Touching Star
It was cold in Boston if you were outside but if you were inside the Jazz Workshop
on Boylston Street you were warm. You would be moved by the show put on by Sun Ra. I had never seen a show such as this. The music was playing and dancers were dancing and interacting with the audience. They made you feel as if you were a part of the show and not just an observer. When the show was over I went back stage to meet this man called Sun Ra. I said to him, I want to be a part of your show. His answer was...be here at 4:00 AM with your bags packed. I told him that I would be back and he said, "If you are serious about wanting to work with me you will be back and if not you won't. I was there.
We left on a chararted bus for Philadelphia, Pa. I was about to enter 'The School of Sun Ra'. When we reached our destination it was a house in West Phila. It was very cluttered...I was given a spot to sleep on the floor in a room with three other people. After a few hours I was awoken by music. "Sonny said to come down stairs," I was told. when I got downstairs Sun Ra told me to sit and listen. I listened to what sounded to me like confused noise without showing any expression. The music would go from noise to a solid melody, one moment it sounded out of tune and the next it was perfect. I could only sit there and listen and enjoy the sounds from these colorful people. When the music stopped after what seemed like two hours I asked Sun Ra what was I going to do. "You are going to be one of my dancers", he said. So I was going to be a dancer. Wow. sure I enjoyed dancing in the club but I never thought of myself as 'a dancer' in a professional sense. How quickly things can change.
The next show was in New York City and it was four days away. Sun Ra said, when we go to New York, you have to be ready. If you are not ready then you do not go. Sun Ra was very eccentric and you dealt with it if you wanted to be a part of the band. He did not call it a band, he called it Sun Ra and his Archastra. I know there had to be at lease twenty people in each show. The music could give that big band sound or the soft combo sound.
Sun Ra was born in 1923 in Birmingham, AL. as Sonny Blunt. However, I felt as if he were from another planet. I think he believed it. He told me that he was a poet and he wrote a lot of poetry and recited a lot of poetry. I soon learned that my job was to be a listening board among other things such as helping him put his shoes .. the show and taking them off after the show.. "Dance in the sun suit", he said to me.
I went out in the audience and I danced in the sun suit. June and the two ladies with her were dancers. June gave me my instruction.
Soon I was wearing a pair of tights with a cape and the planet Saturn across my chest. I would run out into the audience and say, "You're on the Good Ship Earth, but you haven't met the captain of the space ship yet." Space is the place. That was our phrase. Space is the place was one of the well know Sun Ra tunes that folks waited to hear. I soon became accepted as a full member of the group and performed with more confidence. You would imagine that being with such a well known band that you would be put up in nice hotel with all the amenities. Well that was not the case. We were in New York City at a club called, The 5 Spot. When the show was over we had to sleep on the floor until in the morning. When the morning came we caught a subway to Harlem and went to June's apartment which was in the projects, high rise projects, It was a very small space and we all had to make due touring with Sun Ra was a great performing experience but never a very comfortable one. I put up with a lot to hear the jewels that would come from the lips of Sun Ra. "If I came from somewhere here, then why can't I go somewhere there?" were the words of Sun Ra. And one day when I was kneeling and taking off his shoes, Sun Ra said to me,"You will take off the shoes of stars and then one day someone will kneel and take off your shoes with that same smile and pure heart." Because there was hardly any money in working with Sun Ra and my living conditions were rough I returned to Boston.
This was a new me that was coming back to Boston. This was the performer. I wrote and performed for anyone who would stand still and listen. I got a job working for the oldest Black newspaper in New England, The Bay State Banner. It proved to be a very valuable experience that would open doors for me for years to come. It made me a part of history and I interviewed icons in the jazz world. I did interviews and reviews of records and shows. When Miles Davis came to town I went to the Ritz Hotel and called his room. I told him the paper that I represented and he said to me, "Come on Up" in a very raspy voice. Suffice it to say that he gave me a great interview. He denied all interview request from "White" media. We hit it off so well that Miles Davis gave me his home phone number in New York and told me to call him when I came to the city. My most memorable quote from Miles Davis was spoken to me in his kitchen. He looked me right in the eye and said, "It's all about a f----ing sound! You make the right sound people will come hear it and see who made it." Miles Davis had his own strangeness and still a brilliant creative soul.
The Boston Common is a park that is in the center of the city. A place that I would go and sit and think. I was not making enough money writing for the paper and I needed something else. I went and got a large drawing pad and a black marker. I walked around the park offering to write a poem for lovers or just one person who would like a poem. I made a few dollars, not a lot, but enough to keep me coming back. It was on that day that I looked up and saw the sign, YOUR FORTUNE IS IN THE TEA CUP. I looked at that sign and then made a decision to there. It was called Mary Ann's Tea Room, You get a sandwich and a cup of tea. You pick a person from those sitting at the table. I choose the one that looked more to me like a fortune teller. Her name was Rose. She gave me a reading. I said there and let it sink it and after much thought I asked Rose if I could give her a reading with a fresh cup of tea leaves. When I finished giving her a reading she called Mary Ann to come to the table and said let him give you a reading. I gave her a reading. She offered me a job right away. I took my place at the table. There soon was a line waiting to see me, as others were receiving blessings, they would share those blessing with me. I would begin by saying," Greetings, we are going to use this tea cup as a telephone...it does not talk, but we will talk through it. Your fortune is your character, you cannot rise above nor can you fall below it. Your fortune is in who you know and where you go....." There was one person who sat at the readers table who I felt was a demon...the readers were ladies except for me and him. He acted very famine. He was loud and offensive and I wondered what power he had over Mary Ann to even be there. But just as fast as my life as a tea leaf reader started, it ended just as fast. I made up my mind that I needed to be in California, Hollywood.
HOLLYWOOD, EARLY DAYS
Talk about being strange. I was very very strange. I flew to Los Angles with no money. I had no family and knew no one except the musicians I had met in Boston at the jazz workshop or Palls Mall. When the plane landed I got a ride to Hollywood. "Take me to Hollywood and Vine" I said and that is where I was taken. It was 4:00 AM and the street was empty. It was hard to believe that I was the only person within sight at that spot. That was my spot at that moment. I walked and looked at the stars on the sidewalk. I walked until the sun came up. I found a park. It was right across the street from Motown Studies. Little did I know that my future would be shaped from coming to this park. This is wear Les Mcann would come to play tennis. He remembered me from Boston and asked what was I doing in California. I told him, It was cold in Boston. Les Mcann gave me twenty dollars and his phone number. I slept in the park that night the next morning I went and washed up in a restaurant bathroom. I ordered breakfast and while I was eating a limo pulled up with several people who came in and sat in a booth. One of the ladies had a french accent. I was sitting at the counter when she called to me with that famous voice, "Darling, would you come and join us. I got up and went to the table, she said, "You look so interesting". I am a writer, I told her. I am a poet. I shared some poetry with her and the group. She inquired where I was staying and I told her I had no where to stay. She said, "You do now." It was ZA Za Gabor, she said "I have a small cottage with a flower garden. You can stay there...take this note to the man who lives in the front house, he will leave the back door open so you can use the kitchen and bathroom." The street was on Crescent Heights Blvd. and the house was just before the canyon. The place was small but perfect. There was a phone already connected and she said that I could call anywhere in the US. She said that she would call me from time to time to check on me.
I did not live far from a club called The Roxy. That was the spot. The Persuasions were appearing and one of them saw me and remembered me from Boston when I interviewed them. He gave me two passes to get in. I had no idea who I would give the other ticket to.
I ended up showing up by myself. It must have been fate but a young man asked me "Can you get me in?" I said "sure, I have an extra ticket." That was the beginning of a good friendship. His name was Jimmy Adams. Jimmy was a chess player and so was I. We played chess every day. I was also out looking for work to earn money. I got a job writing for Payers Magazine. I met Joe Nazel who was the editor. He gave me an assignment and I completed it very well. From then on I got paid for writing.
What I am about to tell you is strange. I was at resting in my cottage when a small white light filled my room with light so bright that I had to hide my face. I was in the presence of something or someone who was so bright that I could not look. I laid on the floor covering my eyes with my arm. Words started coming to me and I was speaking a poem that lasted at lease twenty minutes. I was crying and reciting this poem that I had never heard before. After about twenty minutes. The light was gone and I was , The Bicentennial Poet.
I had to let as many people as I could hear this poem. I felt that I had been ordained by a higher power to deliver this poem to America. I was on a mission from a higher power. Went I went to the park, I recited that poem for everyone that would listen. When Jimmy Adams heard the poem he said he wanted to introduce me to Jean Houston, Marvin Gay's oldest sister. She had a company called Rising Star Management on San Vicente. Jimmy took me there and made the introduction. I recited the poem. She said that she wanted me to meet Marvin. Being that I could type and had a telephone presence she said I could help out around the office.
When Marvin came in he was very soft spoken. Jean asked me to recite the poem to him which I did. Marvin said he was impressed. He said that as a help of helping around the office that I could answer the large bags of unopened fan mail. A job that I very much enjoyed. Marvin introduced me to his brother Frankie and he and I hit it off very well. Frankie wanted to sing as well and had a voice very similar to his brothers. Jean was having a showcase to introduce her acts to the world.
The place was The Playboy Club in Beverly Hills. It was there that I met people like Ed Townsend and Kenny Gamble. It was Kenny Gamble from Gamble and Huff that came backstage and offered me a chance to record an album called, The Bicentennial Poet. That album came out in 1976 on Philadelphia International Records.
When the album was finished I stayed in Philadelphia and lived in a High Rise on the next floor from Teddy Pendergrass. We spoke and he invited me in for a moment. There several people there as I can remember and I did not stay long. I felt I was on a mission to speak for the ancestors and to remind decedents of slaves where they came from and how they came here. In the 70's and 80's Black folks felt an African connection, especially after Roots aired. But now it is forgotten again. Today's young folks, a lot of them, have no knowledge of their history and heritage. The spirit told me to go back to California and I did.
The struggle continued in Los Angeles, California. I was writing for a Black Public Relations Firm. I wrote Bio's for them and interviewed stars.
Lou Gossett was one of the people I interviewed.
A lot of people started telling me that I needed to be up north. Off I went to Oakland, California. I felt like I was back East. It was different in a good way. I was performing at schools and clubs all over Oakland. I was there until a big earthquake came. After that I knew I had to leave. I took a greyhound bus to Atlanta, Georgia.
ATLANTA GEORGIA
When I got to Atlanta I knew that I was in the right place at the right time. I felt a spiritual energy in the air like Bob Marley said, "there is a natural mystic blowing in the wind." I was in a city with very progressive Black folks. Maynard Jackson was the mayor. I performed at several city functions and soon became know to him. He even asked me to escort his wife to a function. Bunny was her first name and she had an entertainment company, or booking agency. We hit it off on a positive note. She represented Brick which was a popular group at the time.
I have only been married one time. I met her in Atlanta, Georgia. I married her after only knowing her a short time and we had a son.
I was in love with Atlanta and Atlanta was in love with me. I performed often on television in the local market. I was invited to perform at a birthday party for a well known civil rights minister. Mrs. Coretta Scott King, and Andrew Young were present at the party. I performed a poem called Unknown Hero's. When I had a chance to get the ear of Andrew Young I spoke to him about Wayne Williams. He has never been convicted of killing a child, the two folks he was convicted of were adults. And it is very questionable if he killed them. If I remember right I believe that his response to me was that he trusted the system to do the right thing.
Part of me always wanted to be a lawyer for the underdog. I think being a defense attorney is somewhere in my soul. I met Lynn Whatley, he is the attorney of record that is working to free Wayne Williams. His office had mountains of information about the case and he gave me the job of reading transcripts of the many hearings and depositions and to do legal research for him at the library. I enjoyed that work very much.
And it is because of that personal knowledge I know without a doubt that Wayne Williams is innocent. As of this writing he is still in a Georgia prison awaiting the results of a habeas corpus hearing that has been pending for years. When I asked my friend Mr. Whatley what was going on he told me that we are just waiting for the courts.
In the meantime, I am still performing poetry. After one show I met a brother who told me that he played for Isaac Hayes and he invited me to come to the studio where they were recording. Wow, I was going to meet Isaac Hayes. I went to Master Sound Studio on Spring Street. The whole Isaac Hayes Movement was there. Daniel was the percussionist and he told Isaac about me and about the show he had witnessed. Isaac gave the ok for me to have a seat. Isaac Hayes and I hit it off right away. There he asked me to do several things which I got done. I also arranged for a radio interview with a friend of mine who has happy to have Isaac on his show. I told me that he needed a valet...someone to take care of his clothes, band wardrobe, and a personal aide. I accepted the job. Got a passport and was ready to travel the world. I did my job well. Everytime we had to fly the cost to ship the wardrobe was outrageous. I was able to cut that cost more then half. When we got to the venue I made sure that everything that was suppose to be in the dressing rooms was there, I checked on all the exits, bathrooms, and entrances. I picked out two outfits for Isaac to wear on stage and he would come to my room and choose one of the two. Sometimes he would just leave it up to me. I would help him dress before going on stage and help him undress he came off the stage. When I was taking off his shoes one evening I remembered the words of Sun Ra and his words. It was also my job to collect all the music from the stage. The only time I got to be on stage was when Isaac would give me his cape. I loved my job.
One day we were in Vancouver, BC staying at the Georgia Hotel. There was snow on the ground and it was a bit nippy so I went to buy a coat.
The name of the boutique was DaJaVu. On my way back to the hotel I met a woman and it seemed like a Dejavu experience. It was very mystical. That evening when Isaac came to my room to pick the wardrobe he noticed the bag on my bed and asked me what did it say...I told him De Ja vu and what it meant. I also told him that I was working on a song based upon the experience I had coming back to the hotel. I pretty much had the lyrics done. The day I finished the lyric we were on a plane going to Australia. I shared it with Isaac. There were 13 of us who travelled on the road. Johnny Rawls was the body guard. He and Isaac were very close. He had known Isaac for many years. There was Willie Hall and his wife Debra, the singers Diane, and Rose. There was Baby Dee, Big Kim, Spooky, Travis Biggs, and Skip, and Willy Weeks. I am still in contact with Johnny Rawls, Daniel, Travis, and Willy Hall & Debra. Anyway, back in Australia. We were playing at the Hilton Hotels in Melbourne and Sydney. Dionne Warrick on the show with us. I was surprised that she had a man who helped her get dressed for her performance. He was nice and very very gay. I was also shocked to see that she smoked cigarettes. Part of my job was to see that no one smoked in Isaac's dressing room. She had a problem with that and I don't think she like it when I asked her to put out her cigarette.
The only other time I had contact with her was when Isaac asked me to go and get her and bring her to the room without being seen. I did just that. the next day we went out on a boat and did some water skiing. Isaac's legs went apart and for a few days I had to push him on the stage in a wheel chair. One day a group of Aboriginal tribes men came to see Isaac and Isaac told them to talk to me so they came and knocked on my door. That knock changed my life in many ways. Wandjuk Marika was at my door with someone called Chicken Man and others who I cannot remember. He had a long wooded instrument that sounded to me like magic. They told me about their story which would take another time to tell. I invited them to the show that night and they told me that they were not allowed to come. Well, I went and asked that a special table be put up for out special guest. It was done. when we left Australia Wandjuk gave me an yidaki, commonly called a didgereedoo....It is a magic sound...It changed my life profoundly. It is still changing my life.
when we left Austrialia we went to South Africa. Mandela was still in prison. Most artist were refusing to go to South Africa because of their racial policies, Isaac Hayes did not refuse and we went. We arrived in Johannsburg and stayed at the Rand Hotel. We were given the Do's and Don'ts....Do not go into Sweato without an escourt. Do not discuss politics with the local people...and that for the time being we were honorarey white people and that we could go in a white only place to eat. when we got back to the room I decided that I was going our for a walk. When I got outside I quickly met a yound man who I asked to take me to Sweato. I wanted to see the school were the children were shot protesting and starting the fight against their oppression. I learned a lot from going there about what conditions can do to ones mind. The children followed me as if I were a Hollywood star. What money I had I gave away. When we left there we went to the beach. The sign in the sand said, 'FOR WHITE ONLY'. I told my driver, not today. I pulled the sign up took off my pants and jumped into the water at the amazement of the White people in the water who rushed to get out. You would have thought a shark had been stighted. After upsetting the beach I went back to my hotel. This was my first time in Africa. I felt as if I went into another time zone, another reality. Light skinned folks called themselves 'colored' and the dark skinned poeple were called Blacks and people would say, "let me take you to a 'colored neighborhood'....'the blacks live over there'. I was shocked at the mental damage inflicted on the population. We played at Orange Stadium in Sweato. That show was for Black folks....the other place we played was White Only...I will share an incedent that happened at the stadium. The police were very brutal...I saw a Black police officer hit a young man with a stick because he was trying to get under a fence to see the show. I was so moved that I intervened and I remember saying to the police, "Why are you hurting your own people...He is Black like you...you did not have to hit him in the head with that stick." He looked at me and did not respond. I said, "I am taking him with me." I took the child in the dressing room and with a first aid kit I patched up the wound to his head and took him to a place close to the stage so he could watch the show. When I left him I saw this beautiful young woman with the most outstanding breast. Her smile said it all. I asked her if she wanted to come on and she said yes. I informed the guards that I was bringing her across the ropes. I took her to a nice spot and went to do my job. Isaac had not arrived and I had to get the dressing room in order and confirm that everything was in place as the rider stated. If there was not a star put on the star, I had one put there, as well as his name. I had flowers and finger foods in the dressing rooms for the band and Isaac. The only folks allowed in Isaac's dressing room were Johnny Rawls, his personal body guard, and myself. One of my duties was to put oil on Isaac's back and chest. Then I would help him put on his chains. Over the chains he would have a cape. I would walk him out on stage and he would throw the cape to me and I would walk off stage and back to the dressing room. Well on this day in South Africa while Isaac was on stage I was in the dressing room making love to that beautiful woman. I learned to speak Zulu while we were there. All in all we were in South Africa for thirty days. What a thirty days it was. When we left there we went to Manila. That opened up another chapter that is still being thought about. I am so glad that we did all this before aids because I would probably be dead. Sex was one thing that was not lacking on this whole tour. Beyond the sex, I had an experience that was very mystic and somewhat paranormal. We were staying in the Manila Hotel there by the bay...there was a park across the street called the Lunata. It was about 3:00 AM and I wanted to sit alone and enjoy the view and the night air.
When I walked in this park I saw this statue of a Black Man. The writing read, "In Memory of Our Beloved Walter Howard Loving" I was to come back to Washington, D.C. and do extensive research on that man at the National Archieves. His story is to long to go into right now. He wrote the national anthem for their country. He was the aid to the President of the country...he was a musician, a soldier, and a statesmen. He was a genious. He was a Black American Patriot who's last words were, "I am an American, and if death must come to me today, I can think of no greater cause, and I can die no better way. I am an American, were the last words that he said, when the Japanese soldier pulled his sword and took of his head.
When we left Manila we came back to the USA landing in Los Angles, California. We did a few shows in the north west, Vancouver, B.C. and Ocean Shore, WA. After that it was back to Atlanta, Georgia.
When we got back to Atlanta Isaac was back in the studio on Spring Street..Master Sound. It is long gone now. I had not seen Isaac for a few days but when I did go by the studio he played my song..without the lyrics but it was the melody I had made up...I sang the words and was very excited that Isaac Hayes had done something with my song. Shortly after that Dionne Warrick was in Atlanta appearing at The Fox Theatre. She came by the studio one night and Isaac played the track again. I sang the lyrics. After that I was on top of the world. Isaac said to me, "Now don't worry me to death about this song." I did not worry him. Not until I heard the song on the radio with Dionne Warrick singing it. I rushed to the record store and asked for the album...there it was my song by Isaac Hayes with lyrics by someone else. My name was nowhere to be scene. When I confronted him he told me that if I worked for Ford Motor Company and helped design a car my name would not be on the car. I felt a deep anger because he had robbed me of a golden opportunity where I could have done more for my children. A few years later I caught up with Dionne Warrick in Baltimore, Md where she was doing a show. I made it a point to get there. When I spoke with her. I aksed her if she remembed me and she said yes. I asked her if she recalled the night in the studio when I sang the track Deja vu? She told me that she would talk to me and to wait there for a moment and she would be back." After thirty minutes I stopped waiting. The last time I spoke to Isaac Hayes was in the dressing room of the late Grover Washington, Jr. Isaac and I were polite to each other. I gave him my phone number and he said he would call me. The call never came. Now that Isaac Hayes is dead I hope that he can make things right from the otherside.
to be continued.....
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