolled up a storm with two ukuleles (or was it three) and two tipples (if it was the Six Spirits of Rhythm, then it was three) and a guy who played suitcase with whiskbrooms. And no, sonny, I don't mean drums and brushes. I mean a suitcase like you carry clothes in, and whiskbrooms like you brush clothes off with. And in Chicago, the night Jess cried, was the first time in my life I saw a man kick the drum with his foot. Baby Dodds, I think, no pedal for him. I think the Famous Door had moved a little, same side of the street, down toward Sixth, when Bessie came in, upstairs, one Sunday afternoon. She came' in, she planted those two flat feet firmly on the floor, she did not shake her shoulders or snap her fingers. She just opened that great kisser and let the music come out. I know the Famous Door was across the street later on. We had kept hearing a lot of talk about a guy named Basie (there were some mysterious records in town, the JonesSmith Band). Then the band came in, and Jo Jones was on drums, and Herschel Evans was on tenor and Bill Basie was sitting there like some great newt (this girl kept saying). It was a big band and a small joint, and sitting there in the room was like taking up light housekeeping inside a drum. I'm pretty sure Joe Marsala was at the Hickory House then, because it was the same girl and I hit Joe for a ten-spot to buy a jug of Irish whisky. Riley and Farley were at the Onyx later, weren't they, and was it Riley or Farley who kept taking the trombone apart as he played, so he wound up on mouthpiece? Which he Robert Paul Smith, who began his writing career by preparing scripts for broadcasts by the Benny Goodman band and the like, has four novels to his credit and is co-author of the current Broadway comedy hit, "The Tender Trap." His reminiscences about what was once called Swing Street may be a bit outside the experience of our outlying readers, but they touch a soft spot in the heart of a staff member or two around here. 1 played, for my dough, about as well as the whole horn. And remember Leo Watson playing trombone? Courageously? So I went by in a cab the other night, and they're tearing the whole bleeding street down now. I guess the strippers go with the foundations, but save a couple of bricks and Jack White's phone book and Dr. R. E. Lee's tray for old Dad. It was another country, and a lot of them are dead. Bunny's dead, and Bessie's dead and Forrest Crawford is dead and Herschel is dead. Fats is dead and Jack Jenney is dead. But Cosy ain't dead, and I haven't heard lately, but I feel sure that Stuff Smith is still making that fiddle sound like an insane kazoo (and surely somewhere Kenny Watts and his Kilowatts have the only baritone kazoo in captivity), and Lee Wiley is great and they tell me that Lulie Jean looks just as fine and is still singing so high only dogs can hear, fifteen kids and all, and I heard Claude Hopkins the other night, and tell me not that somewhere in this great land we do not have Fess Williams and his Royal Flush orchestra. Go on, tear it down. Some night Paul will come to town and we will go over to Five-Two Boulevard and Wingy will be standing in front of somewhere and tell us the story about the Long Island lady the night the Meyer Davis unit didn't show. And you know something? I'll appreciate that. Go on. Tear it down. I heard a kid the other night on a record with Lee. Kid named Rudy Braff — sounds just like Bunny's back. The Record Changer is published monthly and copyrighted 1955 by William Grauer, Jr., 418 West 49th St., New York 19, N. Y. For subscription rates and collectors' advertising rates see the information blanks in another section in the book. Write or telephone for our commercial advertising rates.