Central Avenue Sounds: William Douglass

Department of Special Collections
University of California, Los Angeles
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William Douglass


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Restrictions on this Interview

None.

Literary Rights and Quotation

This manuscript is hereby made available for research purposes only. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publication, are reserved to the University Library of the University of California, Los Angeles. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the University Librarian of the University of California, Los Angeles.


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Biographical Summary

Personal History:

Born: February 28, 1923, Sherman, Texas.

Education: Jefferson High School, Los Angeles.

Military Service: Sergeant, Tenth Cavalry Band, United States Army, 1942-45.

Spouse: Dorothy Burney; Deloris Seals Douglass, one child.

Career History:

Played drums with:

    Played drums with:
  • Judy Carmichael
  • Wild Bill Davis
  • Benny Goodman
  • Earl Hines
  • Red Norvo
  • Art Tatum
  • Cal Tjader
  • T-Bone Walker
  • Gerald Wiggins
  • Vice President, American Federation of Musicians Local 767, ca. 1950-53.
  • Treasurer, American Federation of Musicians Local 47, 1985-91.

Selected Recordings:

    Selected Recordings:
  • The Tatum Group Masterpieces (with Red Callender, Buddy DeFranco, and Art Tatum), Pablo Records, 1956.

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  • The Tatum Group Masterpieces (with Red Callender, Art Tatum, and Ben Webster), Pablo Records, 1956.
  • Vibrations in Hi-Fi (with Bill Dillard, Bob Drasnin, Bill Kosinski, Jack Montrose, Red Norvo, and Gene Wright), Liberty Records, 1956.
  • High Five: Red Norvo Quintet (with Bob Carter, Bob Drasnin, Red Norvo, and Jimmy Wyble), Liberty Records, ca. 1956.
  • Norvo Naturally: Red Norvo Quintet (with Buddy Clark, Bob Drasnin, Red Norvo, and Jimmy Wyble), Rave Records, 1956, reissued 1986.
  • Cal Tjader Quartet (with Cal Tjader, Gerald Wiggins, and Gene Wright), Fantasy Records, 1956.
  • The King and I: Gerald Wiggins Trio (with Gerald Wiggins and Gene Wright), Challenge Records, 1957.
  • The Jazz Pickers (with Harry Babasin, Buddy Collette, Bob Harrington, Dan Overberg, and Ben Tucker), EmArcy Records.
  • The Jazz Pickers, Featuring Red Norvo (with Harry Babasin, Red Wootten, Dempsey Wright), EmArcy Records.
  • Real Time (with Red Callender and Earl "Fatha" Hines), M&K Records, 1978.

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Interview History

Interviewer:

Steven L. Isoardi, Interviewer, UCLA Oral History Program; B.A., Government, University of San Francisco; M.A., Government, University of San Francisco; M.A., Political Science, UCLA; Ph.D., Political Science, UCLA.

Time and Setting of Interview:

Place: Tape I at Douglass's office at the American Federation of Music Local 47, Los Angeles; Tapes II-V at Douglass's home, Los Angeles.

Dates, length of sessions: February 2, 1990 (77 minutes); February 10, 1990 (129); February 17, 1990 (76); March 3, 1990 (69).

Total number of recorded hours: 5.85

Persons present during interview: Douglass and Isoardi

Conduct of Interview:

This interview is one in a series designed to preserve the spoken memories of individuals, primarily musicians, who were raised near and/or performed on Los Angeles's Central Avenue, especially from the late 1920s to the mid-1950s. Musician and teacher William Green, his student Steven Isoardi, and early project interviewee Buddy Collette provided major inspiration for the UCLA Oral History Program's inaugurating the Central Avenue Sounds Oral History Project.

In preparing for the interview, Isoardi consulted jazz histories, autobiographies, oral histories, relevant jazz periodicals, documentary films, and back issues of the California Eagle and the Los Angeles Sentinel.

The interview is organized chronologically, beginning with Douglass's childhood and education in Texas and Los Angeles and continuing on through his career as a jazz musician. Major topics covered include fellow jazz musicians, musical styles, desegregation of jazz groups, the American Federation of Musicians, and the rise and decline of Central Avenue.


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Editing:

Alex Cline, editor, edited the interview. He checked the verbatim transcript of the interview against the original tape recordings, edited for punctuation, paragraphing, and spelling, and verified proper names. Whenever possible, Cline checked the proper names of nightclubs against articles and advertisements in back issues of the California Eagle. Words and phrases inserted by the editor have been bracketed.

Douglass reviewed the transcript. He verified proper names and made minor corrections and additions.

Cline also prepared the biographical summary. Steven J. Novak, editor, prepared the table of contents, interview history, and index.

Supporting Documents:

The original tape recordings of the interview are in the university archives and are available under the regulations governing the use of permanent noncurrent records of the university. Records relating to the interview are located in the office of the UCLA Oral History Program.

Table of Contents

  • TAPE NUMBER: I, Side One (February 2, 1990)
  • Childhood in Los Angeles -- Meets Dexter Gordon in junior high school -- Music teachers -- Local musicians--Influence of Sam Browne--Choice of the drums as an instrument--Learning from Lloyd Reese--Jamming at the American Federation of Musicians (AFM) Local 767--Joins the union --Hanging around famous musicians at the Dunbar Hotel--Jo Jones--Integrating bands--Benny Goodman.


  • TAPE NUMBER: I, Side Two (February 2, 1990)
  • Finding work--Central Avenue--Enlists in the United States Army Tenth Cavalry Band--Stationed in North Africa and Italy--Central Avenue during World War II--Art Tatum--Performs as a singer -- Discharge and marriage--Drawbacks of unionizing music--Impact of bebop--L.A. nightclubs--Buddy Rich.


  • TAPE NUMBER: II, Side One (February 10, 1990)
  • Participates in the liberation of Rome during World War II--Billy Berg, nightclub owner--Hollywood clubs--AFM Local 767--Dixieland jazz--Lester Young--Racial segregation in Las Vegas.


  • TAPE NUMBER: II, Side Two (February 10, 1990)
  • More on racial relations in Las Vegas--More on Benny Goodman--Bebop--The Club Alabam--The Plantation Club--Other jazz clubs--Race relations in the South.


  • TAPE NUMBER: III, Side One (February 10, 1990)
  • Dynamite Jackson--Winning double time for New Year's gigs--Gerald Wiggins--Amalgamation of AFM locals 47 and 767--Elmer Fain--Going on strike at the Club Alabam--Women musicians--More on Art Tatum.


  • TAPE NUMBER: III, Side Two (February 10, 1990)
  • Tatum's virtuosity.


  • TAPE NUMBER: IV, Side One (February 17, 1990)
  • More on AFM Local 767--Union dues structure--Elks Club auditorium--Union officials--Opposition to union segregation--Jazz musicians and marijuana--Racial discrimination in Los Angeles.


  • TAPE NUMBER: IV, Side Two (February 17, 1990)
  • Elected vice president of Local 767--Pushing for amalgamation of the locals--Union red-baiting--Mechanics of the locals' merger--Continued vigilance against discrimination--AfricanAmericans elected to office in Local 47--Difficulty of maintaining musical skill while serving as a union official.


  • TAPE NUMBER: V, Side One (March 3, 1990)
  • Spread of union integration--Clef Club musical scholarships--More on the struggle to change the union bylaws--Nat King Cole.


  • TAPE NUMBER: V, Side Two (March 3, 1990)
  • The recording industry and Central Avenue--Start of the Musicians Guild--Reservations about union amalgamation--Impact of R and B on jazz musicians--Decline of Central Avenue.


1

Tape Number: I, Side One
February 2, 1990

Isoardi

Bill, it's a pleasure to begin an interview with you. Can we start by talking about where you were born, what the neighborhood was like, the environment, etc.?


Douglass

Well, that's kind of interesting. I consider myself a native of Los Angeles. I wasn't actually born here. I was born in a place called Sherman, Texas, which I know nothing about. My mom [Christopher Sanders Douglass] and dad [James H. Douglass] brought me out here when I was six months old, so there you go. Don't ask me about Sherman. I know nothing about it at all. But I was born in the year 1923, February 28, to be exact. I was reared here, went to school here, and just practically spent all my life here. I mean, I've been in and out of town a little bit, but this has been it. This has always been home.


Isoardi

Why did your folks come out here?


Douglass

I have no idea. I like to feel that they brought me out here so that they'd put me in a fresh setting, like away from the Jim Crow and all that other type of thing. Not that none of it existed here, but basically and by law and whatnot it was not supposed to exist. I don't know. I have no idea. We have a very large family and relatives and whatnot, and it seems that most of them migrated out here around about that time.



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Isoardi

Where did they settle? Where did you grow up?


Douglass

Let me see. I grew up right here— Well, the Eastside of Los Angeles. I think I spent most of my time, as I remember it, as a very young kid, on a street called Compton Boulevard. I don't remember very much about that, but then, a little later on, just a few blocks from there, on what was considered East Thirty-ninth Street, 1500 block, actually, my grandmother and grandfather had a lot there, and they had two houses on the lot, and we, my dad's family—that's my mom and dad and myself and my two younger sisters [Josephine and Frances Douglass] at that time—were living in the rear house. Thirty-ninth Street, and then later— That's called Forty-first Place right now. I do remember sometime, during the thing, for some reason or another they did a little shifting around, and the numbers on the street were changed. Then, from there, we went directly across the street, my mom and dad and our family did, still to the 1500 block and right across the street. And then, shortly after that, we moved out on East Fifty-sixth Street. That's where I did the majority of my growing up, I guess.


Isoardi

Did your family own the houses they lived in?


Douglass

No, they didn't. No, my grandparents owned that piece of property that we stayed in originally, but, no, we never did own any property. It was a funny thing. When I


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think of the prices then, and I've heard about what they should have bought the property for, I mean, I just couldn't understand it. God, they were paying something like maybe—what?—$21 a month rent or something like that. You know, who wants to own anything? [tape recorder off]


Isoardi

What were those neighborhoods like when you were growing up? How would you characterize them? What was it like to be a kid then?


Douglass

That's a hard one to answer. I didn't think about it so much then. The schools we attended were all— I'd say they were quite integrated. They were, I guess, predominantly black, but I guess we had Caucasian, and some of them were referred to as Jews and whatnot. I don't know. I cannot tell a Jew by recognition, you know. People all look the same to me. We had Japanese, Chinese, Hispanic, as you call them. I mean, they all attended the same schools. So there I was in grade school. The first school that I remember was not too far from my first home that I remember, and that was called Ascot Avenue [Elementary School]. And that was located— I guess it extended from the streets Compton [Boulevard] over to Ascot [Avenue], and it was fronted by Vernon Avenue.


Isoardi

Was that the name of the school? Ascot Avenue School?



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Douglass

Yeah, it was called Ascot Avenue at that time. I think the names of those schools have all been changed. Then, later on, when we moved out on Fifty-sixth Street, well, then I was forced to transfer to another school, Hooper Avenue, and that must have been up around—I'm just guessing—up around Fifty-sixth Street. That was my grammar school thing. And then our grammar school years, that was from kindergarten up to the sixth grade, and then you're promoted, and you graduate to junior high school, and then you go to another school. From there, I went over to McKinley [Junior High School], and that was— Let's see. McKinley was fronted by Vernon Avenue, and it ran from— Let's see. God, it's awfully hard to remember the streets now. But anyway, that was my junior high school, and that's where I first ran into Dexter Gordon.


Isoardi

You went to junior high together?


Douglass

Yeah, we were in junior high school together. I mean, we looked at one another. Here we're both the same height, you know, and this and that. People have said that we looked an awful lot like brothers. Of course, I have to say that he was very influential in the fact that I decided to become a musician.


Isoardi

Do you remember the first time you saw him? The first time you met him?


Douglass

All I know— I remember our gym class.



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Isoardi

That was it?


Douglass

We just looked at each other kind of funny, you know, and just kind of grinned and laughed. We just became very good friends, very close friends. There were just a lot of guys in the community, some of them related, and— We just went to school. This is going back an awful long way. But we were in junior high school together. We finished junior high school. I think that took us from the sixth grade up until the ninth grade, and then, from the tenth to the twelve, then you go to high school. From there, we went to Jefferson High School. Of course, Jefferson High School is where we finally began to get our formal training. I think that was the first time I actually got a chance to get into a real instrument class.


Isoardi

Let me ask you about when you first started playing. When did you first pick up and play an instrument? Was it before then?


Douglass

Yeah. I would say that it was tenth grade, my first year in high school. I'd been interested. I had a guitar at one time and a ukelele, because I had an uncle [Peter T. Douglass] who was a guitar player with one of the so-called real popular bands around town, the Les Hite Orchestra. People like Marshall Royal, Floyd Turnham, and a number of others, were in that same orchestra.


Isoardi

I think Lloyd Reese played with Les Hite, didn't


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he?


Douglass

Yeah, Lloyd Reese, who was one of my teachers.


Isoardi

Oh, you studied with him also?


Douglass

Oh, yeah, yeah. All of us studied with the same teacher. That's Buddy [Collette], Dexter, Charles Mingus, myself, and—let's see—Hampton Hawes, Eric Dolphy. He taught everybody. You know, you figure with all these different instruments— Of course, I was a drummer, basically, but I was into studying music. So I studied keyboard with Reese, and he just kind of told me what to do on the drums. He told me who to watch, and this is right, and that's it. I never had a formal drum teacher. I had people that I got together with from time to time, and I just sought out the knowledge that I wanted and just worked at it.


Isoardi

When you were in tenth grade and you first studying an instrument then, was it drums?


Douglass

Yeah, it was drums.


Isoardi

What attracted you to the drums?


Douglass

Oh, well, I had a cousin [Alvy Kidd], a cousin by marriage, and he was quite a little bit of a showboat type of guy. He played on— Well, you've probably read some of the articles by Dexter, the kid who played the washtub and had the tin pans and things all set up like a drumset, simulated a drum sound? I think that was when Dexter first


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got hold of a clarinet. I used to listen to the two of them together, you know, playing with little groups and trying to jam. Naturally, I got attracted to that and wanted to get into it. So I kind of hung out with him and was fooling with the drums a little bit. But then, when I got into high school, and we were under Sam Browne, who was our first music teacher— Incidentally, he was the first black person in the Los Angeles [Unified School District] city school system. He was our band director and music teacher.


Isoardi

He was the first teacher in the system?


Douglass

He was the first black teacher in the Los Angeles school system.


Isoardi

No kidding? I didn't know that.


Douglass

Yeah. There's been an awful lot written about him. I should have some articles around here somewhere, because he's been acknowledged quite a bit in very recent years.


Isoardi

Certainly everyone talks about him who's encountered him. Do you know when he started teaching at Jeff?


Douglass

Well, I don't know all these things, but it's all in these little documentaries about him. I just remember Sam Browne, because there's an awful lot been written about him. He's still around somewhere.


Isoardi

What was he like as a teacher?



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Douglass

I don't have to look back. You know, from this day, I mean, I still respect him. I mean, I thought he was just absolutely the greatest. He is the one who taught all of us how to play and what to do. That was the thing that made school so interesting. He not only conducted the regular high school orchestra and the marching band and all that type of thing, but he organized the little swing bands and taught us how to jam together and all that type of stuff. We used to have those little jam sessions at school. Of course, we were listening to the big orchestras. Like our idols were the Count Basies, Jimmie Luncefords, Duke Ellingtons, and what have you, and he sort of helped us as we were all trying to emulate these people. So he sort of helped us along.


Isoardi

Was music very prominent in your family when you were a kid? Was there music? Was your family listening to records or going to dances to hear the bands, things like that? Or was this something you sort of gravitated to on your own?


Douglass

It's something I did on my own. I always had an interest in it. My dad was with a vocal group, a quartet called the Bilbrew Quartet, and he sort of did that. I guess that was basically a sideline, because I know he was a custodian in the school system. But I actually saw him on stage many times. And my dad's father [Calvin Douglass]


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was a violinist. [tape recorder off] Now, what was that last question?


Isoardi

You were saying you saw your father performing on stage quite a bit.


Douglass

Yeah, yeah. I saw him perform. So I was always aware of these things. My uncle was playing in the bands, so I'd see him on the stage from time to time. And then, as a young kid, he came over. I remember Floyd Turnham, who's a saxophone player. He's still around, also. He and my uncle played together quite a bit. I never will forget them coming over to the house and having a session or something at one time. I know that I was very mad; my mom and dad made me go to bed because it was getting after hours. But I don't know. These kind of things just kept me— I know I used to listen to— At one time I wanted to play a clarinet because I heard Ted Lewis at some time or another. And the guitar, I used to try to get my uncle to teach me. He was very impatient, but he'd show me a few little chords, and I'd learn to strum a few things from time to time. I used to listen to my grandfather. My grandfather was a violinist, and he and Marshall Royal's dad played together in the same orchestra. So I used to see and hear all this kind of stuff at the family picnics and things. I don't know. The music was always around.


Isoardi

What kind of an orchestra was that? Did they


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play regular gigs?


Douglass

I guess at that time they were probably playing what you called— I don't know whether you called it ragtime or— I never knew how to put labels on things. I didn't know what you'd call what Ted Lewis played. But I thought that Ted Lewis was a terrific entertainer. I guess you've heard of him. He had the clarinet and the top hat and all that kind of thing. He did a little bit of singing, and I thought that he was great. And I thought Louis [Armstrong] was great. My grandmother used to have the windup Victrola, and they'd put these records on. I'd hear a little bit of Louis Armstrong, and then, once in a while, a little Lionel Hampton along with him. Then, I don't know, the bands just came into prominence. You know, you used to be able to turn on your radio and catch live broadcasts. This is what was happening. And then, I don't know when Benny Goodman came along. Well, then, I never heard a clarinet like that! I was very much wrapped up in that until I heard Gene Krupa get loose and they left him out there playing all by himself. That was "Sing, Sing, Sing." The first time I heard that, it was on the radio, and something just happened to me then.


Isoardi

Now, were you playing drums at that time?


Douglass

Well, I was interested in it. I had a pair of drumsticks and an old footstool I used to bang on. "Camel


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Caravan" was the name of that program. I never missed it; I never missed a broadcast. And just waiting for that, you know, the idea that the drums were out there going all by themselves— The whole thing was thrilling. That's what I had to do. That's all there was to it.


Isoardi

So it was hearing those Krupa drums solos that really got you going.


Douglass

Yeah. And, of course, when I got into high school, in your curriculum, you had to select what you call a major. I decided to be a music major. I was going to be a musician. And then, when I got into Sam Browne, well, the first thing I did in the instrument class is he put a book in front of me with notes in it. I said, "Gee, I didn't know drummers were supposed to read notes." However, I was very fortunate, because right then I associated the two things, and I've been a note fanatic ever since then, just anything I could find to read or whatever. He was the one who encouraged me in the study of rudiments. I said, "Rudiments? What's that?" So then I'd go down and buy books. I'd hear those words, and I'd go down and buy the books. Then, he would kind of— Well, see, a teacher like that, he had to kind of coach everybody, no matter what. He was a pianist himself. But they had to know enough about all the other instruments to be able to kind of get guys going. And then, of course, he always encouraged everybody


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at some time or another to get with a very good private teacher and really get into the studying of the instrument. We were always encouraged to study.


Isoardi

So he's a teacher who really motivated people.


Douglass

Oh, yeah, yeah. No doubt about it.


Isoardi

So at this time, then, you began with Sam Browne, but you didn't have a private teacher then, did you?


Douglass

No, I didn't have a private teacher then. Then, of course, naturally, I ran around with Dexter and Lamar Wright. Ernie [Ernest] Royal went to school with us there— he was a little older than we were—and I know he was a great trumpet player then.


Isoardi

Oh, really? He was that fine then?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. In school, he was just— Our guys, even before they got out of high school, they could play. We all held down jobs at night while we were trying to go to school.


Isoardi

While you were in high school?


Douglass

Yes. I mean, nightclubs, you know.


Isoardi

When did you sleep?


Douglass

Well, we just didn't. We used to try to sleep in class, and then we used to catch hell from the teachers. They knew what we were doing, and we had to get our studies together or else— We were afraid that somebody was going to come on our jobs and pull us off the jobs.



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Isoardi

You never had any trouble for being so young and playing on stage? You must have been sixteen or so?


Douglass

Well, I had to be fifteen going on sixteen. You know, I was very tall. I guess Dexter and I were both about this height, you know, a good six foot four or so. Even though we were young kids, nobody paid that much attention. They didn't have the real— You know, the liquor laws. They didn't really watch you or pay that much attention to you. Our teachers were always threatening to expose us and get us pulled off the jobs, but they sort of left us alone if we got through school and got our studies. So that was what was happening.

I don't know. It seems like, when you get going on these things [interviews], you know, kind of a million thoughts run through your mind at once. One thing just leads to another. You feel like you're leaving something out, and I probably will, because it's like trying to cover a whole lifetime in a few minutes.


Isoardi

Oh, don't worry about that. Just follow whatever, whatever you—


Douglass

Well, anyway, you were mentioning the private teacher. I know that Dexter wound up with a private teacher, and that was Lloyd Reese. When we'd leave school, I would walk over to his music lesson with him. Here Lloyd Reese is teaching Dexter what to play on the clarinet.


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Then Dexter got a saxophone after that. So then, naturally, I always talked to Reese, just inquisitive, like, "How do you do this? How you do that?" So he gave me ideas on the things that I should study to become a good drummer and which drummers I should listen to. He would tell me a lot about the drummers.

I remember he mentioned to me what a great musician Cozy Cole was, a man with a great amount of knowhow. I managed to meet Cozy after a while, and he was very influential. He was traveling with Cab Calloway's big band, and they'd come into town. Fortunately, he would let me come by his house, after school or so, usually after school. He's getting up around that time. He was one of those guys who practices very diligently at all times. I was able to just sit around there and watch what he did and all the things that he practiced. I saw his books. I went out and purchased every book I could find, and all I could do is just absorb, just watch him play. I said, "Gee, I never knew anybody could read notes that fast." I never heard the rudiments move that fast. I was learning the rudiments, but the way he played them, they sounded so great and so musical. I mean, he didn't take time out to just show me exactly how to play things, but I absorbed. I looked at the notes and then heard them. I sort of watched and saw it all go by, and I just maintained that in my head


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and just decided that I was going to just keep after it until I had it the same way. [tape recorder off]


Isoardi

You were talking about your picking everything up from Cozy Cole just sitting there listening.


Douglass

Yeah. Of course, once in a while, after I got my books together, I'd run across something here, and I'd go to Reese and say, "I don't understand this. How does that go?" Then he would just give me an explanation. I finally decided that I wanted to just take lessons from him, so I studied the keyboard with him.


Isoardi

Why keyboard?


Douglass

I just wanted to know something about the music and what was going on. To this day, I think the keyboard is the most important thing. It's been very influential to me. The reason why I— I don't know. While I was playing drums, I still listened to everybody, each and every instrument and what they played and this and that. To this day, I firmly believe that just playing drums means nothing unless it's related to the other instruments in the orchestra. I felt like by having some knowledge and some feeling as to what the other guys were doing and whatnot, it made me more sensitive as a drummer. That's proved true throughout my career, because I've always managed to accompany all of the great pianists of all time, such as Art Tatum, Erroll Garner, Gerald Wiggins, Earl Hines— I mean, I


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could just go on and on and on. They seemed to like me because I seemed to understand what they were doing.


Isoardi

I've always gotten the sense that, if you know keyboards, you have more of a sense of the possibilities. You can really see the chords and what's happening, as opposed to just knowing the other instrument.


Douglass

Yeah. So that's why I got into it. I wanted to know— I don't know. It was a funny thing.

Like in the instrument classes under Sam Browne in school, besides rehearsing with the band, you had the instrument class. After a while a semester goes by and you move up. You're promoted to the band, and that's what happened eventually. Now, I got in the band, and there's a guy in there playing drums, a hot drummer named Chico Hamilton. Same school, same band— I mean, you know, Jefferson High School was the— Well, what do you call it? I mean, that's where everybody came from. Jefferson High School. That was it. Everybody played. Everybody was working jobs at night.


Isoardi

With a band like that, boy!


Douglass

Yeah. So then, what happened with so many of the guys, Charlie Mingus, all these different guys, they all studied with Reese. Now, Reese didn't play bass, but Charlie was into it, so Charlie studied keyboard. We studied what you call keyboard harmony. I didn't sit there


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and do a lot of piano technique, just the knowledge of what the keyboard was all about. We were all into it the same way, studying the same things, and then going to other teachers. I don't know. Buddy might have told you this whole story. But then, after that, Reese organized a band made up of all of his students, a big band.


Isoardi

Sort of a rehearsal band.


Douglass

Yeah. We used to go down to [American Federation of Musicians Local] 767, you know, the hall down there. We weren't members at that time, but they got it open on Sunday mornings for us. So we would go there and we would rehearse. We'd get our little stock arrangements. I think we all chipped in something like a quarter apiece per week, into the little treasury so that we could buy music. I was reminding Gerald Wilson of this the other night. Finally, at some time or another— I remember Gerald was with Jimmie Lunceford at that time, and he was writing, naturally, so we got him to bring a couple of his arrangements. We called them special arrangements at that time. [tape recorder off]


Isoardi

So Gerald Wilson would bring arrangements by.


Douglass

Yeah, he'd bring arrangements by at that time, and so then—


Isoardi

The band was playing.


Douglass

Yeah. We'd set up and we'd rehearse his numbers


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and then we'd—


Isoardi

What a thrill.


Douglass

So then we would offer to buy them. Sometimes he gave us an arrangement. But then we offered to buy his arrangement from him. It cost us a little more than the stocks did, but we could just automatically tell the difference in the specially written material.

So this band, we'd rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. Boy, if you could have seen us. I remember there was fellow named Charles Martin, who was a pianist. He lived way out in the Watts area, and he would pick up Mingus. He drove a little Willys car, a very small car. Then he would swing by and pick me up. We had the bass, the drums, and I don't know how many musicians in that car, hanging in and outside of us, and then we'd make that trip all the way down Central Avenue until we got to Seventeenth Street where the union was located. Then we'd get out there and take our stuff out. That was the ritual. We looked forward to that each and every week. We played and we played. Finally, we had a lot of real adult musicians who would come around and listen to us play. We had a pretty good thing going. Later on, we were going around and soliciting jobs and playing the dances and things like that. In fact, there was a point where we giving a lot of the union musicians a pretty bad time for some of the jobs. [laughter] So it was through that that


19
Reese, who was— I don't know. He must have been some sort of an officer or had some standing within Local 767 at that time. They came up with some sort of a deal where they got all of us to join by giving us a special joining fee. I think it was something like $25 apiece, and we all joined at the same time. That was because we were in competition with the union musicians. That was a proud day, the day we all got our union cards in our pockets.


Isoardi

Just before that, when you were playing these clubs at night as teenagers, you didn't have to be a member of the union, then, to play at those clubs?


Douglass

No. Well, I mean, there was as much nonunion stuff going on as there was union.


Isoardi

Oh, there was?


Douglass

Yeah. That's what it was all about. I mean, people have got to start somewhere. You can't just start off in the union. The only reason why you would join the union is if there was a necessity for it. I would tell somebody that same thing today.


Isoardi

So Central Avenue wasn't really a closed shop. It was a pretty mixed bag. Some were open; some were—


Douglass

Oh, yeah. All the first jobs I played were just— I remember a lot of the older musicians— You know, we weren't always just playing together as kids, either. I'd sit at home and I'd practice. And then, it happened all the


20
time, some older musician would be driving down the street and hear this going on and say, "That kid's got kind of a beat." Then he'd stop and meet me and so forth and so on.

I remember there was a guy named Waller. What was his name? It was a pianist whose name was Waller. Gus Waller, I believe was his name. Then there was another fellow who's a member of this union now, Eugene Jackson. You know, he's a child movie star from the Our Gang comedy days. Well, he's a saxophone player and a comedian on the side. He came by. Then there was another guy named Ted Cruise, who was a saxophone player. I mean, the guys, they got to know you. So they said, "We'll get this young kid. He keeps time." Oh, just about every Friday or Saturday one of them would come by. I had no car or anything like that. They'd come by and pick me up.


Isoardi

And take you to a gig.


Douglass

The funniest thing about it, they always had to ask my mother's permission. [laughter] They kid me about that now, you know, what they went through. They really had to go through hell. My mother grilled them: "Well, where are you going to be? What time are you going to get back?" They had to go through hell just to get her to let me go out with them on the job.


Isoardi

What clubs were you playing at? Do you remember any of them in particular?



21
Douglass

Oh, I don't remember the names of all of them. Some of the jobs were down on Main Street. I remember Dexter and I and probably Charles Martin, a piano player, we had the job down on Main Street at one time or another. These are just clubs, just beer joints. I guess they had beer and whiskey. Just little places where people just drank, you know. We'd play the music. With our little three pieces, we'd try to imitate the sounds that we heard in the big bands, and we just did the best we could. I remember the salary was $1.50 a night. Of course, people always threw tips at you. You got well off the tips.

The Eugene Jackson thing— We finally started working with a certain amount of regularity at a little club out here called— I think it was called the Zomba, which was on— I think I was a member of the union at that time. Yeah, in fact, I know I was. So I don't know. Trying to think back over the years, what happened before union and what happened when you were in [is difficult], because I know I had the union card when I was sixteen. That's just one of the things that I remember.

You'd go to the places on Central Avenue. I mean, there was the Dunbar Hotel and the Club Alabam. That was a famous place. All of us as young kids, when we got out of school and were on our way home, we would walk right down Central Avenue just for a chance to pass by the Dunbar


22
Hotel, because that's where all the big bands stayed. You know, we used to get the word ahead of time that somebody's band was coming into town—it might be Basie or whatever it was—but we'd stand there and wait on the bus. We'd watch these guys climb off the bus and go upstairs to their hotel rooms, and we just hung around. And then, if they opened in a theater, you know, no school for us! [laughter] We'd see that same movie. You know, they always had a movie and then the stage show, a movie and the stage show. We'd just sit through that movie over and over again just to catch the next show. And then, we'd run out in the alley and watch them come out of the backstage entrance, in and out. That kept on until we got a chance to get acquainted with the guys, and then they knew we were musicians. Once in a while, I'd get a chance to carry Jo Jones's case or something like that, and then you'd get in backstage. I've got a picture of [Harry] "Sweets" Edison. You saw him just a minute ago, right?


Isoardi

Yeah. Buddy introduced me to him.


Douglass

Well, let me show you something. I've got a picture that Sweets gave me during that time.


Isoardi

Of what? You and Jo Jones or something?


Douglass

No, no. During the time when we were with Basie and we were the young kids hanging around and— [rifles through photographs] Golly, what's here? Yeah, see, I've


23
got pictures—


Isoardi

Oh, geez. A very young Bill Douglass with a drumset.


Douglass

Yeah, yeah. Here's another one, see. There he is. Well, who do you think?


Isoardi

Geez.


Douglass

Yeah. That's what Sweets gave me. I must have been around fifteen, sixteen years old when he gave that to me. A real, live autographed photograph of Sweets.


Isoardi

Wow. Marvelous photograph. How old was he then?


Douglass

Oh, he couldn't have been much more than twenty-one, twenty-two, I would say.


Isoardi

Yeah. At the most.


Douglass

Because that's in the thirties, you know. That's in the thirties. That was the Paramount Theatre downtown. Basie was the first band to come out here and play a theater.


Isoardi

And this photograph is Sweets with the Basie band?


Douglass

With the Basie band, yeah. He's right on the bandstand. That's where that picture was taken. In uniform, as you can see.


Isoardi

Marvelous photograph. Marvelous. So did you have much of a relationship with Jo Jones? Did you become friends with him?



24
Douglass

Oh, yeah, to his dying day. I mean, we just lost him about a year or two ago, I guess it was. I never knew when he was going to pop up out this way. It's just that that phone would ring, and then he'd say so-and-so and say— See, I was a teacher around here for quite a while, too. He'd say, "I need to get some lessons." I'd listen, and the voice would get familiar. You never knew when he was coming to town. And then he'd be here. I had to drive him around over here and then over there and so forth and so on. And to this day, to this day, you know, he still treats me like I'm the same young kid. "Say, Bill, let me tell you something." He says, "Next time you pick me up," he says, "I want you to bring your tape recorder, because whatever I tell you, you want to put this down and remember it." [laughter] I loved him. I loved him every day of my— He felt like he was my father. I guess that's how we tagged that name "Papa Jo" on him. I mean, not just myself, but I guess everybody all over the world and all over the country, for that matter. But it was just a relationship. You know, at one time I was a young kid: "Jo, how do you do this? Jo, how do you do that?" So he feels like it's that way— If he were still here right now, he would feel like it's that way. I should still be asking his advice. And I had that much respect for him that I would never say, "Well, no, Jo, that's wrong." Whatever he


25
said, I took it, even if it was with a grain of salt. I made him think that I was really eating it up. That's all there was to it.


Isoardi

Was he a big influence on your playing?


Douglass

Of course. Well, he was a big influence on everybody's playing. Big influence. See, like I told you that Gene Krupa was the first influence. And that's what it was. I heard a lot of great drummers. And then, when I heard Jo, well, that turned me around, all the way around. It was just another thing altogether, a completely different thing, you know, a very loose, free style of playing.

There were just— Every time I heard somebody— And then Cozy was a great influence. I mean, from the legitimate standpoint, he could read anything, he knew all the rudiments. I just couldn't imagine anybody knowing as much as he did. I know that Jo and some of the other guys couldn't read like Cozy could. It wasn't really necessary. But Cozy was just thoroughly schooled. I just decided I wanted to be like that, also.

And then, when I went around other drummers— I mean, like the way I held my sticks. I must have changed it a dozen— Every time I saw a new drummer, I'd try to hold my sticks the way he does. Or where he sets his snare drum or his cymbal. I don't know. I just went through all kinds


26
of things until I finally settled on something that seemed to work best for me. Well, I'm a much bigger man than a lot of guys. I mean, like Buddy Rich is another one of my idols, but he's a little guy, the most powerful little son of a gun you ever want to see. I liked the way he did things, but then I had to decide what was best for me physically.

Then I admired guys like Sid Catlett. Sid was a big guy, but he had that finesse. I mean, there were so many good ones until you didn't know which way to go. [laughter] So what the hell, be like everybody. I never could be just one way, you know. And I guess, in the long run, I finally wound up being myself. But during the years, it was always gratifying when somebody says, "Gee, you remind me of so and so." I've even had little writeups and things where somebody said that my brush work was reminiscent of Jo Jones. To this day, that makes me feel great. It really does.


Isoardi

What would you say the role of Local 767 was at that time? How important were they for young musicians, for musicians down on Central?


Douglass

Well, I don't know how to answer that question, necessarily. We all came up through 767. I mean, that was the union. It was the only place to go. All the musicians we knew belonged to that. So there was a certain amount


27
of— You know, when you finally got your union card and you started playing with all the different guys, the union card meant that you were professional. You actually were a professional.


Isoardi

Sort of accepted as part of the brotherhood.


Douglass

Yeah. We were really proud of it. Of course, that was the only union we knew. We never thought about the fact that it— Well, we knew about this thing that was over on this side. This thing was over on some street called Georgia Street at one time, you know. All the white guys belonged to one local [Local 47], and all the black guys belonged to another. We didn't get really conscious of it until later years. Buddy Collette branched out. He was the only black guy who was on a regular television show, the Groucho Marx show ["You Bet Your Life"].

I was playing with Benny Goodman at that time. I was the only black guy in his band, and I was doing a lot of recording with him. I mean, I did a lot of traveling, the concert tours. My first trip to Las Vegas was with Benny. And then, he even made a statement like— You know how he was. I guess one of the things that impressed me about Benny was not only the Gene Krupa thing, but, I mean, when Lionel Hampton and Teddy Wilson and those guys— Now, all of a sudden, here's black guys playing with Benny Goodman. So therefore— I don't know. For some reason,


28
Benny Goodman was just the ultimate, as far as I was concerned. I mean, I knew he was "the king of swing." He was probably the best and the richest bandleader in the world, to my knowledge. Then, all of a sudden, here the bands are all mixed up. I think it was just one of my ambitions as a kid. I drummed along with all those Benny Goodman records and along with those radio programs. "Gee, maybe there's a chance for me, even a guy like me, to get into a band like Benny's." You never heard of a black guy joining a white band. But then, all of a sudden, that started something. He started something.


Isoardi

So that was important, that model.


Douglass

Yeah. Many years later, when I least thought about it, I finally received a phone call. Somebody said they wanted me to do a date with Benny. I thought somebody was being funny. I almost didn't go.


Isoardi

When was this? The early fifties or so?


Douglass

'Forty-nine, I think it was. Yeah, about '49 I think I did my first date with him. This was during the time that [James C.] Petrillo [president of the American Federation of Musicians] had announced that there was going to be a ban on recording, so everybody was recording like mad. We just had to stay up all night, one date after another. They were trying to cut all the records they could before the strike went into effect. But anyway,


29
there it was. All of a sudden I got a call. They said, "Recording with Benny Goodman." I just didn't believe it. I said, "Well, there's nothing like getting on over to the studio and finding out." And it was true. So there it was. That was a relationship that I was very proud of.


Isoardi

A childhood dream come true.


Douglass

Yeah.



30

Tape Number: I, Side Two
February 2, 1990

Isoardi

You said that in high school you guys were jamming a lot together. Did you guys form performing groups among yourselves? I mean, did you and Dexter or Hampton [Hawes] or somebody form groups and go out and look for jobs? Or were you just getting jobs as they came? Picking up with other people?


Douglass

I think they just kind of— It was as they came. Once in a while, we'd wind up on the same— Well, yeah, I guess we always did. We always did get a little thing. There were always the little parties. And then your own little group of people, they'd want you to play for their thing. And we were always playing for the other kids. We were always anxious to show off before the rest of them. We did an awful lot of stuff. We used to rehearse and do what you call assemblies at school, which were just like little jazz concerts.

There were times when we got people like Lionel Hampton and the Nat [King] Cole Trio to come over to our school and perform. I got to know some of those guys real well. I remember the instance when we were trying to get uniforms for the school band. We had sort of a small band, but we had a good band. We were scheduled to play at— There was a thing at the [Los Angeles Memorial] Coliseum


31
that happened every year. It was sort of an east versus west high school teams against one another, and so all the schools brought their various bands. Our band was invited to perform at this thing. We said, "Well, gee, what are going to do? We need uniforms." And so what we did is we just decided—I was one of the main guys—one night we got the idea together that we would do something. We would have a big assembly or something like this and charge admission and whatnot, and maybe we'd raise the money to buy the uniforms. And so what did they do? They just talked Lionel Hampton and Nat King Cole—King Cole had a trio—into coming over. They performed on our stage for us, and that's how we raised the money. That was the thing: just the fact that, as young guys, we were branching out into the world, but we were getting acquainted with the guys. They sort of looked out for our needs quite a bit.

You were mentioning about the advantages of belonging [to the union]. Yeah, I think it was an advantage, as it turns out, for all of us. The fact that we were just there, we were on the spot, and— I mean, next door to the local itself was Lester Young's family.


Isoardi

They lived next door to it?


Douglass

Yeah. They lived right next door to Local 767. It was just a great big, two-story frame house;


32
that's all it was.


Isoardi

Did Lee Young live there? The whole family?


Douglass

Yeah, Lee Young lived there, his family, you know, sisters, and whatnot. Lester was there whenever he was in town, because Lester was always out and gone most of the time. Lee Young was another one of the many drummers. If I wanted to learn something, I'd go watch— "Lee, how do you do that?" "Like this and that." And then he was another one; he would give me the opportunity. I mean, when the Lee and Lester Young band was formed and was performing around here, I was just one of the young guys that Lee would trust. You know, he could get up from the drums and say, "Come on and play a few tunes." Boy, that was just the the thrill of a lifetime. I got a chance to play with some awfully great people, strictly because I just took care of business and kept it together. So the opportunities were there.

I guess this [Local 767] was on a much smaller scale than this thing [Local 47]. This thing varies between 13,000 and maybe 16,000 members, and over there we had something like 600, which we thought that was a lot of people. However, when all those bands came to town, they all came right through there. You always knew ahead of time that they were coming, and you were right waiting for them. It was similar to the people meeting the [Los


33
Angeles] Dodgers at the airport when they're coming in from a victorious— We were always right there waiting on that bus to get there. If we weren't at the union, then we were right down at the hotel where they checked in. Of course, Central Avenue, I mean, there are a lot of things that happened all up and down Central Avenue and in the vicinity, but then it moved out. It moved to downtown; it moved to Hollywood. I would have to say that the black musicians got in Hollywood and practically took Hollywood over.


Isoardi

When is this? What period are you talking about?


Douglass

Well, I mean, just during the forties, fifties, or what have you. Most of the clubs and things who were doing anything— I mean, the bands were mixed, but predominantly— Like when we wanted to work, we worked on Central Avenue, but the better jobs generally were out here in the Hollywood area. I'm talking about the Sunset Strip. You know where that is?


Isoardi

Sure.


Douglass

That used to be the elite, like Ciro's and the Macambo and the Trocadero and all those places like that. Well, I was fortunate enough to work all those places. All the jobs weren't necessarily jazz, as such, but I'd say they were jazz, because we all— You know, whatever we did— If I was playing society, there was always that little jazz


34
influence, that little flavor or whatever it is you put into it. We made things swing. I mean, that's the way it was.


Isoardi

Do you remember when, I guess when you were a kid, the first time you went to Central? Or when you first started understanding what Central was about, hanging out there? Can you sort of describe what the avenue was like back then?


Douglass

Well, yeah, I guess I could. I mean, we didn't think of Central Avenue as being anything special. People are just now starting to think of the significance of it. It was just home. It was just a way of life. That's all there was to it. I mean, I lived just two or three blocks— I had to go down Central to get wherever I was going. If I wanted to go downtown, I had to get the "U" car on Central and take it all the way downtown.


Isoardi

But the clubs were going, the sounds were coming out, block after block.


Douglass

Oh, yeah. We had all kinds of clubs all up and down the street, and they stretched all the way out towards Watts way. Watts was all the way out around 103d Street or so. And, of course, the Plantation [Club], that was still on Central Avenue.


Isoardi

That was out in Watts.


Douglass

Yeah. That had to be in the Watts area.



35
Isoardi

By this time, then—I guess it must be about the late thirties or so—you're finishing high school. Were your plans then to become a professional musician?


Douglass

Oh, yeah, nothing else, nothing else at all. Our minds were made up in school, just made up. That's what we were going to do.


Isoardi

So you graduate from Jeff. Then what?


Douglass

Well, I just continued to play until the next thing. Shortly after that, I guess, maybe— I finished Jeff in '41. Well, you know, the war broke out December 7 of '41. Of course, I didn't have to go right away. I mean, I wasn't quite of age. But I did go one year later, December 7 of 1942.


Isoardi

Did you?


Douglass

In the service.


Isoardi

You were drafted?


Douglass

No, we weren't drafted. We enlisted. Then, you enlisted for the sake of escaping the draft, because there was another thing, you know— I think Buddy is probably a year older, and— All of us, I remember Jackie Kelso, Buddy Collette, Charlie Mingus, myself, and all of us, they were draft age. So when the draft board was after them— Well, then this opportunity came up in San Francisco. I guess that's where Buddy— They were recruiting guys, organizing a band at Saint Mary's College [Preflight School]. That


36
was in San Francisco [Moraga]. And when you get in that band, then you'd be a musician in the band in the navy and probably exempt from any other duties, but it was a way to escape the draft. So that opportunity arose.

All of us went up there together at the same time. Charlie Mingus didn't pass the physical, and I think by the time they told me to raise my hand to get sworn in, I got scared and chickened out. [laughter] I just didn't make it. Well, I think what happened is they told us— Well, we were supposed to go there and be stationed there for the duration. That's what we were thinking about at that the particular time. Then the guy said, "Well, there's nothing that says that you can't be shipped out." And I said, "Oh no, not get on the boat!" Mingus wasn't going, so I came back. We came back together. Buddy and those guys stayed there, and I don't think they've been on the water yet. [laughter]

So anyway, I went back home and just continued to play in jobs and all that type of thing. And then, just about the time the draft board started after me, about a year later, then another opportunity came up. There was a warrant officer and a lieutenant from the regular army who came down to our local. They were going to enlist the band for the Tenth Cavalry. That's the regular army. You've probably heard of the Tenth Cavalry. I mean, that's a very


37
historical regiment.


Isoardi

Where were they stationed?


Douglass

They were at Camp Lockett, which is in a place called Campo, California, which is about sixty-two miles southeast of San Diego, sitting, really, right on the Mexican border. Well, there was an opportunity, and it came up. So I said, "Well, we're going to be sitting right on the Mexican border for the duration." [laughter] So we jumped at that.


Isoardi

And far from home.


Douglass

So twenty-eight of us went into that band. My teacher, Lloyd Reese, went into that band.


Isoardi

Really? Twenty-eight from 767 went?


Douglass

From Local 767, yeah. [Elmer] Fain, who was the business rep at that time, the big, bad business rep from the union and, boy, just all kinds of guys. We had a fantastic band. So we took all of our basic training there, and we organized. We had a fantastic band. We played all of the USO [United Services Organization] shows, came out here, did the Hollywood Canteen. We traveled here and there. It was great. I mean, it had its ups and downs. We fought with each other, and certain things we didn't like, and whatnot, but, anyway, basically, we were there. And then, what happened was, after about fifteen months, we did go overseas. [laughter]



38
Isoardi

Oh, no. Really?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. Across five oceans. [laughter] You know, I didn't want the navy because I didn't want that!


Isoardi

And Buddy spent three years in—


Douglass

And those guys don't even know what water looks like! [laughter] So there it was. That's what we were doing. We were all comparing, making notes, but then we went. I don't regret it. It was a great experience, even though it was rugged at times. We saw a little action and all that type—


Isoardi

Did you?


Douglass

Oh, yes. However, we were never called upon to fight. We saw action because we stayed— Even though they broke the cavalry up— The cavalry was a horse cavalry, an actual horse cavalry. I've got a picture of myself. [rifles through photographs]


Isoardi

I didn't think they had any left by World War II.


Douglass

Oh, yes. It was just a very historical regiment, a horse cavalry. I learned to ride. Here I am on the horse there. And I've got a picture of myself in my uniform, which I was very proud of. Well, I don't know. I'll just try to keep talking more.


Isoardi

So where did they send you? Where did you guys go?


Douglass

Oh, the first place we went was North Africa.


39
We landed in Casablanca, and then from there we went to Oran, and later on we moved to Algiers. Now, Algiers was a beautiful, beautiful city. Casablanca was dirty, and they were torn up, all the ruins and all that kind of stuff, but Algiers was a gorgeous city. We had some fun there. We played some good clubs. Then, the funniest thing is, when you're stationed around there, like a lot of the— There was always a group of us, about five of us, who were the jamsters. Well, then, we would get a regular gig in town. We'd get off in the evening and then go on our regular little nightclub gig. Yeah, we had a ball. It was a terrific experience.

Then, of course, when we left there, then we had to cross the Mediterranean. We went to Italy, landed in Naples, and then, later on, we made the invasion of Rome. And then, after that was over, then we wound up in our own hotel. Our band was doubled; they joined another band with us, so then my band was doubled. I commanded that band. Then it was fifty pieces. We broke it up into two— Boy, we already had our own eighteen-piece band. We didn't let the other guys from the other band play in our band at all. We thought we were better than they were. [laughter] [showing photograph] Yeah, there's what a good soldier looks like.


Isoardi

Yeah. Three stripes.



40
Douglass

Oh, yeah. As soon as I finished my six weeks of basic training, three stripes. Never one or two. Well, see, the thing about it, the band was a newly authorized outfit, so all the ratings were open. So all we had— We had a warrant officer, and we had a first sergeant and a staff sergeant at that time, and the rest of us were all recruits and rookies. And then, they had to pass out the ratings. You had to be a combination of good musicianship as well as being a good soldier, and I was excellent in both areas. [I was a] pretty young guy to be a sergeant because I had to order a lot of old men around, you know.


Isoardi

I can really see, in a lot of ways, the similarity with Dexter Gordon. I mean, why people would say you guys could be brothers.


Douglass

Yeah. It was really a funny thing. Just recently, not too long ago, Dexter came out here. That's when Concerts by the Sea was going. He came out. I went out to visit him. He was playing at Concerts by the Sea. You know how the lights and things are at a club. So, naturally, I got down there and listened to him play. And then, when he finished his set, I stood up and walked over to him, and we hugged and this and that, and then we went and sat down together. Later on, he got up and went to the dressing room, and then somebody came over and hounded me for an autograph. I said, "Wait a minute." They thought I


41
was being funny. They got real, you know, "This guy won't give us an autograph." I said, "But I'm not Dexter." They thought I was lying. You know, the lights were kind of soft and low. I guess you'd just have to see the two of us together. But, yeah, that was really funny.


Isoardi

Were you able to make it back while you were stationed below San Diego? Back to L.A. to the avenue?


Douglass

Oh, yeah, in and out all the time. Well, we were always in San Diego, just about every night or so, but any time we had any amount of time at all, well, then, bam, straight back to Los Angeles. We'd come in and hang out in the clubs and jam and this and that. And, naturally, when I was home, I'd stay there. That was the thing that was so beautiful about it. We were just home. You know, people just didn't believe it. It seemed like we were just home all the time. [laughter]


Isoardi

What was the avenue like during the war? How had it changed from before? Or had it changed much?


Douglass

Oh, I couldn't see any particular change. I mean, it seemed like things were really swinging. The clubs seemed to swing. I guess there must have been another crop of guys. There were a lot of guys who didn't get affected, who didn't get called into the draft, and they weren't affected by it. There were an awful lot of guys who were guys who were gone, necessarily. We were


42
just in and out. I don't know. I guess I couldn't answer that. It was pretty much the same. Things really spread out.

There were clubs— Well, you know what happened down in the area up around First Street and San Pedro and whatnot, places that are predominantly Japanese or used to be predominantly Japanese. You know, that was when they put all of the Japanese and their families into the camps and whatnot. So then the things, the hotels and clubs and things down there, seemed like— I don't know. It was not all black. But basically, it seemed like that's where the avenue kind of moved and stretched on out that way. There were all kinds of clubs and things down that way, too. I do remember them.


Isoardi

So that area used to be a Little Tokyo kind of area.


Douglass

Yeah. I think it is again now. It is now.


Isoardi

But it was pretty cleaned out, then, by that campaign of internment.


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

Do you remember going to a lot of those late-night jams there? Did many white musicians come down there to play at all?


Douglass

Oh, yeah, did they. We always had this way of getting together. We used to have the little after-hours


43
spots. I remember the Ritz Club always used to have the battles of the saxophones, or the word would get around that so-and-so is going to be down here at such and such a time. I'll never forget. We had a guy named Bumps Myers. You probably remember him.


Isoardi

I know the name.


Douglass

He was a real hang-outer, a drinker, and this and that. He played saxophone. He was in the Lee and Lester Young orchestra. He was the other tenor in that orchestra. And then, he worked with Benny Carter and just about everybody. Very predominant. He liked Ben Webster. He liked to drink and just hang out and that kind of thing. And then, I remember when Corky Corcoran came along. He was a little, hot, tenor player, and he used to come down on the avenue. See, then they'd have the battles, and he'd give a lot of people a bad time. But he was always nervous when Bumps was around. [laughter] Yeah, we had all kinds of after-hours— I mean, there was Lovejoy's, and there was [Ivie's] Chicken Shack. I mean, there was Jack's Basket Room. I'll always remember Lovejoy's. It was an upstairs place. I was a very, kind of, young guy at the time, but I was working at a club. It was on— Well, I worked at a club on West Eighth Street. It was called the 331 Club. I mean, I had met Art Tatum before that, but that was when I had really gotten acquainted with Tatum.


44
Tatum was playing there, doing a single.


Isoardi

Do you remember when this was?


Douglass

Well, it's got to be— Let's see if I can think. I don't know. I'd have to say this has got to be about '41 or so. Yeah.


Isoardi

Was this before you went into the service?


Douglass

This was before I went into the service. Yeah. And I remember I was with a group called Dootsie William's Four Chocolates. The reason why I got that job was because George Reed, who was a drummer/singer with the group, he got drafted. Nellie Lutcher was in that group. I remember I auditioned for the job, and I won it on the basis of my singing.


Isoardi

Really?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. We used to play instruments and sing in four-part harmony. I mean, really together. We played opposite Art Tatum. Tatum was a drinking guy at that particular time, and he used to go out and jam from time to time. This guy who owned the club was named Herb Rose. Art used to give him a pretty bad time. I was just a little kid who was worshiping guys like Art and whatnot. So Art would tell me, "Tell Herb to give you a case of Pabst Blue Ribbon." Whenever I got that case, I'm supposed to take it over on Central Avenue to Lovejoy's and put it in the refrigerator. When everybody saw me coming there


45
with a case of beer, then the word went around town, "Art's coming in tonight." [laughter] You'd have all the piano players and everybody hanging around, you know. But I was the keynote.


Isoardi

Did you ever see him drink anything other than Pabst?


Douglass

Well, he drank Scotch, V.O., and then he chased it with the Pabst Blue Ribbon. Of course, I was working with him at the time that he finally gave up the drinking. That's when his health got bad.


Isoardi

That was that trio with Red Callender?


Douglass

Yeah. He lost all that weight, and he was off— He was away from the drinking at that time.


Isoardi

Do you remember the first time you heard Art Tatum? What kind of an impact did he have on you?


Douglass

Oh, I don't know. I can't remember the— I don't know. He was just fabulous. I mean, I just couldn't think of anything to equal that. Of course, I was a frustrated piano player, anyway. I was taking piano lessons all the time, just trying to use it for my own knowledge and whatnot. But I heard him, and I heard all the piano players. As great as Art was, I knew which ones Art liked, also.


Isoardi

Which ones were they?


Douglass

Nat Cole was one of his favorites. He used to


46
like Gerald Wiggins. I was working with Gerry for many years, and Art used to come into our club on Central Avenue. That was a little place called the Turban Room, which was sitting inside the same building as the Club Alabam. That's the building that was the Dunbar Hotel.


Isoardi

The Turban Room was in the Dunbar, also?


Douglass

The Turban Room was in the Dunbar Hotel. We had a trio—


Isoardi

Was that like a smaller lounge or something?


Douglass

Just a little small lounge, yeah. It was right here. If you went all the way back, well, then, the big Club Alabam was in the back. So we were working in that. It was Gerald Wiggins and myself—we worked as a duo—and then, on the weekends, we'd add Red Callender on bass. And then, later on, it was a trio.

Art was another one. You never knew when he was in town or not, but you'd look up and there's Art standing at the bar. After he'd get loaded, to see him decide that he wants to sit in and jam some— I had worked with him on that thing I was just telling you about. I remember what a bad time he used to give Herb Rose at the 331. He'd say, "You didn't get this piano tuned today." You know, a big Steinway. Just anything. Like, if the piano wasn't tuned, he would threaten not to even work. This kind of thing. And then, this thing we had in that club was just— We were


47
up on a little pedestal there. We had a little spinet piano with half the notes missing off of it. And they never tuned it. It was terrible. Of course, like with Wiggins and all, we stayed loaded all the time, anyway. But we'd jam, and then we'd get off the bandstand. We might stay off the stand for hours and whatnot. Then Art would walk in there, and, after standing at the bar for a while, then he'd decide he wanted to play. You've never heard anybody play like he could play when he gets on an old, bad piano. He'd fool around, find out what's missing and what isn't, and then what he did to that piano was just something else altogether. It didn't stop him. He just knew what to do with it. Those are the things that are not on record, you know—hearing him play a bad piano and what he could do with it.


Isoardi

What kind of a singer were you?


Douglass

Oh, I'm all right. I can hold my own.


Isoardi

Did anything ever go down on record?


Douglass

Oh, a long time ago I did a few things, a couple of commercial things. I did a Louis Armstrong impersonation.


Isoardi

Did you really? You recorded?


Douglass

Yeah. But then, other than that, as far as singing, I never was— I mean, naturally, you're serious about it to a certain extent, but it's just one of the


48
things— You know, when you worked in clubs, somebody had to sing. They wouldn't hire a group and then hire a singer and this and that. Only the big show spots would do that. I mean, whenever you got a job, they'd ask, "Does anybody in the group sing?" Then we'd look around, and somebody would say, "Well, Bill, you're it." You know, one of those things. So it seemed like I got stuck with it most of the time. There were a lot of things, a lot of jobs I didn't like, because sometimes the singing seemed like it was more important that the playing, and I always cared more about the playing than anything else. Then, later on, I began to accept that it was just part of the deal. You just had to sing. So many people just sing sometimes.

Right before I came to work down here, it was a funny thing. One of the last jobs in one of the Young groups I was working with, the only reason we held onto the job was because of my singing. We had a little, girl piano player; she was a novice. I was teaching her how to play piano, really, and then showing her— You know, I've been doing a lot of teaching a long time. So there's a little group— In fact, I started working with them just by chance, started jamming with them at a little session out at the beach. Then they asked me to work a job with them. So I said, "Well, okay." The job was paying money. Then, after


49
that, I said, "Well, you guys have got to join the union." I brought them down here and got them to join the union, because we got a nice hotel job out in Manhattan Beach. And we left there. We went to another little place out in Redondo Beach. We had a real nice— This was one of those kind of happy-hours type things. It was five days a week starting from five [o'clock] to nine [o'clock]. The boss was a real picky type of guy. He would talk about the girl. He said, "Why doesn't she sing?" She couldn't play and sing. He would just tell me, "The only reason I keep you guys is because of your singing," he says, "because she doesn't really play that well." And he was right, in his own way. But we did things in such a way so that we made it come off. Naturally, I didn't compare her to the type of people who I did play with. But, I mean, I was just trying to help her along. And she's still a good friend. I see her all the time.


Isoardi

Is she still playing?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. She never learned to sing a note, though. I just told her, "All you've got to do is learn how to sing." If I had worked on my piano and then sung with it, I think I could have stayed busy all the time. [laughter]


Isoardi

It sounds like it.


Douglass

Yeah, I think I could. I really believe I


50
could.


Isoardi

So you're in the service, you're traveling around a lot, and you're playing a lot of music in the service.


Douglass

Oh, yeah, we were playing all the time.


Isoardi

And your band is pretty much, throughout your years in the service, guys from Local 767.


Douglass

Yeah, we had some good ones. Well, even Bumps was in the band for a while. He didn't go overseas with us. Ulysses Livingston was in the band, guitarist. He didn't go overseas with us. And Reese didn't go overseas. There were quite a few of the older guys who didn't go.


Isoardi

Why not?


Douglass

Well, I don't know. Everybody was just trying to get out of it. People were doing whatever they could to just kind of beat the rap physically or whatever it is. Then, some people, I don't know. They just— You've heard of Billy Hadnott.


Isoardi

Sure.


Douglass

Well, he was our first sergeant for a while. He was in the army before we joined. So a lot of people did all kinds— I don't know. There were all kinds of funny things that happened when it was time to go. Like, I was just as bad as any of them. I mean, I started complaining about this and complaining about that, going on sick call


51
or whatnot, trying to play sick. I'd do anything to keep from going. But after a while, there was just no way out, you had to just go ahead and accept it. So that's all there was to it. I mean, it's a very uncertain thing when you get on that boat, go up that gangplank, and you look at that little bit of water there, and you know that this is it. When you get on that thing, well, you're there. I saw a lot of guys—not in our band—but I saw people jump overboard once they got on there. That's how people panic. And I'm talking about officers, the guys who ordered you around and said, "Do this, do that, and blah, blah, blah." They're the ones who just cracked completely when they got on board that ship.


Isoardi

So are you in the service, then, for the duration? Until the end of the war?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. I was in the service exactly three years and seventeen days.


Isoardi

And then you got your discharge.


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

And then it's back to L.A. and Central Avenue?


Douglass

Yeah. Well, there was always Central, but I went to San Francisco.


Isoardi

When you got out?


Douglass

Yeah, when I got out.


Isoardi

Why San Francisco?



52
Douglass

Well, all the same guys— Jake Porter was one of the guys. He was in our Tenth Cavalry Band also. He's one of the guys who didn't go overseas. Great trumpet player. He's still around. When I got out of the service, he knew when I was coming out, and when I got back home—I think I was only home just for Christmas—he had a job in San Francisco, and he wanted me to join his band up there. So I went up there and stayed. I think we worked there for about a year. I met my first wife [Dorothy Burney] up there. We got married and then came back here. I should have stayed in San Francisco, but because I'd been away so long, I wanted to get back here. Then when I came back here, well, then the bottom dropped out of everything. Nothing happened around here. And then I—


Isoardi

Really? This is about '46, '47?


Douglass

Yeah, it was about '47 when I got back here.


Isoardi

What do you mean "bottom dropping"? Do you mean jobs?


Douglass

Well, all of a sudden— I mean, that was the way of life. One minute you're busy working, and the next minute there are no jobs. And then, sometime or another, things will pick up, and there's more jobs. So that's just the way it was. It's always been that way.


Isoardi

Was that happening to other people?


Douglass

Oh, yes.



53
Isoardi

Throughout the avenue? Other musicians?


Douglass

Yeah, yeah, yeah.


Isoardi

Things were just drying up, then?


Douglass

Yeah. Some guys were working and some were not. Sometimes there were periods when there wasn't that much work.


Isoardi

Why do you think this thing hit in '47?


Douglass

Oh, I have no idea. I don't stop to analyze or think about why it happens and this and that. Just like things are very much that way now. Of course, I can see the reasons. I mean, I happen to feel that things in the clubs and things are really happening right now, starting to really pick up, and they are happening more and more and more so. But from a union standpoint, we're not getting that business, and I think it's the fault of the union, basically. You see, the thing about it is, we have a health and welfare program, we have the pension program and all that kind of stuff that we try to sell people on and all this kind of thing. However, it's supposed to be employer paid. Well, then, people or clubowners or whatnot, they don't want to accept the responsibility of being your employer. They'll pay you, but, I mean, they just want to pay you the money and that's it. They don't want that responsibility.

So, consequently, a guy works on a job, he may get on


54
a job and stay I don't know how many weeks or months or whatever it is, and then, when the job is over, he can't draw any social security. I mean, he can't draw unemployment or anything like that, because there are no benefits or anything like that being taken out. That's what's happening on the average job. The only thing that's happening where the people are getting those benefits is just in the recording field and whatnot, where you have things that are negotiated in the contracts. So somewhere along the line I think that we are on the wrong track. We're missing the boat somewhere. That's just my feeling about things right now.


Isoardi

Yeah. That would mean going out and trying to organize most of those clubs.


Douglass

Well, that's what needs to be done, and that's what we're in the process of trying to do right now, except that it's a little bit on the late side. I mean, there may be a way, but we have to keep searching until we find a way.


Isoardi

We're already more or less up to 1947, when you're back in L.A. By this time bebop is in, and it's in big. As the music changed in the early forties through the mid-forties, how did you react to that? Or how did you become aware of it? How did it affect you? Do you remember the first time you heard this new music?



55
Douglass

Oh, yeah. I remember. Well, the first time I heard it was on records. You know, some of the Charlie Parker and Dizzy [Gillespie] things. I was in the service at that time when I first heard it. Sure, I heard Charlie Parker and the guys. There was a certain difference about it, and a whole lot of it I liked. Of course, a lot of the fellows that I admired as drummers— I mean, the first drummers I heard on the first Charlie Parker dates were actually Cozy Cole and Sid Catlett. So that didn't— I mean, they were the greatest, anyway. Then I began hearing about Max Roach, and I began to hear him. And, of course, records— I mean, I didn't always get carried away by records so much, or if I liked something on a record, I didn't really accept anything until I heard the guy do it in person.

I'm still like that. To me, a recording is like these photographs. That's just a record of something that was done at a particular time. That's not the ultimate. But to see a guy perform over and over again— "What does he do tonight? What will he do tomorrow night?" You know, a record is just going to play the same way every time you hear it. I don't care how good it is or whatever it is. I can always enjoy it. But I like to think— Even when I'm playing myself, I don't know. If I play a tune right now, I mean— I don't know. Tomorrow night I won't even


56
remember what I played today. It's just a matter of being spontaneous and taking whatever happens. You feel different from day to day, so, consequently, that's going to come out in your playing. I'm not saying it's better one night or worse one night. It's just— I don't know how to explain it. But your whole process is just a little bit different. Then it depends on who you're playing with. How does that guy feel? And so forth and so on.


Isoardi

Yeah, the chemistry between—


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

Were you in L.A. that week or couple of weeks when Dizzy Gillespie and Bird [Charlie Parker] came into town and played Billy Berg's on Forty-sixth [Street]? Did you go to see them?


Douglass

Yeah, I was there. Yeah, Milt Jackson. Shelley Manne was playing drums. I can't remember who the bass player was. Yeah. But I was there. Heck, I worked all the Billy Berg spots before that. There were a lot of Billy Berg spots. The first one was the Club Capri, and that's where Lee and Lester Young started their band. The Club Capri was located on Pico [Boulevard] and La Cienega [Boulevard]. It was right next door to a bank, and it was on the corner. They used to call them the jitterbugs. I think most of the young kids came in there and bought nothing but Coca-Colas and things like that. But, boy, did


57
they dance. You know, the jitterbugging was going on at that time. I used to just go there and sit there and watch. And then, of course, I got a chance to sit in with that band. But most of the time I was just there because that's where things were happening. Boy, you're talking about jam sessions. At two o'clock, things were just starting. The few people who were in the know got a chance to stay in the club, and then the bands like Duke Ellington, Basie, or whoever was in town— I do remember, like Jimmy Blanton from Duke's band and Ben Webster and people like that, they all came in there and then the jam session started.

I was just out there in the audience, and every so often they said, "Well, Bill, why don't you come up and play the next set?" That had to be a thrill. So I got a chance to play with all these guys. I would do that because the next time I look up Ben Webster's in town, and he's going to work somewhere, well, he calls me. So that's how you— As you were saying, just being on the spot and just kind of growing up with things, developing a little bit of a reputation, then the guys think enough of you to call you.

But anyway, that was a thing that happened. Then he had that thing going on. Then Billy Berg bought another club called the Trouville. That was over on Beverly [Boulevard] and Fairfax [Avenue]. The Trouville was a club


58
that was kind of Beverly Hillsish, kind of an exclusive-type nightclub. It must of gone a little defunct or something. In another words, it had a reputation of being— Because it was a much more beautiful place than the Capri was. So when they opened the Trouville, now, here's what he had in there: he moved Lee and Lester over to the Trouville, and then, at the Capri—he kept it open—he brought in Lorenzo Flennoy's group. Lorenzo Flennoy was a piano player. In that group, there was Charlie Mingus on bass, Loyal Walker on trumpet, Buddy Collette on alto sax, and Bill Douglass on drums. So we kept the Capri going. It's jumping like mad, and then he opens up the Trouville. Over there at the Trouville he's got the Lee and Lester Young group. He's got Leo Watson and the Spirits of Rhythm alternating. He also had Slim and Slam. That was Slam Stewart and Slim Gaillard. They were there at the same time. They had Joe Turner there at the same time singing the blues. They had Billie Holiday there at the same time.


Isoardi

You're kidding!


Douglass

That's what happened, you know. There's no let-up all night long. How did he find time for all these people to play? I can't remember. That's what was going on at the Trouville. So you know that it was like this, you know. It was ridiculous. And then, while that's going


59
on, soon he goes down on Hollywood [Boulevard] and Las Palmas [Avenue] and opens up the Swing Club. He puts Benny Carter's big band in there.


Isoardi

So he's got three of these places going at once.


Douglass

He's got three clubs going at the same time. He didn't even open Billy Berg's, which was down here on Vine Street, until all those others places had closed.


Isoardi

So these three were going in—what?—the early forties, mid-forties? Or even earlier than that?


Douglass

Let me see. I'm trying to think. It seems to me like when I did my little thing in the Capri, I think that was before I went in the service. Yeah, that was before I went in the service. Because I know, when then things started to change around—

Even Buddy Rich worked over there for Billy Berg at one time. I was kind of the house drummer. In some way or another, when Lee and Lester left there and went wherever they were going on tour or whatever, they had Jake Porter and the Loumel Morgan Trio with Buddy Rich on drums. Buddy Rich was getting ready to go into the service at that time. He had a bad time with the union, you know. He was down there just doing whatever he could, and then, some way or another, he had a bad time with the union, so the union refused to let him work, supposedly. And then Billy Berg called me from over at the what's-its-name and says, "Well,


60
you work over at the other place tonight." Now I've got to go replace Buddy Rich, you know. [laughter] But then that was a lot of fun, too, because I was there and Buddy was still there. You know, he was getting his money under the table. He would just come up and sit in, do the drum solo and all that kind of bit, and the people were still flocking in the place. But I'd say that had to be early 1942, something like that, because that was before I went into the service.



61

Tape Number: II, Side One
February 10, 1990

Isoardi

Let's begin today by going back a little bit. I think last time we finished around 1947 or so, when you're back in L.A. after your tour of duty and your year in San Francisco. But let me ask you one or two things about your war years. Last time, I think you said that you led the troops into Rome during the Italian campaign when the allies liberated Rome.


Douglass

Yeah. Did I get that far? [laughter]


Isoardi

I wonder if you could tell us a bit more about that. You were at the head of the allied troops?


Douglass

Well, no. You know, we formed this band. I told you about the band, the Tenth Cavalry Band that we joined, that we enlisted in. And then, finally, when the cavalry itself was dissolved, they kept the band intact, one of the units intact, and they took us overseas. That's when we made our little overseas jaunt. So they gave us another name. It was more like special service. I think it was the 118th Army Services Band or something like that. Then we were attached to Allied Force Headquarters, so we were a unit within our own. Then they took another band and joined it together with us, another twenty-eight-piece band. So then, actually, as far as parades and things like that, we had a band that was larger than fifty


62
pieces in size. And because of my great height and whatnot, they felt like I would look good as a drum major.


Isoardi

So you were the drum major?


Douglass

Yes. I had to help train the other drummers. [tape recorder off]


Isoardi

You were saying about being appointed the drum major for—


Douglass

Yeah. I took over the duties of actually leading the band. My rank at that time was staff sergeant, and we had another fellow in the band who was of a higher rank than myself, an older fellow, but they kept him basically in the office for more clerical-type duties. It was my job to lead the band in parade formations and things of that sort. I guess the function I was telling you about is when we went up—

Well, what we did, we took part in the invasion of Rome, such as it was supposed to be. At that particular point, the Nazi army was pretty much on the run, and we were making this gigantic push up north from Naples up towards Rome by trucks. When we got outside the gates of Rome itself, there was a truce that was called. The truce was for the sake of saving the city of Rome itself, you know, the Vatican City, which is where the pope and the— It's very famous for the Catholic religion. The truce was called in order to give the enemy a chance to move farther


63
north and clear out of the city, because the allied forces, the United States in general, usually destroyed everything in their wake. They wanted to preserve this very historical city. Consequently, we stayed there at the gates overnight, and then we had to get out and polish up our boots and uniforms and so forth and prepare for a parade. Then that's what happened. The following morning we got the British Eighth Army and the American Fifth Army— You know, I'm talking about [George S.] Patton and [Dwight D.] Eisenhower. All the big wheels were there.


Isoardi

You had [Bernard L.] Montgomery at the head of the British Eighth Army?


Douglass

Yeah. Secretary of State [Henry L.] Stimson came there to interview the troops, and they had a bit of a flag-raising there. The place was liberated, and then [came] the march into the streets of Rome. That's what we call making an invasion. We were blowing our music, and the tanks and things lined up behind us, and the troops— I've told many of my friends about this. It was quite a thing, just going down the streets of Rome with the people pouring champagne from the rooftops and so forth and so on. But that's what it was all about.


Isoardi

And you were in the lead?


Douglass

Yeah, I was leading. I was the first man down the street.



64
Isoardi

All right! That must have been a thrill.


Douglass

Yeah. It was, yeah.


Isoardi

You must have been on all the newsreels.


Douglass

Well, yeah. They had newsreels at the time, and that's what happened. They had the newsreel cameras. It was a very historical event.


Isoardi

And you had the band right behind you, I guess, right?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. We had a better than fifty-piece military band.


Isoardi

And a good chunk of those guys, I guess, were from Central Avenue, right?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. Well, twenty-eight of them, twenty-eight of us exactly who were recruited right here at the [American Federation of Musicians] Local 767 on Central Avenue. Of course, there were a few guys who did not make the trip overseas. There were some of the older fellows who managed to angle their way out of it. There were always replacements here and there—a few younger guys, you know—but basically that's what it was. Basically, they were all Los Angeles. We had a few guys from other places, but basically they were from Los Angeles.


Isoardi

So you could say that a handful of jazz musicians from Local 767 liberated Rome.


Douglass

They were all jazz musicians, yeah. [laughter]


65
That's true. They were all jazz musicians. We had some good guys. And then, of course, what we did the rest of the time, we split the band up into small combos and played the clubs. We did the USO [United Services Organization], Red Cross functions, and things like that. Our primary concern was we would entertain all the troops. There were times we went to the front line to entertain the troops. Of course, when we got into Rome, we just sort of settled there. The stars and the various performers came through, and we were the band that was always picked to perform for them. I have to say that we lived a very good life while we were there in Rome. Eventually, we got our own hotel, a five-story hotel, that just housed—


Isoardi

Just for the band?


Douglass

Just for our band. We had room service, sheets, and then we had our own banquet hall. Even though we had these K rations, C rations, and things of that sort, you know, stuff that was delivered over there to us to eat and so forth and so on, they had the Italian chefs and things who could take this stuff and just really just do it up grand style. So it was like a banquet every day. [laughter] We were in a very favorable position, because we could always get ahold of food and take it out to the people, the women or whatever it is. Like, we all had our little girlfriends and things like that. We could always


66
get a few rations to take to them and their families, and that way we stayed in pretty good stead with the people. We had a lot more going for us than a lot of the other troops, so to speak.


Isoardi

Who else from the Central Avenue scene was in that band with you? Do you remember anybody in particular?


Douglass

Oh, I'm trying to think. Well, let's see. I'll always remember James Nelson. He was a neighbor of Dexter [Gordon]'s. He was another young fellow who went to school with us also. He was a tenor saxophone player. We called him "Hawk."


Isoardi

Hawk?


Douglass

Yeah. He was a very, very tremendous talent.


Isoardi

Did you call him that after Coleman Hawkins?


Douglass

Yes, I think so. I don't know. Well, I don't want to talk about just one man individually. But he was one. And there was David Bryant, who's a bass player. He's still around. Gosh, if I have to stop and think about— We had Perry Johnson. He was the other sergeant in charge, like myself. Johnny Randolph. God, for me to call these names, it's pretty— I'll have to think about that one a little bit. I mean, I think I can dig up the names for you.


Isoardi

Did most of these guys, after the war, come back home and continue playing?



67
Douglass

Yeah, we were very fortunate. We did not lose a man the whole time. All of us returned here. We lost some guys here and there after we got back, but none of it was a result of the so-called action that we saw. When I say action, we didn't have to pull out our guns and actually fire at anybody. We were fired upon sometimes. I mean, there were air raids and things of that sort.


Isoardi

When you were around entertaining troops and things like that?


Douglass

Yeah, that type of thing. And then, a lot of times, in the places where we stayed, there would be an air raid and things like that. I had to learn how to get the guys into the trenches and teach them how to cover up and protect themselves in the event of the air raid and so forth. So those were just a few anxious moments. But basically, when we were there, the Rome thing, most of the time we had pretty much of a ball. [laughter]


Isoardi

It sounds it. A little while ago, I read Red Callender's autobiography. I think at one point he makes a reference to your time in Rome, and he says that you tell a great story about running American jeeps on Italian cognac.


Douglass

Oh, my. Yeah. [laughter]


Isoardi

What story is that?


Douglass

Well, when we used to leave our little campsite or whatever it was— I don't know if all of this was in


68
Rome, but— Well, we were in Rome for a while, and then later on we were in another little campsite in Caserta, Italy. Whenever the band went from one little town or little place to another, they always furnished us with these army trucks, and we would pile in and drive from one place to the other. They used to have the Italian POWs [prisoners of war] who acted as your drivers, and they would drive the trucks and haul the band around and this and that. There was always access to jeeps and things like that, but it had to be official government business before you could consign any gasoline for the jeeps themselves. But whenever we made our little trips into town on our own, well, we would go in there, and, of course, naturally, you're trying to lord it up and this and that, and you want to go out and you want to buy your booze and bring it back to camp. We would buy the stuff by the cases. Champagne was the thing. We were young guys. We thought champagne was pretty sporting. Except we found out that the people, the populace around there, they looked upon champagne drinkers like we do beer drinkers around here. [laughter] Then we finally got on to the cognac. We got ahold of this cognac. "Well, this ought to be great." Boy, I don't know what proof it was, but when you got that in your mouth, it would come out your ears. Boy, it was just the worst stuff in the world. We hated it, but we bought cases of it.
69
[laughter] But I remember there was— I just thought about the stuff just being that strong.

There was one time we had a little run to make. What we'd do, we'd go down to visit the houses, or get into town and get in the— We always had that thing of transportation. I could always requisition a jeep, but I could never get the fuel for it. So we finally got this bright idea: "Nobody's going to drink this stuff." We poured it in the gas tank and off we went. [laughter]


Isoardi

No problem.


Douglass

Yeah, no problem. The jeep would cough a little bit, but that was about the extent of it. [laughter]


Isoardi

That's good. Those are the war years, spent pretty comfortably, boy, compared to most.


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

Last time you were talking a bit about playing in various clubs in Hollywood, and you talked specifically a bit about Billy Berg, whose name just comes up over and over again. He started a number of clubs, [Club] Capri, the Trouville, Billy Berg's Swing Club later—


Douglass

And then later on it was just Billy Berg's, when he finally got turned loose from the others at some time or another.


Isoardi

I've seen his name mentioned over and over in many books, but not much about the guy. Who was Billy


70
Berg? Where did he come from? Was he a businessman or a club manager primarily? An entrepreneur?


Douglass

Well, he was a clubowner. At that time I never knew anything too much myself, personally. I never paid too much attention to anybody's business. All we knew was that he was the guy we worked for. The times that I worked for him, he's the guy that gave me my paycheck and all the rest of us. He just had a thing with musicians. He was just one of these guys who just seemed to be very highly successful in promoting the clubs and then the people who worked in his clubs.


Isoardi

He was a fan himself very much, then?


Douglass

Oh, yes, very much so.


Isoardi

As far as you know, had he always sort of been into clubs, into managing and promoting clubs?


Douglass

Well, from the standpoint of my knowledge, yes, that's all I ever knew him to do. That's all I ever knew about him.


Isoardi

What kind of a guy was he? What was it like to work for him?


Douglass

Never any problem. He seemed to love musicians, and most of them loved him. We never had any problems. I mean, God, those clubs— I mean, I've described them to you. I mean, it was a place to work.


Isoardi

Yeah. It sounds like he just pulled in the best


71
people he could get ahold of.


Douglass

Yeah. That's true, yeah.


Isoardi

Were those clubs fairly successful?


Douglass

Oh, yes. I'd say they were very successful. So many people that they— Well, I mentioned Slim and Slam. You know, that was Slam Stewart and Slim Gaillard. One time when they were working at that thing where they had all that big fanfare going on I told you about. I think it was the Trouville club. They were there. And then, a little later on, Slim Gaillard came back and I think worked the regular Billy Berg's nightspot with another fellow named Tiny— I think it was Tiny Brown. I'm trying to think what they called it at— What did they call it? But, anyway, that was— If you remember the famous "Cement Mixer"? "Cement mixer, putty putty—" Great big hit. They made a big record, and it was during the time that they were working there, so, consequently, there again, he had a couple of ready-made stars working right in his club. I remember that quite well.


Isoardi

The guy had some luck, as well, eh?


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

How did you go about getting jobs in Hollywood? I mean, obviously Central is your area. You're around there a lot, it's where you live, you know the clubs, you know the people. But what about crossing over, going above


72
Wilshire [Boulevard], playing in the clubs up in Hollywood? How did those gigs happen?


Douglass

Well, it just seemed to happen by itself. I wasn't that involved as far as being a leader, but when somebody booked a good job somewhere, they always managed to call me. I know during the time that I was working there with the—

Oh, just an example, when I was working with Dootsie William's Four Chocolates, we were booked by MCA [Music Corporation of America], which is a big booking agency, you know. They took us over at one time. We were always busy working clubs and things like that, but they pulled us out of one club and then put us in the Trocadero with Lena Horne, who was an up-and-coming star at that time. This was just about the time when the war was going on, when we had the blackouts. You know what the blackouts were? When everything was blacked out around here? Well, the Trocadero was a very going club at that time. And there again we— I don't know. That was one of the reasons why we were booked in there. I don't know. I can't answer that question very well.


Isoardi

So you never had to deal with those people as a leader or anything like that?


Douglass

Not really. But it wasn't that you were leaving Central Avenue. I mean, you just went where the jobs


73
were. The jobs were all over. I mean, I'd just say that Central Avenue is just where we were based, but we were working all over Los Angeles: Beverly Hills, the Sunset Strip, which at that time was considered very exclusive. These were the real jobs, where you wore your tuxedos and black ties and things like that. These were the real quality jobs.


Isoardi

They paid very, very well, though.


Douglass

Oh, yes. At least we considered it so at that time.


Isoardi

Another thing I wanted to ask you about Central, a lot of people that we've talked to talk about the clubs. I mean, the main thing is where the music was, but was Central Avenue more than just a chain of clubs? I mean, what else was going on on Central Avenue, like during the day? What was Central Avenue like? People must have gone to Central Avenue for reasons other than to hear music, I guess. Did they?


Douglass

Well, yeah. You had your markets. You had your bars. There were hotels besides the clubs. I told you about the Dunbar Hotel. Oh, let's see. There was another hotel on Washington [Boulevard] and Central just about off the corner from the [American Federation of Musicians] Local 767, where the black union was set up.

It might be interesting to tell you about some of the


74
people who belonged to our union at that time, to kind of enlighten you. People talk about the West Coast scene versus the East Coast and the West Coast style and the East Coast style. That's a farce. I mean, I'll tell you who the members of 767 were. Louis Armstrong was a member. Nat King Cole was a member. Lionel Hampton was a member. I could just go on. Jelly Roll Morton. I mean, I could go on and on and on.


Isoardi

Jelly Roll Morton was a member of 767?


Douglass

To my knowledge, he was.


Isoardi

He came out here and lived for a while, didn't he?


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

Between the twenties and thirties?


Douglass

I remember meeting him when I was a very young kid.


Isoardi

Under what circumstances?


Douglass

Oh, I don't know. I just met him. He was there at the union. I didn't have any dealings with him or anything like that, but—


Isoardi

Did you know who he was?


Douglass

I knew who he was. I saw him rehearse down there where most of the rehearsals and things went on.


Isoardi

What was he like rehearsing? I guess, from what I've heard of him, he was a man in charge.



75
Douglass

Well, yeah, he was. That wasn't my type of thing, you know. I was into the more modern things like [Count] Basie and [Jimmie] Lunceford.


Isoardi

So he was kind of old hat.


Douglass

Well, yeah. We used to look at the the ragtime and the— I don't know. I didn't like to call them corny or anything like that, but there was a thing about some of the older musicians. You know, it wasn't what we were into necessarily. However, we knew what they were, and we respected them for what they were.


Isoardi

When you were that young, was ragtime or New Orleans jazz big out here? I mean, Jelly Roll Morton was here, and he was certainly one of the giants.


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

But if you have a sense of what music, say, was like, before swing, if you will— Do you not remember much of any of that?


Douglass

Well, I didn't really get involved in it until it was swing. However, I do remember an awful lot of the bands and things. I remember some of the bands that I heard, where they had the tuba rather than the string bass. I remember people keeping time on the banjo. You know, they had the banjos in the band as opposed to the guitar as we know it now. Acoustic guitar and, later on, electric guitar. I know as a kid, another one of my first


76
jobs, I used to get calls from a fellow named Satchell McVea, who was the father of Jack McVea.


Isoardi

Jack McVea? I was just going to ask you.


Douglass

Yeah. And he played banjo with one string. [laughter] One-string banjo.


Isoardi

How?


Douglass

I don't know. I mean, a lot of people played banjos just like guitars. They played single-string and so forth. So I guess on a banjo you did the same thing. He was the guy who used to just book jobs all over the place and send different ones— Because I didn't always work with him. I'd work with one of his subleaders or whoever he was, but just one of the many sources through which we got jobs. All the jobs we played weren't strictly jazz or swing as we liked it or wanted it to be, but you played whatever the job called for. Or if you're a young kid, you get a call, you played whatever that band was playing. So I worked with a lot of older guys at that time. I just had to go along with what they were doing. Just whatever, you know.


Isoardi

So I guess, although it wasn't your thing, among the older generation New Orleans jazz was big, I guess. Dixieland jazz was big around there?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. There was always quite a bit of it. Even if it wasn't happening directly on that street, you


77
know, Central Avenue— I mean, I'd always think about the musicians as being from around the Central Avenue area, and they were up on West Eighth Street, such as— You know, I mentioned the 331 Club. There was another club. I remember Pete Daily. He worked up on West Eighth Street. He was a very famous Dixieland musician. I even worked with him at one time or another. There was Wingy Manone; he was out this way. I worked several instances with him, also. And Teddy Buckner. I never will forget Teddy Buckner in the Beverly Caverns, I think was the name of the place. That was on Beverly Boulevard someplace or another. His band always was more or less a Dixieland-style thing. He was the fellow who was always referred to as "Little Louis Armstrong." He was quite famous. Only in recent years he just retired from Disneyland. He had his band out in Disneyland for many, many years until they finally retired them.


Isoardi

Why was he called "Little Louis Armstrong"? Because he played like Armstrong?


Douglass

Well, he did that same type of thing, the same type of style as Louis. You know, the high notes and— And he resembled Louis. Physically, he resembled him to a certain extent. But there again, like a lot of those fellows, like I said, members of the Clef Club, I mean, they would know more about this type of thing, because I think


78
they were more involved with those guys, you know, even more so than I was, except for just playing an engagement with some of them on occasion.


Isoardi

I guess when you were a kid, were you at all near or have any contact with the Royal family.


Douglass

Yeah, the Royal family. It seems like I've always known Marshall [Royal] and his brother Ernie [Royal]. Ernie went to the same high school I did, Jefferson High School, even though he was, I guess, maybe a couple grades or so prior to me. Marshall went to Jefferson High School, also, but I think he was probably away from there before I came in there. But Ernie was there at the time that I got there. And then, as I said, my grandfather, who was violinist, played in the same group as Marshall's father.


Isoardi

Marshall's father, was he a professional musician?


Douglass

Yeah. They were professional musicians. Not that they did it exclusively. I imagine they probably held down other types of jobs. I know my grandfather [Calvin Douglass], as well as my dad [James H. Douglass] and my uncle [Peter T. Douglass], they held down jobs as custodians in the Los Angeles [Unified School District]. I guess it was a certain amount of playing that they did, also. I guess it's always been like that. People hold down something that's more or less stable, and then they're still


79
getting out and doing their little musical chores.


Isoardi

It seems like you can point to a couple of families here and there that really made important musical contributions. It seems like, I guess, in the Los Angeles area, Central Avenue area, the Royal family were prominent very early on. And Buddy Collette and other people have talked a lot about the Woodman family down where he was at in Watts as being crucial.


Douglass

The Woodman Brothers [Britt, Coney, and William Woodman].


Isoardi

The father [William B. Woodman, Sr.] was a musician and encouraged them very much. Was there anyone else in the Royal family who played other than the two brothers?


Douglass

No. That's about the extent of my knowledge. Have you talked with Marshall?


Isoardi

No, we haven't yet, actually. He's reluctant to because I think he's writing his memoirs. [laughter] We'd like to, believe me. Maybe you can put in a word for us.


Douglass

Yeah, well, I'd be glad to do that. He and I are very close friends. We always have been. Our families have always been. I guess sometimes he knows more about my own family than I do. [laughter]


Isoardi

Okay, let's see. What else did I want to ask you about? Oh, yeah. Last time, I think we talked a little bit


80
about particular people whom you knew and you played with on the avenue—people like Dexter and Wardell Gray and Hampton Hawes and people like this. I don't think I asked you about Lester Young much. Did you have a chance to play with him or—? What was it like when he was out here playing? What were the things he was up to? And where was he playing?


Douglass

Well, naturally, Lester was just like a legend. Like we saw him when he was with the Basie band. Lester could just do no wrong. I can't say that I just knew him from the standpoint of hanging out, but I got a chance to be around him quite a bit when he came out here and settled out here, he and his brother Lee. You know, that's another fellow you should talk to, Lee Young.


Isoardi

Yeah, we've gotten in touch with him.


Douglass

Lee was one of the fellows, the local drummers, whom I admired quite a bit. I always tried to pattern myself after him. He was a great influence on me, I'd have to say. And then, of course, I always loved him, because I was always there at like the Billy Berg clubs and other clubs wherever Lee and Lester appeared. I was always out there in the audience. One of the main things was that I'd sit there very anxiously, you know, and Lee would sometime or another ask me to come up and do a set. So, therefore, I had chances to jam with Lester Young.


Isoardi

Wow.



81
Douglass

So that was it. I remember a lot of the funny sayings and things like that that Lester used to say.


Isoardi

Yeah, he had a strange way of talking.


Douglass

Oh, he had a way. I remember— It was outside of the Capri one night. I guess it was intermission. They were out in the little alleyway in back, just yacking and talking and whatever it was. This was during the holiday season. Somebody walks up, and Lester's out there and— excuse my language—somebody asked Lester, "Is Santa Claus going to bring you anything for Christmas?" or "How's Santa Claus going to treat you this year?" And he says, "Motherfuck Santa Claus." [laughter] He said, "It don't mean a thing. It just means play a little louder. That's all." [laughter] Yeah, he was quite a character. That was just typical, just having some really funny things to say.


Isoardi

I read somewhere that he had almost created his own language. He had his own vocabulary for everything. And unless you knew him, you had a hard time understanding what he was talking about.


Douglass

Yeah, [Harry] "Sweets" Edison is like that, too, to me. Sometimes he can just say the funniest things that— He can say some funny things, that's all there is to it. It never leaves you, you know.


Isoardi

Isn't it also true that Lester called everyone


82
"Lady"?


Douglass

I don't know.


Isoardi

Did he ever call you "Lady Bill"?


Douglass

No. I just remember that he's the one that tagged Billie Holiday with that "Lady" thing ["Lady Day"]. Yeah, that's what I attribute.


Isoardi

I guess you heard Lester Young play with the Basie band in the thirties.


Douglass

Oh, yeah.


Isoardi

You knew the records.


Douglass

Oh, yeah. I knew the records and saw them in person. That was the first big band I ever saw in person.


Isoardi

His playing after the war— There's a lot of talk about how he was playing after the war compared to before the war. He had this bad experience down in Georgia when he was in the military, etc. Did you notice a change in the way he played when you were playing with him in L.A.? Did you notice if he was playing differently from the way he played in the thirties?


Douglass

I don't know. I always enjoyed him. I didn't notice any particular difference. I mean, I guess if there was any difference— I mean, I used to hear him a lot on the Norman Granz concerts when they'd have him and Coleman Hawkins and possibly Benny Carter and Ben Webster and all of them, you know, those jam sessions. I guess we thought


83
it was pretty hot at that time. I guess that type of thing right now might bore me a little bit, you know, like one saxophone chorus after another after another. As I look back on it now, if there were times when I wasn't quite as excited as when I heard him with the Basie band, which was organized, well— In other words, they'd throw those things together, and we swore by those Jazz at the Philharmonic concerts, you know— It was just something— Jam sessions are great, and they're a lot of fun, but I think sometimes jam sessions can be overdone.


Isoardi

Especially if you're behind it playing the drums for forty choruses. [laughter]


Douglass

Oh, man. Yeah. You know, my expressions— Yeah, I used to get pretty mad at a lot of guys for just being too longwinded.


Isoardi

Do you remember any particular instances?


Douglass

Oh, well, it goes on, and it still happens. You should hear Red Callender and me talk about it. If we had our way, we would probably leave all horn players at home. [laughter]


Isoardi

Gerry [Gerald] Wiggins just said the same thing.


Douglass

Yeah, well, that's where we were. There were times when we just didn't want to be bothered with them. In other words, you're just utility, as far as they're concerned. I mean, you could be working on a job, like


84
Gerry and Red and I, we could be working on a job, and we're producing something, we're doing our little thing—and we always had a hot little group—and there was always somebody who brought his horn along and wanted to know if he could play with you. I won't mention any names. Some of them are very prominent-type guys, too. But I used to talk about them, and I used to tell them to their face. They'd walk up on the bandstand—it's your bandstand— "Let's play a little so-and-so, E-flat." Now, they've called the tune, they've called the key, they've set the tempo and the whole thing, and you're just back there. You might not like the tune, you might not like the tempo, but that's the natural way. And it happens today. Wherever you go, it still happens. Those are just things I could do without. Because I just felt like, when we had piano trios—and I worked with some awfully great pianists—I just felt like we were much more expressive. It was much more of a ball than just sitting up there playing background for somebody to just blow their nose or whatever it is.


Isoardi

I also wanted to ask you a bit about your experience playing with Benny Goodman. You talked a little bit about it toward the end of our session last time.


Douglass

All right.


Isoardi

And especially, you made a reference, I think, to traveling to [Las] Vegas, etc., and dealing with problems


85
of Jim Crowism out there in Vegas. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about that, about what Vegas was like, and what was facing a black musician going out to Vegas back in— I guess this was the early fifties or so.


Douglass

Yes, it was exactly. It was the year '51 that I went to Vegas doing a job. I guess it must have been about a two- or three-week stay or something like that, and it was the Benny Goodman Sextet. I happened to be the only black member of the sextet at that time. I'd heard a lot about Vegas. This was my first trip there, my first experience. I had heard these stories that happened at that time, that even the star entertainers, I think, like Lena Horne and people of that calibre, they usually had like a trailer-type thing, a dressing room set up out in the parking lot and whatnot.


Isoardi

And that's where they would stay? Even— Now, Lena Horne, people like that, were the headliners—


Douglass

I don't think they necessarily stayed there, but they'd go on and do their show on stage, and they were there, and they didn't stay in the hotels, as such. At least, to my knowledge, that's the way it was.


Isoardi

Even for the big-name stars, the headliners.


Douglass

Even the big-name stars. If they didn't know somebody's private residence where they stayed, well, then they had to go over on what I think was called the west side


86
of town. There was a little area called the west side over in Vegas, which was very much different, as opposed to the Strip itself. So that was the type of thing. And I know that, when I went in there with Benny, he seemed to kind of control things and sort of laid the law down. I know we got in there first, and we got to the rehearsal, and we were working at the El Rancho Vegas, which was not like a hotel, as such. It was made up of bungalows. We each had a bungalow right there on the premises, and we were booked in there, and so everything was great. You know, we had to pay our rent. I felt, at that particular time, it was a little bit costly. But that part of it was all right. I felt very uncomfortable because everybody treated me so great, you know—


Isoardi

Hotel management? Everyone?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. Well, he just sort of [said], "This is my drummer, and this is that, and then blah blah blah blah blah—" I couldn't even go off in a corner and sit down by myself without somebody like throwing a napkin on my lap [and asking], "Can I get you a cup of coffee or this and that?" I mean, I don't know. It was a real funny thing. They just spread so much attention. When I'd go off, they'd say, "Well, what are you doing over here by yourself? Why don't you come on in here and blah blah—" You know, that type of thing.



87
Isoardi

Why do you think this happened?


Douglass

Well, Benny said, "This is my drummer, blah blah blah, and you're going to treat him like everybody else." He just laid down the law. I'm going to stay there at the place. And to my knowledge— I mean, I might be wrong, but to my knowledge I've never heard of any black staying out on the Strip in one of the hotel accommodations. But he sure had it there for us. I know the one we opened, the El Rancho Vegas, you know, Duke Ellington's band came into town the very next day and opened right across the street from us at the Thunderbird [Hotel], and at that time I was staying over there, but I know that all of those guys stayed over on the west side at Miss Shaw's Motel.


Isoardi

Did you ever talk to them? Or did they ever say, "What the hell are you doing?"


Douglass

Oh, did I! Well, this is the funny part of the story. It was a funny thing. Like, we'd play our sets, and I'm like the rest of the boys, you know. When I had nothing to do, I'd step outside into the fresh air, walk out in the back, if it's at night, by the pool—there's nobody out there—and then I'd like to light up. And somebody would come out after me: "What are you doing out here by yourself?" [laughter] I had no privacy whatsover. Everybody's afraid that I was going to become a loner at the place.


88

I even went in the casinos with some of the guys in the group. We'd go in there, get on a dice table, put a couple of bucks up there and roll the dice, and it was real funny. I remember I got to rolling the dice one day, and there was a guy standing—naturally, a white guy—and he's standing there, and he must have felt like I was lucky to him or something, because every time I'd roll the dice, he'd lay a big pile of money on it. And then, when I get ready to drag, he'd say, "Don't drag it down. You're hot. I'm not going to drag mine down." And we'd sit there, and I'd let that thing stack up until I finally crapped out, and so that's it. He said, "Well, you were hot for a while," you know. That's all there was to it. It was really funny.

But anyway, what happened is that I finally decided—I don't know whether it was the second day or whatever—but I know I finally decided that I was going to go over on the west side of town and see what was happening. I didn't have a car of my own, but Johnny White, the vibe player, he had a little old, raggedy car. I don't know what kind it was, but we drove up there together. You know, Benny gave us money, gave us plane fare and the whole bit. Well, in the interest of saving money, we drove in order to put that plane fare in our pocket. It was perfectly all right as long we were there on time. So that was just one of the many things. And then, of course, by the same token, I thought that we


89
were—I don't know what it was at that particular time—but I thought we were paying quite a bit of money for room rent. So in the interest of being thrifty and whatnot, Johnny let me use the car, and I found my way over to the west side. The sidewalks weren't paved and all that kind of— It was really a funny thing. They had their own little casino over there, a Chinese lottery, where they played the— You know. What is the thing they play?


Isoardi

Oh, keno.


Douglass

Keno. That's it. They had a keno parlor over there, and the people would play it, and you could get into the card games and all that other kind of stuff. Things were going on, but it was basically like the black section of town.


Isoardi

With a black casino and a black strip?


Douglass

Yeah, a real poor Central Avenue-type thing. There was an Elks Club there and places where they hung out, and they had their little fun. And later on, as I found out, there was a band that worked in the club where we used to go over there—a couple of the places—we used to go over there and do some jamming from time to time. But anyway, I just went in there kind of unshaven and just— It was right after rehearsal or something. I just went over there and went in their bar and hung out a little bit. I noticed that people could go in there at that particular


90
time and bring their own bottle in the bar and ask the bartender for a glass. That's how relaxed things were.


Isoardi

Boy, how times have changed!


Douglass

Yeah. But I just sat around and this and that. I said, "Where can a guy get a place to stay around here?" I figured I'd kind of check out the room rents. So I was told about Miss Shaw's place. I went around the corner and spoke with Miss Shaw and found out about getting a place to stay. I think it was something like— I'm trying to think of the amount. It was some ridiculously low price.


Isoardi

Compared to what you're paying on the Strip.


Douglass

Yeah. I've forgotten what it was. But at any rate, I just said, "Well, what the hell." It was one of those things where you had one of those community bathrooms and all that kind of bit. But I felt like I could hang in there and make it, and I could save myself a little more money. So I moved out of the El Rancho Vegas and stayed over there. And then, lo and behold, the Duke Ellington bus pulls in, and all of them stayed there, except Duke himself. I mean, guys who were on the show with him like Timmie Rogers. And I remember the guys in the band like Al Hibbler, Paul Gonzalvez, Ray Nance— Those are the ones who I kind of got tight with. I mean, I knew a lot of the guys in the band. But all I know is that, when they came in there and— I don't know.



91

Tape Number: II, Side Two
February 10, 1990

Isoardi

You were saying they were paying about $40 a week?


Douglass

Yeah. Well, anyway, whatever it is, that rate was just— I'm just making a guess. But it was nothing like what I was paying. I was paying practically nothing. I might have been paying $5 or $6 or $8 a week. I don't know what it was. This is 1951. But when I found what they were paying, I couldn't understand. Like, when you went anywhere on the road, people knew how to lay for you, and the prices would go up whenever they found out you were a musician or an entertainer or whoever you're playing with.

So this was going along all right. I don't remember what month it was, but all I know is that it got cold there at night. They had the butane gas tanks and all that kind of stuff. Of course, when I'd leave my room at night, I'd light the fire and whatnot so it would be warm when I came in. And, naturally, I'm acquainted with all the guys. Like, we all have to go out on the Strip now to do our shows. There was a place where we'd go around the corner and catch the bus. There was a bus there that would pick you up on the corner, and they would take you all the way out on the Strip. The guys would go on over to the Thunderbird and work, and I'd go on this side of the street and report to my job with Benny. Naturally, I'm dressed.


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It was either a tuxedo or whatever the uniform was. Miss Shaw would see all of us take off together and get on this bus, so she started inquiring with the other guys. She says, "Well, what does he do?" They said, "He's Benny Goodman's drummer." She says, "God—" [laughter] She was so fucking mad, you know. [laughter] So she started turning my heat off. [laughter] She'd come to me like, "Well, you know, like blah blah blah. You leave the heat going. I've got to get something from you for utilities and whatnot." So I'd toss her another five bucks or something like that. But, boy, she was so mad. I mean, the other guys— I mean, it was really funny. It was a joke, the fact that I was staying there practically rent free. I guess she was charging me the same kind of rate because I went in there looking like a bum. I guess she was charging me just what she would charge the regular natives around there—just a little bit of nothing. But that was the thing.

But naturally, I got to be very tight with the guys in the band, and I got to be what the guys called their connection. Because when I went into the Elks Club with the little group that worked there— There was a guy named Dave Hendricks, who was from Los Angeles, also. He was a saxophone player. He was leading the group. And then, there was a drummer who was playing with him whom I got acquainted with, and this drummer would play drums in the


93
group and then deal blackjack on the side. It seemed like every time I shook hands with him, when I pulled my hand back, there were a bunch of them [joints] rolled up. [laughter] So naturally, I mean, I indulged a little bit, but I didn't know what to do with these things. But, naturally, I'm real good buddies with Ray Nance and Paul Gonzalvez, so I'd say, "Hey, you want a hit?" They'd say, "Hey, where do you get this?" and so forth and so on. And so then they started coming to me. Finally, everybody in the band is hitting on me, you know. [laughter] "Well, can you make the connection for us?" And, of course, when I finally mentioned it to the guy, he says, "Well, man, you know, like it's just me and you. Other than that, just forget it." He just liked the way I played. I used to sit in over there all the time—so he was just being friendly. That's all there was to it. I just told the guys, "You have to just forget it. Whatever I have I'll share with you, but nobody's going to make any big killings. No big scores here." [laughter]

Benny himself was— I don't know. My relationship with him was great. I mean, I always respected him. I always admired him. He treated me just royally, I would have to say. The only time I actually got mad at him was when I was over on the west side, I got into a game and lost all of my money. [laughter] I mean, to the standpoint that I didn't


94
think I was going to make it through the week. So I went to Benny. Benny was always in the casino at the El Rancho, and he was always with the roulette.


Isoardi

Oh, he's a big gambler? He liked to gamble?


Douglass

Well, he did at that particular time. I knew he was playing. He was there. That was part of the thing. He spent all of his time at that roulette table. Bundles and bundles of chips, you know.


Isoardi

Gee. That's a sucker's game. It's got almost the worst odds in the house.


Douglass

His brother, Irv Goodman, acted as the band manager. He was also a trumpet player, but he acted as the band manager.

I'd tell Irv, "Well, look, Irv, what about getting a little draw, a little advance or something like that?"

"Oh, man, Benny so and so and so."

He was scared of his own brother.

So I finally just went on in there to speak to Benny. I said, "Well, Benny, I'd like to make a little draw, get a little advance."

"What the hell do you do with your money?"

I said, "Same thing you're doing with yours." [laughter] "Except that mine's a little bit short."

He finally just tossed me a bunch of chips or something like that and said, "Get the fuck out of here." So other


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than that—

But we never had any problems. I always respected him. I used to feel sorry for a lot of the guys who worked for him, though. I know that the majority of the musicians that I've run across called him a son of a bitch. Well, I guess you've probably heard the stories.


Isoardi

Well, there's one that comes to mind that I think Bill [William] Green told me. I don't know where Bill got it. I don't think he was there. But apparently there was a group of people over at Goodman's house one day, and they were rehearsing or something. It was just ice cold, and he didn't have any heat on. So the guys are trying to play, and they're freezing to death. Finally, one of them says, "Benny, don't you know how cold it is in here?" Benny stops, and he says, "Gee, no, I didn't notice. Thanks for telling me." He goes and puts a sweater on and says, "Okay, let's play." [laughter]


Douglass

Oh, boy. Yeah, that's just like him. You know, my first experience playing with him was quite a while before we went to Vegas, of course. It was rehearsals, and then we had a record date. It was mostly recording and things like that. I used to see how he treated these different guys, and you never knew where you were. You'd have a group of guys here— Sometimes it was the big band. You've got this guy playing bass, this guy's playing piano,


96
and so forth and so on. So we're rehearsing today and we run this: "Okay, now, everybody be here at such and such time tomorrow. We're going to record." And then, when I got to the record date, they'd be all new guys. So, you know, I'd go, "I wonder what happened to so-and-so." This went on time after time, day after day, and then you find out he's letting all these guys go. I mean, he's got you one night, and then he fires you. Boy, I'm trying to just play everything just perfectly, to the best of my ability. Different guys in the band [said], "Benny likes you to do it this way. He always likes this, and he always likes that." So I'm trying to remember that. Then, he had this way of looking at you. He'd stop playing and look at you just funny, and now you're wondering what's going on, what's wrong. He'd kind of look away, and then you'd go back to it. Boy, I mean, he just kept you kind of upset. And the next time, he'd look at you again, and then he could tell you're nervous, and then he'd laugh at you. I'd say, "Oh, shit, what is this bit?" You know? So, anyway, you'd hear the stories going around. You didn't always hear directly, but you'd hear, "Oh, Benny's going to record tomorrow night." "Yeah, okay." So I'd get the call, and I'd be there. You just didn't know when the ax was going to fall. It was kind of a nervous situation.


Isoardi

How do you relax?



97
Douglass

Yeah, well, you just couldn't. You tried to. You did the best you could. You didn't know what was right and what was wrong.

Anyway, finally one day I heard about a record date. "Benny recorded last night."

"Yeah?"

"He had Lee Young on drums." You know, this and that.

So I said, "Okay, well, that's it. It was good while it lasted, but I guess he's finally decided to get another drummer for the time being."

Well, in the meantime, I'm working with Jake Porter on Central Avenue at the Downbeat Club. You know, that was our regular job. We had kind of a semi-bluesy, jazz-type thing, and it was right on Central Avenue. This is home to us, so we're all relaxed. We're drinking and just swinging and having a ball. I have to say that Jake was kind of responsible for me getting the Benny Goodman call in the first place. He was a very close friend of Fletcher Henderson, and Fletcher Henderson was the guy who did all of the writing for Benny and whatnot, so I know that Fletcher had a lot to do with getting me that spot with Benny. Well, anyway, when this news came out, I just let it go at that. "Maybe they'll call me again; maybe they won't." I just went on back to my regular job, which was playing every


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night at the Downbeat Club with Jake.

It was a Saturday night, and we were swinging. I mean, we'd had a few belts and things like that, and we were up there, you know, and this and that and so forth and so on. I didn't know it, but Benny came in that night with Fletcher. Fletcher brought him in there. They're sitting there. And then, when we came off the stand, I mean, it was natural. We're all real show-offs when we're all on the stand, you know. Everything was really hot. I came off of the stand, man, and I look, and there's Benny looking straight at me, and he's sitting there with Fletcher. So I didn't know what— You know, "Hi, Benny. Well, how are you doing?" He says, "Why don't you play like that when you're in my band?" [laughter] So I made up my mind then. I said, "Never again will I ever let anybody tell me how to play for somebody else. I'm just going to be myself, no matter what it is." And that's the way it was.

Other than him giving you those little funny looks. I mean, we'd be on the stage playing, and after that, he'd stop and look around like this and that. I'd just look the other way. [laughter] Then he'd laugh, you know. He knew what I was going through. But he just liked to bug people.


Isoardi

Jeez. Tough one to work for.


Douglass

Yeah. I used to feel sorry for some of the—


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Like when we were there in Vegas, there was one little guitar player—and I guess I'll just leave him nameless—but it was just one of those things. You know, we'd rehearse— And Benny, he'd hand you the music. Sometimes he'd have something written out, and then sometimes it was something to memorize, or, even if it was written out, after a few times around, he'd take the music and he'd want you to remember it. I mean, that's really testing you, you know. So, all right, great. Well, this guy didn't have too good a memory, or maybe it was just his nerves were getting the best of him, and Benny would just give him hell. And then, when they did have the thing, this guy didn't read as fast as the rest of us, either. So Benny would kind of give him a bad time. But the guy could really play. I mean, when we really got going, it was all right. Then Benny, when he set us up, sometimes he would tell this guy, "Well, move your chair over there a little bit," and kind of moved him so he was almost out of the group. And then, when he started introducing the fellows in the band, he would look at him, and then he'd just skip over him. And this boy, I used to feel sorry— He'd come over and he'd say, "Man, I know what he's trying to do, he's trying to get me to quit. That's what he's trying to do." He said, "But I've got a contract, and I'm going to stay here." I never did know what to think about that. But that just shows you how cold he could be to
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some people. However, I have to say that, in my own personal relationship, I admired him. I knew he was a great musician. He always has been one of my all-time favorite musicians. He's a disciplinarian, and as far as the knowhow and all that kind of stuff, that's the way he is.


Isoardi

Let me ask you a little bit about some of your favorite hangouts. You mentioned that you had a pretty steady gig at the Downbeat. What was the Downbeat like as a club? Do you remember what it was like inside or—?


Douglass

Well, all I knew was, there again, it was almost right next door to the [Club] Alabam. It was just on the corner there. I don't know. It was just full of people, and there was a bar, then the tables and the waitresses and so forth, and there was the bandstand. That's the same Downbeat Club that brought Howard McGhee. To my knowledge, that's the first place that Howard McGhee worked. That was when I got my first little taste of bebop, you know, because that was the spot where Howard McGhee brought Teddy Edwards and Roy Porter. I can't for the the sake of me remember just who else was in the group. But that was, as far as real, live, and in-person, one of the first actual bebop bands that I ever heard.


Isoardi

Now, McGhee had come from the East Coast, hand't he? He wasn't an Angeleno?


Douglass

Yes, he did. No, he wasn't an Angeleno.



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Isoardi

And that was your first experience with live bebop, then?


Douglass

Yeah. Live bebop. It was very impressive to me.


Isoardi

He was a great trumpeter.


Douglass

Oh, yeah, yeah. Really, yeah.


Isoardi

And he had Teddy Edwards playing with him?


Douglass

Yeah, Teddy Edwards. That was the first time I saw Teddy, the first time I was acquainted with Roy Porter. I don't know how long he'd been out here, but it seems to me like there were a number of guys around town who knew Roy at the time. So I think Roy must have been around here a little bit longer than the rest of them. But just when he came out here, I'm not sure.


Isoardi

Was the Downbeat, I guess, the place you played most down there?


Douglass

Oh, no.


Isoardi

Were there other clubs you hit pretty regularly?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. Well, there were all kinds of— When I was actually on Central Avenue, I think I spent more time in the Club Alabam itself, which was the big place inside the Dunbar Hotel. And then, after that, when I left the Club Alabam, they had just recently opened that Turban Room, which was the little cocktail lounge where Wiggins and I worked together.


Isoardi

You worked as a duo there?



102
Douglass

Yeah, we worked as a duo for a long time. Then they finally let us add the bass on weekends, and then it finally got to the place where we were a trio.


Isoardi

And the bass was Red Callender?


Douglass

Was Red Callender, yeah.


Isoardi

Great trio.


Douglass

Most of the time it was Red. There were times when we had Charlie Drayton playing bass, and then maybe Joe Comfort or somebody else. But basically, it was Red most of the time.


Isoardi

The Club Alabam sounds like it was quite a show. It had chorus girls and all sorts of different acts?


Douglass

Yeah. That's where everybody went when they left all their Hollywood jobs, Beverly Hills jobs, and whatnot. Then, around about two A.M., everybody came from all over everywhere, and they always gathered right in the Club Alabam.


Isoardi

Really? For jams?


Douglass

Well, yeah. It wasn't always a jam. The show would always run late, and then it just seemed like they did that just because everybody was coming over there, not only the musicians and whatnot, but the crowds. I guess I'd say that the predominantly white crowds would just sort of follow the guys over, and then, when then that closed up, then they would just migrate to the little after-hours


103
joints. The after-hours joints were all over the place.


Isoardi

Yeah. But the Alabam was never an after-hours place, then? It was a—


Douglass

Not technically or legally. It was just a place that just ran late. [laughter] I mean, I worked in there. It used to make me pretty mad. You never knew what time you were going to get off.


Isoardi

Were you in the house band then?


Douglass

Yeah. House band. And the show always ran overtime. Oh, it was a really quite a thing. Curtis Mosby was the owner for quite some time, and he was famous for being bad pay.


Isoardi

Was he really?


Douglass

Oh, yes. So you always went through that thing, you know, like the chorus girls and everybody on the show, everybody in the band sitting around waiting to get paid. I mean, sometimes you'd get some money and then he would owe you some. It seemed like you were always just doing something— It seemed like I managed to always get my money at some time or another. However, it was a job, and it was a steady job. You didn't always like it, but there you were. You made the best of it. And then, of course, that was one of those jobs where— I guess I worked there many times during the course of my lifetime. Then, later on, it was a guy named Joe Morris who became the owner after


104
that. Or he had a partner.


Isoardi

He took over the Alabam from Mosby?


Douglass

I don't know if he took it over directly from Mosby, but at some time or another he did become the owner.


Isoardi

Was he connected with the Morris Hotel?


Douglass

I don't remember. He's the same Joe Morris who opened the other place that was farther out on Central later on, a big place called the Plantation [Club]. Did you ever hear about that?


Isoardi

Oh, down in Watts?


Douglass

Yeah. I used to work with him out there, too. Let's see: Buddy Collette and Charlie [Charles] Mingus and I and a number of others. Oh, we were in a guy named Snake White's band. Snake White was an arranger, trumpet player, good musician, and a hell of a drunkard. [laughter] Yeah. That place was hilarious.


Isoardi

The Plantation?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. The stuff that went on and—


Isoardi

Like what?


Douglass

Oh, man, like— Well, Wynonie Harris was there, and people came out there to see who was going to fight who, you know. [laughter] Yeah, it was really something.


Isoardi

It almost sounds like a roadhouse.


Douglass

Yeah. I mean, we had Dorcester Irving, a bass player, a real cockeyed guy. I guess he'd get kind of


105
tanked up a little bit and get a little bit upset. He'd play, and he'd get up there and get to showing off. Then Wynonie Harris, the great blues singer, he made some kind of remarks about him, like cracking at him on the mike. Dorcester would just act like he wasn't paying any attention to him, and when Wynonie kept cracking on him, next thing you know, he went after him.


Isoardi

No kidding?


Douglass

Yeah. He pulled the peg out of his bass and went after him like this, you know. He had Wynonie begging for his life. It was really funny. Snake White would be leading the band. He wrote arrangements and all that, and we'd be playing. We used to have those rehearsals with the different people on the show and—

Oh, I remember one instance, just an instance. There was a guy who was a tap dancer. We had his music and all that. We played his introduction. The show was going on. You know, [sings], he runs out there, "Pick it up, drummer! Pick it up!" He wants it faster. And Snake says, "No you don't. I want this to swing." [laughter] He just wants the band to be right here, you know. That was the kind of stuff that went on. Now, that poor dancer couldn't get anything going like he wanted to, and Snake's not going to let it happen. He was the boss. Yeah. Oh, that was just typical of a lot of things that went on, but it was


106
funny.


Isoardi

Who else was in the band?


Douglass

Charlie Mingus, Buddy Collette— Seems to me like— I'm trying to think of this boy, Nellie [Lutcher]'s brother. Joe Lutcher. It seems like he was in the band. I can't remember all the names of the guys who were in that band.


Isoardi

When was this, then? About mid-forties?


Douglass

Shoot, don't ask me. Sometimes I try to think about a lot of these things as to whether I was in the service, or was it after my time in the service, or— No, I know it was before I went in the service. Because I know the thing that was significant about that was that he was trying to get us to take a cut in pay because "business is bad" and this and that.


Isoardi

Oh, Joe Morris, you mean.


Douglass

Joe Morris, yeah. But, you know, "This club is going to make it, and I'm sure I'll be able to pay you more." And then, all of us were studying with Lloyd Reese at that time. We were just a bunch of young punks, but Reese was a bit of a genius. Naturally, I would tell him what's going on in the club. He says, "Well, next times he mentions that, just ask him, as soon as things get better, how much is your end of the profits going to be?"


Isoardi

Ooooh.



107
Douglass

Yeah. And then, I, for one, would go there and present it to him like that. And he says, "This little young punk—" You know. [laughter] Yeah. Reese is the one putting the ideas in our heads. He's always trying to tell us how to take care of business and not let people take advantage of us.

Reese gave me a very good example, and I'm telling you that it always hung true throughout my career, everywhere I've ever been. He says, "You know how it is when you go in the market? Okay, just for example, you're going to get a loaf of bread. This is Weber's bread or whatever it is, and it costs so much a loaf. Okay, great. Then you look over here and you see some new product, bread, whatnot, and it's maybe about half the price of the other. You feel it, and it seems to be soft, and it seems to be fresh, so you try it. And it's good. So whenever you go to the market, you get that loaf of bread. And you keep going and this and that, and, all of a sudden, one day you walk in there and it's the same price as the other. Then you get the one—" [laughter] Yeah. He said, "The same thing happens in music." Because this guy is telling about what he is going to do and this and that.

Of course, he had a chance to get mad at us because of the fact that, around about the time that Billy Berg got the Trouville and moved Lee and Lester [Young] out of the Capri


108
into the Trouville, well, then he hired Lorenzo Flennoy to go in the Capri. And so Lorenzo Flennoy calls the guy I was telling you [about], Loyal Walker, Buddy Collette, Charlie Mingus, and myself, to go into the Capri with him. So, naturally, voom, it's a better job. We're not going to have any problems with the money and all that kind of stuff, and here Joe is talking to us about maybe taking a cut and so forth and so on, and then he got very mad at us.


Isoardi

Because you were leaving?


Douglass

Because we left there to go work for a white guy rather than to stay there to help him to— We said, "Well, that's just the way it is. We just have to go, and that's all there is to it." So that's what happened. But then, the ironic thing is, when the club started to kind of make it and pick up, he did let that band go, and he hired Count Basie. [laughter] It's like I was telling you about the market thing. So there you go. Yeah, as soon as things picked, you see—


Isoardi

They must have really picked up!


Douglass

You see who got the job. Yeah. It was a gigantic place, too. When they got those crowds in there, well, there's nothing but money. The Alabam was a very large place, too.


Isoardi

So this was happening about 1940 or so, then, I guess. Is that right? You guys were playing at the


109
Plantation.


Douglass

Yeah, this had to be 1940s, yeah. 'Forty-one. Because Buddy and all the guys, they went in the navy, I guess, sometime— It must have been maybe the early part of '42. And I know that in December of '42 was when this Tenth Cavalry Band was organized down at the union, and so that's when we took off.


Isoardi

So ultimately, then, Joe Morris buys the Alabam, or takes over the Alabam.


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

Later on. And Mosby, I guess, ran the Alabam for quite a long time, though. Did he go back quite a few years?


Douglass

Yeah, he did. I don't know. There are a lot of guys who have been around a lot longer than me; they could tell you. In fact, they could even tell you the name— I think that place had another name at one time or another. I wouldn't know anything about that. But it had another name before it became the Alabam. I guess it had to be after— Yeah, it had to be after my army days that I finally went back in there again as the house band. The other time, I was working with Curtis Mosby. And at the time I worked for Joe Morris at the Alabam, it was after my army days. I'm quite sure that was. Because when I left there, I remember I left there to open the other little club that was right


110
there in the same building.


Isoardi

Do you know much about some of the background of Mosby or the Mosby family? I know he had a brother named Esvan Mosby, I think.


Douglass

Yeah. And then he had a son, who I used to know. I don't know. I don't know that much about them. I couldn't tell you that much.


Isoardi

He was a musician at one time, wasn't he?


Douglass

Yeah. I think he led Curtis Mosby's Blue Blowers. I used to remember hearing that name all the time. I never heard the band, but I guess this was kind of before my time.


Isoardi

Wasn't there also some kind of festival or parade on Central once a year? Do you remember that at all? There would be a parade down Central Avenue, and they would end up in the ballpark or something. Was it Wrigley Field or whatever? And groups would be playing.


Douglass

The only thing that I remember, there used to be a Labor Day parade, and I didn't really take part in that. I know that my uncle before me, who was the guitarist, he used to tell me about those things. I think that the musicians in some sort of a way, the union made them obligated to play in this parade or whatever it was. That could be the one that you're talking about. I understood that, in the cases of a lot of them, I think that they were


111
on one of these trucks or whatever it is. I don't know if it was a marching band, necessarily, but I think it was one of those— Whatever they called those. A bandstand on wheels or whatever.


Isoardi

Let me ask you. You referred at one point to the fact that you guys would play everywhere. There were a lot of other places to play. Certainly other than Central Avenue, and, say, the fancier clubs in Hollywood, outside of those two areas, where else would you go to play?


Douglass

Well, we did a lot of work in Watts. There were a few places that happened around Watts.


Isoardi

Do you remember any of them? I mean, the Plantation club was down there, right?


Douglass

Yeah, that was there. That was on Central Avenue in Watts. And then there was another one on 103d [Street]. I've forgotten the name of that one—Savoy or something like that—you know, on 103d and Graham [Avenue] or something like that. I don't know. There were always little places popping open here and there. I used to play over in Pasadena quite a bit.


Isoardi

Really? Where at in Pasadena? Do you remember?


Douglass

Oh, don't ask me. [laughter] Don't ask me. A joint's a joint. They come and go, you know. Sometimes it might be somebody's high school, or it might be some sort of a civic auditorium or whatever. Just wherever something was


112
going on.


Isoardi

I just moved up there. I wish there were still some joints up there. There doesn't seem to be much.


Douglass

In fact, there were a number of guys, musicians, who were tired— There were a few guys. Like one of them, William Ellis, Bill Ellis, he was a tenor player, and there was Bob Farlice, who was a trumpet player, and we were all in the bands, and we rehearsed together. We had some guys who lived out in Watts, some were in Los Angeles proper like me, some guys were in Pasadena, and, boy, that was the only freeway we had at that time, but we used to eat that thing up. We'd go over there for rehearsals. There were always things just happening. There was always Glendale, always a couple of clubs that were really happening over there in Glendale. [Melody Club]


Isoardi

Really?


Douglass

I mean, what was his name—? Spider, the piano player. Spider— What's his name? Dang. These names really get away from you. I know that's where Bumps Myers and Brother [William] Woodman, who is one of the Woodman Brothers, they were in that little Glendale spot for a— No, not Spider. Poison. Poison Gardner was the name of the piano player who led the—


Isoardi

Poison Gardner?


Douglass

Poison Gardner, yeah. And Bumps Myers. It was a


113
two-tenor type thing. And they had a couple of other guys. That was one of the places over in Glendale that just jumped like mad. Glendale was the type of city where black guys didn't hang out on the streets and whatnot, but in the clubs, you went in there, the clubs jumped, and things were all right. We had a lot of places like that. There were also places like that in South Gate. I used to hold down a little job in South Gate off and on throughout the years. We always referred to those places as "Little Texas" or "Little Mississippi" or whatever.


Isoardi

You'd finish your gig, get in your car, and split!


Douglass

Yeah. Nobody you knew lived around there, that was for sure. You'd go in there and do your gig and have a ball with all the people and so forth and so on and then back to town.


Isoardi

"Little Texas," "Little Mississippi," that's good. Did you ever go toward the coast much? Were there any clubs along the coast or down in Long Beach or San Pedro or anything like that?


Douglass

Yeah, yeah, always. We worked Long Beach, everywhere else, and then we'd leave here and go to San Diego. I don't know. Just jobs. Like this week you might be working in San Francisco. It just seems like you're always up and down the coast, in and out and all over and everywhere. That was when things were really happening.



114
Isoardi

A lot of clubs.


Douglass

Oh, yeah. You just didn't stay in once place. Of course, every once in a while the tours would come up. I mean, I used to leave here and then go away on one of those blues tours or something like that where you go all through the South, cover every town in Texas and Louisiana. Then we worked our way down into— Oh, one of the towns that I enjoyed was Oklahoma City in Oklahoma.


Isoardi

Why?


Douglass

Man, we used to go by car. The band I was in with Jake, we'd go by car. We would jump five hundred miles a day and work in a different town every night.


Isoardi

Wow, that's grueling.


Douglass

Yes, it was. You always got sick whenever you went out.


Isoardi

Why did you like Oklahoma City so much?


Douglass

Well, I don't know. I think it was one of the places were we— I think we stayed there about three days. And then, you know, some of the best girls I ran into—


Isoardi

Were in Oklahoma City.


Douglass

Yeah. [laughter] All I know is we had a ball. It was fun, you know. And, of course, we were playing the blues. You've heard of Big Joe Turner?


Isoardi

Oh, sure.


Douglass

Yeah, he was with us, and then Wynonie Harris,


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also, T-Bone Walker—


Isoardi

Wow. So this tour originated in L.A., and then you guys—


Douglass

Yeah. You worked your way through. The way you would do it, you'd leave here, probably the first place you worked would be somewhere in Arizona, either Tucson, Arizona, or Phoenix. It would be one or the other. You'd play one town, either Phoenix or Tucson going up, and when you came back, you'd play the other town. Then you'd go from there into El Paso, and then, from there, from town to town in Texas, and then we'd get into Louisiana. I mean, we hit New Orleans on occasion.


Isoardi

This blues tour was pretty much L.A.-area musicians?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. It was the same thing. It was just formed right here. We'd just leave here and take off and go. You'd go wherever it was.


Isoardi

Hell of a lineup. Who else did you have? You had Joe Turner, you had Wynonie Harris—


Douglass

And T-Bone Walker.


Isoardi

T-Bone Walker.


Douglass

Yeah. And then, at times, somewhere along the tour, we'd pick up Marian Abernathy. I mean, you talk about learning how to play the blues, that's where I learned to play the blues.



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Isoardi

Boy, that was some college of the blues! [laughter] What was it like going through the South? Was that your first trip through the South?


Douglass

Yeah, that was my first. Well, let me see. Wait a minute. No, my first time through the South was in the service. Yeah, because I remember, that tour that I'm talking about, that must have happened about 1947 or so. Because I remember, I was married. I had a wife at that time. But my first experience going through the South was when they took us from Camp Lockett, I mean, Campo, California, and then put us on the troop train going to Newport News, Virginia. That was when we went through and we saw all the signs, you know, "White Only" and so forth and so on. That was kind of a new experience for myself and a lot of guys. So that was the experience we had.

I did have a little experience with some of the towns when I came back from overseas and when I was stationed in different places like Virginia and then San Antonio, Texas, and a few others. They moved me around quite a bit during the time that I came back, so I got a chance to get acquainted with a whole lot of the stuff that went on down there—finding out where I could go and where I couldn't go. That was a real weird thing.

I remember when I was in Camp Lee, Virginia. It was kind of big facility where they had bands and bands that


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rehearsed and things like that, almost like a regular musical thing. You could do a little bit of studying. I don't know how to describe it. It was a very big camp. I'd run into guys like Jimmy Rowles right there and then Jack Berger and a few guys that I knew from here in Hollywood. These guys you haven't seen— So here you are. And then we couldn't even go to town together. We weren't allowed to mingle with one another. So that was kind of strange. Here you run into guys you've known all your life, and you kind of had to watch where you went and who you hung out with. Yeah, really something. So I had a little bit of the southern experience before that tour.



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Tape Number: III, Side One
February 10, 1990

Isoardi

I wanted to ask you a little bit more about Central Avenue itself. You mentioned Curtis Mosby and— Is it Joe Morris of the Plantation [Club]?


Douglass

Joe Morris, yeah.


Isoardi

Are there any other other owners that stick out in your mind who were sort of prominent on the Avenue? Any other people who ran businesses or clubs down there who are somehow economically important down on the Avenue?


Douglass

Yeah, well, I think of Dynamite Jackson.


Isoardi

Who was Dynamite Jackson?


Douglass

A fighter. For a long time he carried the title of heavyweight champion of California. [laughter]


Isoardi

Was he the legitimate heavyweight champion?


Douglass

Yeah, he fought. He was a great big guy. I used to hear about him as a kid, and then I got to know him because, naturally, I worked for him in clubs. He had a club on Central Avenue at one time or another. Even though I went in and out of there, I didn't work for him there. I worked for him quite a while in another club that he opened over on Adams Boulevard just west of Crenshaw [Boulevard].


Isoardi

Do you remember the name of that club?


Douglass

Dynamite Jackson's.


Isoardi

What about that earlier club you mentioned?



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Douglass

Dynamite Jackson's.


Isoardi

That was called the same thing? [laughter]


Douglass

Yeah. [laughter] I worked in the other club with Gerald Wiggins and Irving Ashby. Gerald Wiggins was playing the Hammond organ at that time, and Irving Ashby was on guitar. Dynamite, he was a funny type of guy. Well, an ex-prize fighter, he's just about as tall as I am and bigger, you know, an enormous, scary-looking type of guy. I don't know. The conversation came around once. He was saying, "I so-and-so and so-and-so. I never mess with nobody. I don't bother nobody. Gerald, do I ever bother you?" Gerald says, "You'd better not bother me, you big motherfucker!" [laughter]


Isoardi

Gerald said that?


Douglass

Yeah, that's what Gerald said to him.


Isoardi

Little Gerald?


Douglass

Yeah. "You better not bother me, you big, ugly motherfucker." [laughter] That's the way he talked to him.


Isoardi

Well, he had guts. [laughter] So you guys were working for him in what, the late forties, maybe?


Douglass

No, this had to be '58 going on '59. I know I was working there during the time that I was sort of courting my present wife [Deloris Seals Douglass]. We got married in '59. But, yeah, that was one of those funny things, funny experiences.


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I remember what happened that we finally left the club. We were working there, oh, I guess about six nights a week, and we always had a thing— The thing that always existed when the holidays rolled around, if you got a job New Year's Eve somewhere, the New Year's Eve jobs always paid enormously much more than your regular jobs did. So there was always a problem. Guys, usually, when they were working on a steady job, if somebody booked them ahead for a New Year's job, well, then they're looking all over trying to find some sub to take their place over here while they go out to the other place and make the money. So it always created a bit of a hassle.

Well, in Dynamite's, I don't know just what it was, I don't know what was happening. I think that maybe Tuesday night might have been our regular night off, and I think that maybe New Year's Eve fell on Tuesday night that year. Well, that's our night off. [laughter] So we think nothing of it, you know. When we didn't show up Christmas Eve, he wants to know what's going on.

"Well, that's our night off."

"Well, then, what about next week?"

"That's our night off."

"Well, hell, you know goddamn well I'm the one who's taking care of you. I'm the one who's feeding you. You should know that you—"


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I said, "Well, you know, unless somebody tells us what's happening—"

So anyway, he got mad at us for that reason. Of course, we didn't care.

However, from time to time, I've been a little bit involved in the union [American Federation of Musicians]. I think, at that particular point, I had not a regular job in union, but I was on the wage scale or the price committee, you know, one of the committees, that reviewed the scales and then came up with suggestions. It was as a result of that I knew what the problem was, and I knew how hard it was to get people to work in your place. I really felt like if you were on a steady job and holding it down, that just because a particular night in the year rolled along that you should stay on your regular job. But I do know that he, like all of the rest of the other places, when New Year's Eve came around, they always put a cover charge on, which they didn't have before. They doubled the price on everything, but yet they wanted us to sit there and work for that same little bit of money that we were getting. That's the reason why it's written into the union contract right now. I'm the one who instigated that, that everything, no matter where you are, it pays double.


Isoardi

For New Year's.


Douglass

Yes. It's got to pay double. No matter what


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you're making, it's got to pay double for New Year's. So they finally adopted that and figured it was a good idea. I don't know what happens on New Year's now, but that's the way is if you do anything that's contractual at all.


Isoardi

Was Dynamite Jackson a product of Los Angeles? Did he come out of the Central Avenue area as a boxer, do you remember?


Douglass

Yeah. I don't know where— You know, none of these people, I never knew where they were born or where they were from originally. But it seems like he was just one of those characters who was always here, to my recollection.


Isoardi

Can you think of any others?


Douglass

Who were around here?


Isoardi

Yeah.


Douglass

Henry Armstrong. He used to live right down the street from me. And there was a Jack Thompson. I think he was a lightweight champion at one time or another. But Henry Armstrong— My dad [James H. Douglass] used to take me over there to the Olympic Auditorium. I used to see him fight almost every Tuesday night.


Isoardi

You went to the Olympic that often?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. Because we had some good fighters, you know. It was just the thing. There were a lot of hot fighters, and we used to go to the fights until this thing


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got so ridiculous. We didn't have to pay any $100 a seat or anything like that. Whenever there was a really big fight, they would do it at Wrigley Field, which was our ballpark, which was over on—what?—42nd [Street] and Avalon [Boulevard] or something like that? Henry Armstrong was living right out here when he was a triple champion.


Isoardi

So the late thirties, early forties was that?


Douglass

I guess. You'd have to kind of go to your record books and history books—


Isoardi

Isn't that when Armstrong— Yeah, I think that's when he had those three titles.


Douglass

Yeah. I know he passed away just recently.


Isoardi

Yeah, last year.


Douglass

In fact, the Clef Club had what we call our Christmas party. We do that in late January. That's a kind of Christmas dinner for the club members and their guests. And Mrs. Henry Armstrong was at this affair.


Isoardi

Do you remember any characters on the avenue who were hanging out in the clubs or anywhere who weren't anyone in particular, may not have been famous, but were just characters?


Douglass

Oh, there's hundreds of those. I mean, nothing comes to my mind right now. But there were always hundreds of characters. They're just guys who hung out with you, part of your entourage, so to speak.



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Isoardi

You had an entourage?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. Well, especially Wiggins. He had a whole slew of guys who went with him. Because Wiggins was a drinker at that time. He always bought all the drinks.


Isoardi

Yeah, every time I ask him something, he says, "I can't remember much about that. I was drunk all the time." [laughter]


Douglass

Yeah. Yeah, Wig would— And then, when payday comes, he owed the boss money, you know. [laughter] Those kind of things, yeah. And sometimes, if you weren't careful, you're working with him, and he'd tab up yours, too, you know. [laughter] I worked many of the clubs where I used to draw, draw, draw, until I got ahead of the man. Especially the places where— You know, there were some guys who had a reputation for being slow pay and all that kind of thing, so you always did things to try and get ahead of them.


Isoardi

How did you meet Gerry Wiggins? Do you remember?


Douglass

Oh, I remember Gerry was in one of Les Hite's last orchestras. I remember him playing piano and— Gee, I don't know how I— Well, all of us were just musicians. I mean, I didn't play in the Les Hite Orchestra, but I was always around there when they played and heard them when they were rehearsing. Damn, that's a good question. I'm trying to remember exactly when. But I remember I had the


125
occasion to call him at one time when I had an audition set up. That's not when I first met him, but we did a couple little things like that and— It's kind of hard to remember just when it was. There was one particular club or something we worked, an after-hours spot or something like that, when all of a sudden he kind of decided that he liked the way I play.


Isoardi

So you guys just sort of hooked up, then?


Douglass

Yeah, so we just kind of hooked onto one another, and then, after that, it seems like we were just— We worked so many places, you know. Even though there were things where we just drank, drank, drank, we played a lot of good jazz. The Turban Room was one of the places. And when we left there, we used to go in other places. When we'd get into a club, we'd stay there for quite some time.


Isoardi

By popular demand?


Douglass

Well, yeah. We had a way of kind of packing the clubs. I know the boss at the Turban Room— We used to take those long intermissions. Gerry used buy drinks for people, and then people are always buying drinks for you and whatnot. The boss admitted that he made more money when we were off the stand. [laughter] We were sitting around the tables, and then the places where we worked, it was Saturday night every night. Everybody came in there to just hang around and drink and see what was going to happen. That was


126
all there was to it. That happened in several clubs.

I remember Mike's Waikiki, but there again that was on Western Avenue. Things just began to move over that way, too. Well, things just didn't just move; things just spread out that way. First, it was Western Avenue and then it was Crenshaw and then things just continued. They were just all up and down, just spread out all over.


Isoardi

You mentioned the Les Hite Band. I suppose that band must have been the most prominent big band to come out of L.A., wasn't it?


Douglass

Well, it seemed to be. I used to hear a lot about it. I'm pretty sure that Lionel Hampton was associated with Les Hite's band. And I have to say— I don't know. I can't say offhand, but I imagine that Marshall [Royal] and an awful lot of the guys were in there. I remember a lot like the prominent guys like Oscar Bradley, drummer, Floyd Turnham again. It was really a good band, really name-band quality, that type of thing.


Isoardi

Who was Les Hite? I don't know anything about the guy. I don't even know what he looks like or—


Douglass

Well, some of the older guys, when you talk to them, they can tell you more about him. I knew him to talk to him. He knew my uncle [Peter T. Douglass]. I guess that's how I knew of him, because my uncle was a guitarist when I was a very young kid.



127
Isoardi

So he was pretty much your uncle's generation, then?


Douglass

Yes, he was.


Isoardi

Was he from this area, do you know?


Douglass

I don't whether he's from here originally, but yeah, that's what he was. Boy, he was an Angeleno, as far as I was concerned.


Isoardi

Did he play an instrument?


Douglass

I always remember him just sort of conducting. I don't know whether he played any instrument or not. He was a very likeable guy. I always liked him. He always called me "Veep," you know, because at that time I was the vice president of [Local] 767. See, this is when we were getting ready to go into the amalgamation years. I was a young guy, but the reason why we got into these offices and whatnot is because we had started this amalgamation thing, talking up on getting the unions together.


Isoardi

I want to get into that.


Douglass

Yeah. So the only way that we could do it was to just go and run for office and get elected.


Isoardi

So it seems like, probably, if you were to look at the list of people who played for Les Hite over— How long was that band together? Maybe twenty years he had that band?


Douglass

Oh, God, yeah. I guess so. Maybe longer. I


128
don't know.


Isoardi

Probably every prominent musician who came out of L.A. went through that band at one time.


Douglass

Yeah. I think he was probably leading the band when I was a baby, more than likely.


Isoardi

Do you know how long that band lasted?


Douglass

Oh, I have no idea. In his later years I don't think he was leading a band. I know that at one time or another— Well, you know, Elmer Fain. I went to his funeral yesterday.


Isoardi

Elmer Fain?


Douglass

Elmer Fain. He was the business rep.


Isoardi

Yeah, of Local 767.


Douglass

Of 767, and for a long time was the business rep over here [Local 47]. In fact, he retired out of 47.


Isoardi

Oh. He just died.


Douglass

I went to his funeral yesterday, yeah. He goes back a long time. He was also in that group that joined the Tenth Cavalry Band. He was in that group, also. As long as we knew him, we never knew him to be a saxophone player. We were really surprised that he had a horn and knew how to play it. But he had to march along with us and play in the marching band. Fain is an institution because of the fact that, when all of us were just barely starting to learn how to play instruments and we were running around playing the


129
little nonunion jobs and whatnot, well, then, he made us very aware of the union, because he was like a big policeman or something. We were always hiding from him, even though we didn't belong in the union.


Isoardi

Why would you hide from him?


Douglass

He just seemed to be so big, bad, and ugly. He just gave every— Sometimes you'd work with other musicians who belonged to the union, and they were always staying out of his way, because he was the type of guy who really went out and hunted you down. Unions had a lot of clout then, you know. Like, if you were on a job, he could pull you off the job and all that kind of stuff.


Isoardi

And he did it?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. He would do it in a minute. He'd pull his mother off a job. If anybody was breaking the rules, according to him— So that's how I got to know him. He didn't sit too well with too many of the musicians, you know. I don't know. I had my own thoughts and feelings about him. I mean, I got to know him pretty well. He was in the service with us, and he was one of the older guys who didn't make the— You know, I guess they discharged a lot of the older guys, and they didn't have to make that trip overseas when the rest of us got ready to go. But I mention him because of the fact that I know that during the time when the amalgamation first came into effect, well, he was


130
out of a job. I mean, he and Les Hite together formed some kind of a talent agency.


Isoardi

Oh, really?


Douglass

Yeah, called the Hite Fain Talent Agency. Because of his experience in knowing the clubs and whatnot— Well, he even booked us on a couple of jobs. He would begin to work like a booking agent, you know, trying to book talent in the clubs. That's what he was doing for a while. But then, as fast as the need came, they needed a regular business rep in 47. Well, then he finally got that job again.


Isoardi

Oh, he did.


Douglass

So that's what happened to that. But I don't think that I remember Les Hite organizing a band anymore, after that time.


Isoardi

Did he stay in kind of brokering talent?


Douglass

I really don't know exactly what he did or what happened to him. I just know that he passed away, and I know that had to be— Well, our amalgamation took place in 1953, so I don't know. I guess sometime shortly after that—


Isoardi

He died shortly after that?


Douglass

I imagine he did, yeah. I know he did, but I don't know if that was exactly the time. But I don't remember him becoming active again as far as leading a band.



131
Isoardi

Could you talk a bit about what the conditions were like playing in those clubs on Central? I mean, what the hours were like, if you can generalize at all about the situation. What the hours were like, what the pay was like? Was it pretty hang-loose or—?


Douglass

I don't know. Most of the clubs were unionized, like the [Club] Alabam and all of them. We had scales, you know, wage scales. God, it's hard to remember what those figures were like.


Isoardi

At the time, the money that, say, an average musician working on Central would make, would it be more than, say, most people who were out with regular day jobs or—?


Douglass

No, I couldn't say that that was true. It seems to me like there was a scale of some sort. In the Alabam days, I think we had gotten the scale up to the point where a sideman made something like $72 a week. I guess we're talking about working six nights a week.


Isoardi

At the Alabam, which was one of the better clubs.


Douglass

Yeah. Well, not one of the better clubs. I mean, the Alabam was all right, but that was just average.


Isoardi

Oh, really?


Douglass

Yeah. There were clubs like out in Hollywood and— But if you got a good hotel job or something like that, they had a scale that was called a deluxe-type


132
scale. I don't know why they called it deluxe, but the real good hotel jobs, the Beverly Hilton [Hotel] or somewhere like that, those would pay more than the things over on Central.


Isoardi

When you did work those jobs up in Hollywood, was there any contact with Local 47?


Douglass

Well, there was contact. I guess our local made a certain amount of contact with them.


Isoardi

To work those jobs?


Douglass

Yeah. Well, I think that that's one reason why the amalgamation came about. Because there was a— I don't know. I don't know if it really happened, but there was supposed to have been something like scale undercutting or one local vying against the other. I didn't know, really, but, I mean, I used to hear little things like the officials at 767 would call over there. We got a band going in one of the clubs out there somewhere, and they used to call and find out what the scale was. It seems to me like whatever local got into the spot first, they were the ones who would establish the scale.


Isoardi

I see.


Douglass

Yeah, I do remember that figure, about $72 a week. I know that, while I was in the Alabam that last time, I was actually vice president of 767 at that time. Joe Morris had gone down to the union and negotiated with


133
them and gave them a hardship case and whatnot and got them to reduce his scale down to the $60 level. So I know, when I got to work, the musicians—we had about a nine-piece band there—they were pretty much upset. They were pretty much upset by the fact that the union was going to reduce the scale right out from under you. So now I'm a union official and I'm working in the band also, so when they were upset I asked them, "Well, what do you want to do? Are you guys game? I mean, why don't we strike?" To my knowledge, that was the first type of nightclub strike that ever happened.


Isoardi

You did? It came off?


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

Tell me about that.


Douglass

There were two owners: it was Joe Morris, and he had a partner named Clarence somebody or other. The guys came to work, we got there, the place is full of people, it's almost time for the show to go on. So the guys in the band are sitting there, and I tell them, "Well, we're just not going to work. I'll get a contract for the $72 amount drawn up, and then we'll make sure that he signs it, or we don't go to work." See, because what he's got, he's got a contract from the union on the $60 scale.


Isoardi

So you guys are not only bucking the Club Alabam, you're bucking the union leadership.



134
Douglass

Yeah, that's right. So that's what we did. We just said that we were not going to play, and we also told him that if they tried to bring another band in there that we were not going to let it happen. I was not going to let another band come in there. As usual, the guy still owed us money. [laughter] It was really funny. They didn't know what happened. Now it's time for the show to start and people are in there and we're not going to budge. So this guy Clarence, he doesn't know what to do. He finally just has to go ahead and sign the contract that we had for the $72 a week. Of course, when Joe came in and found out, he says, "Well, I never would have done that." I don't know what he would have done any different, but that was the way it was.


Isoardi

So you got what you wanted.


Douglass

Yeah, we got what we wanted, and so we continued to work there.


Isoardi

You didn't have to carry a sign out front.


Douglass

And then, I remember, shortly after that, he brought Dinah Washington in there. She packed so many people in that place, with the cover charge and all that kind of bit, that, instead of just having two and three shows, we used to do about nine shows a night.


Isoardi

Nine shows!


Douglass

Yeah. We used to just do a quick show and just


135
cut it off and try to get people out. People are standing around the corner in line waiting to get into this place.


Isoardi

Jeez. When was that? Dinah Washington. What was that? The late forties, when she was just becoming well-known?


Douglass

Well, this is— Let me see. I guess it's got to be— Let me see. I'm trying to think if it was late forties or— I don't know. I can't remember exactly what year that was. But Dinah Washington was well known.


Isoardi

Well, actually, if you were the vice president of the local then, it must have been around '51, '52?


Douglass

Well, we have to be talking about like '50, '51, or something like that. But it's during— See, when I was there, we were in the process of trying to bring about the amalgamation, which did happen in '53. This has got to be the really early fifties, I guess.


Isoardi

Yeah, he was making out. And he was appealing for hardship? [laughter]


Douglass

Oh, yeah.


Isoardi

Did you encounter many women musicians down on the avenue? Were there many? Who were they? Do you remember?


Douglass

Oh, Clora Bryant was around there at that time. You know, she was kind of a young thing at that time. And I remember—



136
Isoardi

But she was playing.


Douglass

She was playing in the Alabam. She was playing in the Alabam after I left. Like during the time when—


Isoardi

In the house band?


Douglass

Yeah, when I was— Yeah, I guess we called it a house band at that time. I think probably Lorenzo Flennoy might have been leading the group at that time. But at that time I had moved into the Turban Room with Gerald Wiggins. I think that she was there then. I don't know. It seems to me like there were different bands and different things moving in and out. It wasn't a stationary house band like it was when I was there. I mean, there was a violinist named Ginger Smock.


Isoardi

A violinist? Really?


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

Playing jazz violin?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. She played jazz violin, played a little bit of everything, yeah. She's still around somewhere. I think she's up around the Las Vegas area. I heard someone talking about her just recently, but I haven't seen or heard from her in I don't know how long.

And we had many people who were pianists. Nellie Lutcher was around at that particular time. And— God, if I can just think of— There were a lot of— Betty Hall Jones.



137
Isoardi

Who is she? I haven't heard that name.


Douglass

Well, I still hear from her all the time. She's living up around Perris, California. She's in and out and travels. I guess she goes abroad and back again. She's an elderly lady. She's kind of in the same class with Nellie Lutcher.


Isoardi

A piano player.


Douglass

Yeah, a piano player. A piano player and entertainer.


Isoardi

Did you ever play with Vi Redd? I think she was a—


Douglass

I knew of Vi Redd. I knew her. I mean, I knew of her brother, who was a drummer, and I knew her dad, who was a drummer, Alton Redd. Alton Redd was one the guys that my uncle used to play with, and I knew him quite well.


Isoardi

So her family goes back quite aways, then, too.


Douglass

Yeah, it goes back. Her family, also. She's another one you can talk to, because her family was really entrenched. I think Vi Redd even had a little secretarial job at Local 767, for a while. I knew her at that time, but she never impressed me, or I never did know that much about her. It just seems to me like she just kind of sprang up all of a sudden, because I wasn't even aware that she was a player of any kind. I don't know. I guess there are a lot of people in the—


138

Dorothy Donegan. I didn't know her on Central Avenue, but I remember when her husband [John T. McLaine] at that time had a club over on about Forty-Sixth [Street] and Western Avenue, a supper club or what have you, and it did quite well. I worked with her over there for quite some time. That's not Central Avenue itself, but that's another one that happened a few years ago.


Isoardi

She was a fine player, wasn't she?


Douglass

Yeah. She's still around. I just heard her name. She's going to— Oh, I think they mentioned that she's going to be in the Playboy Jazz Festival at the [Hollywood] Bowl. I just heard today that she's going to be on one of those programs.

Yeah, there a lot of women musicians. God, they just don't pop into my mind right now. I guess when I leave you, at some time or another, and before we get together again, if I can think of them, I'll start jotting them down.


Isoardi

Okay, great. Or when you get the transcript of this, you can always add some if you want.


Douglass

Oh, yeah.


Isoardi

I wanted to backtrack just a bit to Art Tatum. His name has come up a lot. It's fortuitous, in a way, that I'm talking to both you and Gerry Wiggins at the same time, since you two interweave so much, and you both have


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another common point of focus in Art Tatum. I know you did some recording with Tatum.


Douglass

Yes.


Isoardi

Those marvelous Pablo [Records] sessions. What was it like in the studio with Tatum? How was he?


Douglass

Oh, Tatum was just great, just one of the greatest things that ever happened in my life. I not only recorded with him, I was his regular drummer. We worked together every night. He stole me away from Gerry Wiggins.


Isoardi

He stole you from Gerry Wiggins?


Douglass

And Red, also.


Isoardi

Red Callender.


Douglass

Yeah. See, Tatum used to come in and out of town. He was a drinker at first. When we were working that same Turban Room, you just never knew. I mean, you're up there jamming, you're playing, and then you look around, there's Art standing at the bar, just hanging over the bar with his Scotch in one hand and Pabst Blue Ribbon in the other. He'd sit there and listen, and he'd pop his fingers and so forth and so on. He knew everybody. Then Gerry said, "Oh, my God, God's in the house." And then, later on, for no reason at all, Art decides he wants to sit in and play some.

Oh, Ben Webster used to hang out in there, too.


Isoardi

At the Turban Room?



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Douglass

Oh, yeah. Always— Well, everybody: Lloyd Reese, Ben Webster, everybody came in the Turban Room. That was just one of the places that, when anybody came into town, they all came to the Turban Room just to see what was going on.

So Art would want to play. That piano had half the notes missing, a little spinet piano. We were up on a high platform over the bar. I'd worked opposite Tatum like in the Herb Rose incident, you know, where he used to threaten to quit because Herb didn't get the piano tuner in there. They always had a nice, brand-new Steinway for him to play. Well, he was that type, real particular about pianos. If you didn't tune it, he might not play, that kind of thing. How a guy could sit in there and listen to this old raggedy piano— We couldn't get the guy to fix it. We couldn't get him to do anything with it. You know, there's been cigarette butts and drinks poured all down the piano and everything else—


Isoardi

And that's what Gerry's been playing on?


Douglass

That's what he's been playing on. Of course, we were loaded half the time. We were just doing the best we could. All you'd do is, "Goddamn it!" you know, "This note's missing, and that's missing, or this one is sticking." Art would get up there and fool around with this thing a little bit, and then we started jamming. To


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hear him take a piano in that kind of shape and then what he did with it was something that you don't have on record. It was just phenomenal, and only because he wanted to do it. And then, when he decided he was going to take a club job here for a couple of weeks— He was in and out of town all the time, even though he had made this his home. He lived in an apartment over on West Adams [Boulevard].


Isoardi

Was he living by himself then?


Douglass

Yeah, he was by himself. He had just gone through some kind of a divorce. I don't know who his first wife was, but he hated her because, in the settlement, she got his piano. Can you imagine that?


Isoardi

That's cruel.


Douglass

Made no sense. Made no sense at all, you know. He got married again while we were working together. Someone called me from New York. They're trying to locate his widow now. And for all of me, I can't remember her name.


Isoardi

Oh, Gerry Wiggins just— Was it Gerri Tatum?


Douglass

I don't know. If Gerry Wiggins has any ideas on that, I'd sure like to know about it, because this fellow— In other words, what it is, it's got something to do with some Tatum music, and she's got some money coming or something coming.


Isoardi

Gerry Wiggins just told me that she's around


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here, and I think he said her name was Gerri Tatum.


Douglass

Yeah. I think the last time that I saw her was at that Gerry Wiggins thing that was promoted downtown, it seems to me. And I had no way of knowing.


Isoardi

Call him up. He might—


Douglass

Yeah, well, I will. I'll remember to call him and ask him.


Isoardi

So Tatum's living in an apartment on Adams?


Douglass

At that time. He bought a home shortly after that. I guess shortly before he got married this last time, he bought a little home that was up in, I guess, Baldwin Hills or something like that, a nice little place. That's where he was until he passed away.

I don't know. I guess he got such a good feeling out of sitting there jamming with us that he decided, for the next club job, that that's what he wanted to do. And as he told me, he said— You know, he used to always have the trios with the bass and the guitar. He said they had to rehearse. They'd do this and that and work out the thirds and things like that, the little things that they could play together, but he just felt like playing with us—that it was just so much more relaxing. He could just do whatever he wanted to do, and Red was a tough enough bass player that Red could stay right on top of what he was doing. I always felt good about the fact that he felt like


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nobody could play drums for him better than I could.


Isoardi

Great compliment.


Douglass

Yeah. I carry that with me everywhere. If I'm good enough for Art— Art never said "Bill, do this" or "Bill, do that." It seems like I was just sensitive enough to the things that he did. So that's the way it was. I feel very proud of that. Yeah, nobody can say anything to me about how to play drums. If it was good enough for Art, it should be good enough for anybody. [laughter] Art could have had anybody he wanted, you know. He could have had anybody he wanted. He paid well. By the standards of those days, he paid very well.


Isoardi

So, all of a sudden, poor Gerry Wiggins is a solo?


Douglass

Yeah. [laughter]


Isoardi

He's not a trio. Both of you guys left then?


Douglass

Yeah, we took that job. But what happened is that— I don't know what happened with the Turban Room. It just kind of leaves my mind as to when that thing closed or what happened with it. But Gerry always had a way of going from one place to another. I started working with Gerry again, naturally, but I worked other places. I don't remember leaving Tatum and going back to the Turban Room. Tatum did several engagements. Like he'd come here, and this thing might last a couple of weeks or so, and then


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Tatum would go out on his own, maybe as a solo or that kind of thing, and then he'd come back, and we'd play somewhere else and this and that. And then the next time we'd go together to San Francisco. Red couldn't go to San Francisco, and I know he had me locate a bass player that he had heard of, who was in town, a guy named Leroy Vinnegar. Nobody had heard of Leroy Vinnegar at all until Leroy Vinnegar worked with us. Then everybody wanted Leroy Vinnegar. They didn't know what they were getting into, because Tatum found out after he finally hired Leroy Vinnegar that Leroy was only adequate in certain keys.


Isoardi

And Tatum played them all. [laughter]


Douglass

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Tatum, yeah, he liked to play in B-natural, E-natural, and this and that, and so he had— I mean, I was there. He had a guy named Dudley Brooks come to rehearsal and write out the bass lines. He'd tell him exactly what to write and where to put it in the staff, and then Dudley would write out— Most of it was just whole notes and half notes, you know, not a whole lot of difficult stuff, but just general— In other words, he didn't have the bass player just playing the changes. He had certain lines that he wanted, and Red knew those pretty well. From then on, I had to carry that bass book with me at all times. And then, when we were in San Francisco, I'd sit there with Leroy and help him with the notes. Of


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course, he never was really comfortable with them, but he'd do just enough and this and that. It just kind of limited our repertoire, so Tatum would only go with the ones that he knew real well, and then he would jump into B flat or G or whatever it is and then feature Leroy Vinnegar.

Of course, Leroy could play; he sounded good. And then, when we got back here, that's when Shelly Manne and André Previn grabbed ahold of him and they did that My Fair Lady album that was kind of hot and so forth. It seemed like Leroy just kind of caught on. Everybody wanted him from that point. I mean, Tatum was a good enough reference. They see you in the club, you're playing with Art Tatum, and then all of a sudden you're available over here. Who do you think you're going to call?


Isoardi

Yeah. After Tatum ripped you two guys off from Gerry, what club did he go into? What was the club date that he had?


Douglass

Oh, the club. We went into a place called the Royal Room. That was located on Las Palmas [Avenue] and Hollywood Boulevard, a little place right on the corner there. That was one of the most delightful engagements I'll ever remember.



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Tape Number: III, Side Two
February 10, 1990

Isoardi

Why was it one of the most delightful engagements you've ever had?


Douglass

Well, it just was. I don't know. There was a certain feeling— There's a certain feeling just going to work and feeling like you are somebody and that what you're doing is very, very important. And the atmosphere, I remember, was very— Tatum would play just quiet, so the atmosphere was very, very quiet. It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop.


Isoardi

Because he would lower the volume so people would quiet down?


Douglass

Yeah. If people yacked, he would just play so soft that after a while the next guy would say, "Hey, shhh. Quiet." So after a while, it got like that. Pretty soon the waitresses and things didn't move around and rattle their glasses and things like that, either. It was just like a concert, you know, just very quiet. We'd sit there. And we'd get up there, and we'd play as a trio. He had certain tunes, and we'd do the things together. He'd feature me on the drums. That was another thing about playing drums with him: he was a drummer himself at one time or another. It was almost as if he was reading my mind because, while I'm playing my little


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patterns, he seemed to find little musical things to inject into what I was playing. He wasn't leading me, just complementing the little things that I did. I never could describe— I wish I could have recorded something like that.


Isoardi

Yeah. There are no recordings of that trio? You three guys?


Douglass

Well, it was the three of us on the things that we did, but, I mean, that was the Norman Granz thing. Norman Granz, at that particular time, he would get Tatum during the day, and he'd have him record with different groups. I've got all those albums here.


Isoardi

Yeah, all the Pablo albums.


Douglass

So then, the only ones who actually read [music] did a lot of other things with him, along with other people. But the ones where we were together as a group was when he added Ben Webster and Buddy DeFranco on two albums. So those are the only ones that I'm on with him.


Isoardi

How long were you at the Royal?


Douglass

Well, I don't know. It had to be about a two- or three-week stay or something like that. Most jobs at that time didn't last must longer than that, especially an appearance like that, because Art was the type of guy who moved in an out, and he was here and there. And then, later on, he came back, and then we went into Jazz City.


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Jazz City was another engagement. That was on Hollywood Boulevard at Western Avenue. Yeah, that's where that was. And then, later on, we went away to do the Blackhawk in San Francisco. That was when we took Leroy with us. When we came back from there, then we went into— I think this club was called Zardi's on Hollywood and Vine [Street]. That was where that place was. So that's another one of the engagements. Leroy played that one with us.


Isoardi

What were the audiences like at places like the Royal coming to see you guys?


Douglass

It seemed like we attracted a terrific movie crowd and all kinds of celebrities and, of course, naturally, musicians who came out there. Musicians were just clamoring to get into the place. That's the reason why sometimes your best night would be a Monday or Tuesday, the nights when most musicians were off, and then they would be there. We had people like Leopold Stokowski.


Isoardi

Stokowski came to hear you?


Douglass

Yeah, he would come in there and sit there with his mouth, his chin hanging wide open, you know. Yeah. And we had the movie stars. I remember Sonny Tufts got thrown out—he drank a lot—just for being noisy.


Isoardi

They threw him out?


Douglass

Art was playing "On the Sunny Side of the Street," and he says, "Sonny. You get it?" He said,


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"That's me." [laughter] Well, that's one of the funny ones. Sunny side of the street; that's him. [laughter]


Isoardi

There are a lot of stories about classical pianists, [Vladimir] Horowitz and [Artur] Rubinstein and people like this, sneaking in the clubs to hear Art play.


Douglass

Oh, yeah. Well, that happened. I don't remember Horowitz, but I know that he did. And Art was a fan of his, also. They both admired one another, especially from a technical standpoint.


Isoardi

Is there anything Tatum couldn't play?


Douglass

No way. He could play— I've seen him do runs with these two fingers up here and then the other two fingers playing something else down there—a couple of different things going on at the same time. Stretched tenths from here to here. He used to give me piano lessons. I was always a frustrated piano player. Not piano lessons, as such, but he knew that I was interested. He was always showing me things.


Isoardi

He would do runs with one hand, with two fingers playing one thing and the other two fingers on the same hand playing something else?


Douglass

Yeah. Two fingers on the black keys, and then the other two fingers would be playing something else on the white keys. He could do that in either hand; it didn't matter. He was just phenomenal.



150

Tape Number: IV, Side One
February 17, 1990

Isoardi

I think today we're up to the union [American Federation of Musicians], one of your areas of real expertise.


Douglass

Oh, well—


Isoardi

I think if we can roughly follow an agenda that goes from [Local] 767, as much as you can talk about it, through the amalgamation, and then into the Local 47— If you can do it that way chronologically— Let's begin with Local 767, your earliest memories of it, what you can tell us about its very early history as much as possible, and then just bring it up to the point of the amalgamation and your involvement with it, etc.


Douglass

Yeah, well, okay. I guess we became aware of the union and what have you as a result of when we were young kids. Did I mention that? That Buddy [Collette], Charles Mingus, myself, and most everybody else, the Woodman Brothers [Britt, Coney, and William Woodman], and who have you, we were young kids, we were all in the business of practicing music and playing professionally as much as we could—you could call it semi-professionally. You know, this fellow [Elmer] Fain was always on the scene. It would get a little rough when every once in a while there were people who were actual


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union members who would engage the rest of us to do certain things with them. So we just began to develop a certain anxiety or fear or whatnot of what was going on, even though the guy had no jurisdiction over us. You finally got the idea that, when you saw this guy, it was time to run or hide or get out of the way. But we were very aware of that. And then, of course, as I pointed out, there was a time when we became so competitive that it was desirable to the union to try to get us in and to get us in as cheaply as possible. And then, Lloyd Reese, the fellow I told you of, who was teaching the majority of us, I think he was in a position down there at 767. As I recall, he was vice president or something like that. He had a lot of pull. So they had what they call a sort of a membership drive and got all of us in for a very low amount. I think the amount that we paid was about $25.


Isoardi

What was the normal initiation fee?


Douglass

The regular initiation fee at that time, I'm quite sure, was $50. I think that that was the amount that we paid for it. And when I say initiation fee, that covered the initiation fee to the union, to the federation—you know, all locals are members of the federation—and then it also included the club. Even in that little local we had a thing that's very similar to Local 47 where we all belonged to a corporation that's called the club, as well as


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the union itself. Now, the club, if you want to know, is a corporation that holds property. It's my understanding, it's always been our understanding, that a union or a local itself cannot own property. What happens is that, if we happened to own property, such as they do in 47— Well, 767 owned that little piece of property that they were on, also. So you form a corporation that's called the Musicians Club. The name of our club over at 767 was the Rhythm Club. None of us paid much attention to it, but to belong to one, you had to belong to the other. So in a sense, it's like the local pays rent to the club. Or if you're a member of the corporation and you're a member of the local, you're really paying rent to yourself. You can see how a union or a local, with all the legalities and the things they go through, that they can run into a little bit of trouble. Somebody might wind up wanting to sue the union. Well, they can't bother your property because it doesn't belong to the union; it belongs to the club, see. So that's really the same situation as what's happening with Local 47. Even though just this year we have instituted a dues raise— Well, a dues raise means that all the members, you know, actually, your dues have gone up. I think it's some $10 more than it was a year ago. That's because there hadn't been a real significant dues raise for quite some number of years. The thing that really happens,
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though, is that we raised our initiation fee. We moved that— Believe me, 47's actual initiation fee was $50 up until just recently, so we've doubled it up to $100.


Isoardi

Pretty cheap.


Douglass

Yeah. Really, it's just that the thing has been behind for a long time. However, when you pay your initiation fee, well, then we have $100, which we call an initiation fee into the union, and there's $100 of that that's— Well, the way it was before, if I can remember correctly, we used to have what you called a $150 initiation fee. Fifty dollars of that was to join Local 47, $50 was to be a member of the club, and the other $50 was to be a member of the federation. So if I can just get my figures correct, it's still $50 to the federation, $50 to the club, and then $100 to join the local. Something like that. I mean, it's all divided up, and there are reasons for this. And then, of course, when the guy pays his— How much is that? That's $200. And then, with the new dues structure, which is $92 a year, many fellows, unless they work out something other than that, they'll join, they'll pay these initiation fees, plus you still have to pay your first-quarter's dues. However, we don't do it by quarters anymore. We do it semi-annually, which means that we have to pay for half the year. Or you might want to pay for the whole year and get it out of the way.


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So now you'd have that $200 plus the $92 to join. Or if a guy says, "Well, I can only pay the first installment," well, then he'd have $47 to pay, and then in July there's another $47 that's supposed to happen. I guess that's just interesting. I mean, I'm sitting in this hot seat called treasurer right now, so I'm supposed to— Well, I mean, I've got all this stuff written down. I don't do business off the top of my head. Not ever. But, anyway, I'm just trying to do this to let you know what you're really getting for like $25. You get the whole trip.


Isoardi

That's a good deal.


Douglass

So you're in there, and you're legal, so we've been there ever since. That's all it costs us to get started in that thing.


Isoardi

A separate amount of this money goes to the club, right? Now, what happens to the club treasury?


Douglass

Well, the club treasury is what maintains the building.


Isoardi

For the maintenance of the property. I see.


Douglass

You know, you've got utility bills, you've got this, and you've got that. Of course, in many instances the local itself will take care of all of these things, but they take care of them for the club, in the name of the club.


Isoardi

And this is pretty much the way 767 was set up?



155
Douglass

Yeah, it operated the same way.


Isoardi

Same way?


Douglass

Yeah. Well, I mean, there's transfers. If you save up some money in the club, you could always transfer it into the general fund as you see fit. Or the club, if it needs money, can borrow money from the general fund into the club, and, sometime or another, the club pays it back. So it's like you're borrowing from yourself and putting it back, but there's always something to work from. And you keep a certain amount where nobody else can touch it, so nobody else can get their hooks into it.


Isoardi

Do you remember when 767 was founded? Do you know much about its history?


Douglass

I don't know. There are a whole lot of people, and I've been giving you names of people who were around there. See, at the point that I'm talking about, I'm just a little child, just a little high school kid who is playing music and all the rest of us, so we're getting into the union. And then, we don't realize what we're getting into until we get in, and then we can go back and we can talk about the old hats and whatnot and how they were doing. There was a competitive thing that went on between the up-and-coming, real talented musicians like Buddy Collette, Charlie Mingus, Jackie Kelso, myself, Dexter Gordon, Chico Hamilton, all these guys, you know— We're all kids in


156
school and just about ready to come out of school. And we'd play— Now, did anybody tell you about the Elks [Club] auditorium?


Isoardi

Yeah, I know about the Elks auditorium.


Douglass

Okay, you know about that. Well, that's where an awful lot of the action happened. The big bands came in and played the dances there. I mean, it had a downstairs floor and then a smaller club room upstairs.


Isoardi

I didn't know that.


Douglass

Oh, yeah. That's the place where everybody had their functions, all of the so-called little social functions and things like that, the various social clubs, the Elks auditorium was it. That's a very, very historical place. It's equally historical as the Club Alabam. Equally.


Isoardi

So this was musicians and entertainers and all sorts of socials, weddings, whatever was held there.


Douglass

Yeah. Now, you know what the Elks organization is. The Elks were the ones that owned the building. It was a very nice structure [with] a big parking lot in the back. It was a big auditorium, with a balcony and all that type of thing. And then, of course, above that, we had another little club room and facilities and things like that upstairs. And, boy, Saturday night, both ends of it were jumping.



157
Isoardi

Pretty regularly every Saturday?


Douglass

Yeah, it used to be a thing where it would seem like there would be a union band on the bottom floor and then a nonunion band on top and so forth. And then every so often the nonunion band would get the bottom floor because somebody comes out and they hire you, you know. They rent that hall, and then they hire you to play, and there you are. Of course, the union had that problem. Like whenever they caught a bunch of us playing in there, there were certain things they would consider a union house. Well, then they used to hassle you a little bit. That's the reason why it was advantageous to us to join the union, as well as it was advantageous to the union to have us in, because we gave them a pretty bad time. You're undercutting or cutting the throats of some of the professionals.


Isoardi

So the club upstairs was generally smaller? It had smaller groups, smaller sizes?


Douglass

Well, yeah, it was quite a bit smaller. That's right, smaller parties, although, as I recollect, they had some pretty nice functions that went on up there.


Isoardi

I guess a lot of big bands must have come through, if that was a big auditorium.


Douglass

Oh, yes. That's right. Yes, they did. [Count] Basie, [Jimmie] Lunceford, Earl Hines. I remember Earl Hines being there with— You know, his vocalists were Billy


158
Eckstine and Sarah Vaughn. And then, we had the Lunceford band. It was part of the scene.


Isoardi

The Elks Club was located where?


Douglass

It was on Central Avenue, and I would say— I'm just making a guess. You know where Jefferson Boulevard runs across and segues and then goes east? I think that's called Forty-first Street right there. I think the Elks must have been somewhere just north of Forty-first or possibly Jefferson and Central, it seems to me. Right there.


Isoardi

Was the Elks Club, as a social organization, very big in the community then? Is it a big organization?


Douglass

Yeah, well, to me it was big. I mean, you're talking to a kid, now, when it was there. It was just a place of recognition. I mean, we were always there. In school, we'd go to all the dances; all the big dances and things were held there. Sometimes even school events like proms and things like that were probably held there.


Isoardi

What type of people were in the Elks? Do you remember at all? Were they businessmen? Or was it a whole spectrum of the community?


Douglass

I really don't know. I have no idea. I have no idea who ran the place or rented it out to who or anything like that. My only recollection of the Elks myself is when I worked there or when I just went there to hear somebody or


159
those things. I was either a customer or an employee or whatever.


Isoardi

So back to 767. [Local] 767 is located where on Central?


Douglass

Seventeenth and Central.


Isoardi

Seventeenth and Central.


Douglass

So, you see, that's still going farther northward. That's up above Washington Boulevard. But you can see it's just a very short space, a period of just a few blocks separation from one another. Well, we were members of this local, and, of course, just so much as locals go, the big bands, a lot of them, when they were in town, they used our local. Sometimes it was downstairs. It was really just a large, two-story frame house that housed the Local 767. I remember the Basie band rehearsing downstairs right beside our financial offices one day. Then, other times, we had— Well, it was just a big room, it was all open, so that it was big enough for rehearsals, and we had the big bands rehearse upstairs. That's where our group, what we called the Lloyd Reese Band, all of the Lloyd Reese Students, that's where we would rehearse every Sunday, right there.

We had the offices down there. I remember very well that the financial office was run by a very popular fellow named Paul Howard. He was a very famous saxophone player. And then, even though he was holding down that job there,


160
his organization was out playing nightclub jobs. I remember him being in a place called Virginia's. I never caught him out there, but I used to hear about him. His band was called the Quality Serenaders. And that's quite a popular, a very famous— That's historical. A lot of people would know who they where. Paul Howard was quite popular. But he was also a great financier, what have you, because he held down what you call— Well, we called him a financial secretary, which would be equivalent to what the treasurer's office is in 47 right now.

We had a lady named Florence Cadrez, who was the recording secretary. That's equivalent to what our position called secretary is like in 47. In other words, the secretary's office keeps track of all the records and so forth and so on and whatever pertains to you or whatever in the business.

And then, they had a vice president, who didn't have an office on the premise, necessarily. He was vice president. However, he still attended all— We had a little board of directors, trustees, board of directors and the whole thing, and we all attended the board of directors meetings. I'm not talking about just the regular membership meetings, but you always had board of directors meetings such as we have here. So like, as vice president, the vice president always acted as a member of the board, or, in the


161
absence of the president, well, then he would chair whatever type of function or meeting or whatever went on.


Isoardi

So the highest policy-making body was the board.


Douglass

Yes. We had four officers in that union, and then we had a certain number of people who made up the board of directors.


Isoardi

Who was the vice president when you joined? Was it Lloyd Reese then?


Douglass

Well, when I joined, yeah, I believe Lloyd Reese was the vice president at that time. And then, I can't remember if it was Leo Davis who was the president at that time or if there was a fellow named Bailey who was president preceding him. These things weren't very important to us at this stage. I can only just kind of remember, you know. I know that, as far as my getting involved or becoming really interested in any union, being involved in any union politics or policies or what have you— It seems to me that Leo Davis was the president at that time. Very popular.


Isoardi

So among you guys coming in then, none of you were especially interested in political activity or the union as a political body or anything like that? You were pretty much joining as the next step on your musical career?


Douglass

Well, yeah, that's what it was. So we were around there. Of course, we never relished the actions and the things that went on, because, as you're out playing in


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the field, there were times when the union gets in your way, and other times they might be helpful to you, or sometimes they didn't help you when you thought they should. So then you began to get your feelings, "Well, that damn union, so-and-so and so-and-so." And that's the way it is all over the world right now. It's always been that way, to a certain extent. Except that, in those days, unions did have a little more clout. If we had that kind of clout nowadays, well, we could probably make the whole thing thrive a lot more than it does. But now you're hampered by all kinds of laws. There are all types of laws in effect now that are designed to hamper or to cripple the unions. I mean, this is the type of thing you probably get now if you start getting into studying what happens with unions and union activity and whatnot.


Isoardi

Well, I grew up in a teamster [International] Brotherhood of Teamsters] family in the fifties, and I, just in the last couple of decades, just from my family's vantage point, have seen a big change.


Douglass

Yeah. However, as things went on and on, and then you began to see this and that— I don't know. All of a sudden things began to hit all of us a little bit. There was always black and white. You know, the white union did this, and the black union does this. There were number of us like Buddy Collette, Charlie Mingus, myself, Chico


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Hamilton, many of the same people I'm talking about— I mean, things worked out as we were moving around in the clubs. Well, then, all of a sudden we're working with some of the white guys from over in 47. Musicians, I mean, when they start digging one another and working together, well, then it happened.


Isoardi

What brought you into contact with some of the musicians from 47? Was it working the Hollywood clubs?


Douglass

Well, I'd say that happened. Or all of them— You know, Central Avenue was the place. Everybody over there, everybody came to Central Avenue, you know. That was where— What was the song ["Basin Street Blues"] that said, "That's where the black and the white folks meet"? You know, they talk about "Basin Street." Well, hell, there you've got Central Avenue again. The people, when they'd leave those clubs, they'd come down here, and all the after-hours activity was all up and down the streets of Central. And, of course, musicians are going to get to know one another. That just happens.

Okay, well, anyway, as we began to get conscious of all this type of thing— I mean, I guess I became very conscious, but I guess when I became conscious of it, I was a member of— Well, I guess '49, '50, '51, when I was doing these things with Benny Goodman, there were a lot of times I was the only—sometimes there were others—but I was the


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only black in the band. When he had to take care of business such as contracts and things like that, well, he was always bitching about the fact, why did he have to come all the way across town to take care of business for me? Or why did he have to send my checks here when he sent everybody else's checks uptown there, you know? So he would talk about that, and so, naturally, these things were ringing little bells in your head, you know, like, "Yeah, what is it all about?" So Buddy was having the same type of thing. Of course, now, you know Buddy was on the Groucho [Marx] show ["You Bet Your Life"]. I know you've heard about that. He was the first black to hold down a regular staff job on a TV network. So there you are. He's going through this thing. Jerry Fielding, when he had to employ Buddy or whatever it is, and then when he had to send his check in or whatever it is, it had to go over across town. So we're all aware of this. And then, we were talking with Lloyd about it, and Lloyd was saying so and so and so and so. So finally—


Isoardi

What was Lloyd saying?


Douglass

Well, he looked at the thing the same way. What we needed to do was progress. "Yeah, what you guys ought to do, you should buck against this thing. I mean, why should we have two unions here? It's discrimination." Okay, they're all putting this stuff in. And, of course, you have


165
a lot of discriminatory action and things like that that's happening all over the country. Everybody's very conscious of it. You're trying to break down Jim Crowism here, Jim Crowism there. You have your speakers and your organizations. I guess the only organization that I was aware of at that time was the NAACP [National Association for the Advancement of Colored People] and what they were supposed to stand for some way or another. I took out a membership in it.


Isoardi

How did you become aware of the NAACP?


Douglass

Oh, I don't know. Just because, all around you— Well, it was called the National Association for the Advancement of they called them "colored people" at that time. So, you know, naturally you're conscious of this. "Well, gee, an organization like this, to get into a thing like this seems to be the right thing. What they're preaching seems to be the thing that we all should be interested in and the things that we're striving for."


Isoardi

So when did you join?


Douglass

Oh, I don't know. But it was back there—


Isoardi

It was around that time?


Douglass

Yeah. I was very young at that time. I guess I had neighbors and friends and whatnot and a lot of people— It was just the thing, something to belong to, you know.


Isoardi

It seems like in this couple-of-year period, you


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made some big changes. You go from being a fifteen-year-old high school kid who is becoming a professional musician, playing a lot, to a union member, to a member of the NAACP. Your own consciousness seems to be changing quite a bit.


Douglass

You're running into this stuff. Like I told you about the neighborhoods: you go to Glendale to play and maybe over to Pasadena. Well, you wouldn't dare be caught walking around the streets there at night. I mean, that was just a general feeling. Like, in the clubs you were king. But as soon as the night was over, well, you get into your little buggy and get back across town or whatever it was. You didn't hear of people spread out and living in those areas, even a little place like South Gate, which is just south and east of here. I remember that's another one of those places where— I was always working over there, and I had my little problems, my little run-ins with various people for— I mean, a lot of racial things. We'd run into places where we even had to fight once in a while.


Isoardi

Really?


Douglass

Oh, yes.


Isoardi

In clubs or—?


Douglass

Oh, yes.


Isoardi

The audiences were predominantly white in those clubs?



167
Douglass

Yeah, of course. There were a lot of places we worked as musicians. Even though we were black musicians, sometimes we would combine and work with white fellows. We worked in white clubs, in white areas. Black entertainment was very popular. That's the reason we really spread out. We were spread out all over the place. But still, you'd have those incidents.


Isoardi

Any one stand out in your mind?


Douglass

Oh, not necessarily. Not any particular person or anything like that. But we all ran into situations like that. And, of course, the thing to do was to try to keep cool, but sometimes the only way out of a situation would be to bust somebody. It didn't always erupt into a great big thing. I know I had experiences where, when I laid a guy out cold, well, it seemed like, after that, we had peace and quiet. [laughter] Yeah. So people may get a little excited quite once in a while. And then, of course, other times it was different. I don't know.


Isoardi

Did you ever get hassled by the police in these areas?


Douglass

Not really.


Isoardi

Just trouble with occasional patrons?


Douglass

Yeah. Not really any hassle with police. I'm just saying personally. I mean, other musicians probably did, for whatever reason. They were always hassling you.


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They'd want to catch you— You know, at that time the marijuana laws and things were very, very strict. We used to hear about guys getting busted for having what they call a joint or something like that, and we'd look and say, "How can anybody be that dumb?" [laughter] I mean, if you do a thing, why carry it around with you? And how in the world could you let yourself get caught? [laughter] So that's the way we looked at it.


Isoardi

Did you call them joints?


Douglass

Yeah, a joint, yeah, or a roach. Some tiny, little thing like that. A little thing that's been— Well, sometimes a joint was a whole cigarette or whatever it is. But, in many instances, we're talking about something that's half smoked, and most of it's gone, and you're saving a little bit of it for later. And then you let somebody stop you and open up your car and say, "Well, what's this?" And then, bam! Off to jail.


Isoardi

Were there many harder drugs around back then?


Douglass

I guess there was. I mean, we never thought that much about it. I guess all kinds of stuff was happening. Every once in a while you'd hear somebody say, "Oh, so and so is a junkie," this and that. Like, "The hell with him. How dumb can you be?" and so forth.


Isoardi

But for most guys, I guess it was booze and pot then.



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Douglass

Yeah, booze, and then the pot was a little extra luxury and whatnot, the thing that people sneaked around to do. I don't want to just put all of it— Because I could tell some real stories about a lot of prominent people.


Isoardi

Oh, go ahead! [laughter]


Douglass

But, I mean, as a youngster in these days that you're talking about, I didn't drink and I didn't smoke. I didn't smoke anything. But I was around older guys who did. And then, when I'd go to a lot of the little house and social functions and one of these little smoking things would break out, I found out, among some of the older musicians, this is what it was. God, I was so disappointed in so many of the people who I saw indulge. You know, I got just very— And then the guys used to laugh at me because I was— I thought it was just terrible that they even did that around me or exposed me to something like that. And they used to just kind of laugh at me. But I don't know. I just kind of— Whatever it was, I grew out it. I learned how much of it to take and how to accept it. I don't know. That's the thing. You become aware of this type of thing. Like you say, "This is wrong and that's wrong," and then you say, "Well, gee, everybody's doing it," you know, this and that. You discover those types of things.


Isoardi

So this period, between the union, the NAACP, traveling out to these other areas—



170
Douglass

Oh, yeah. That's right.


Isoardi

Pot, everything. You're coming of age quickly.


Douglass

Well, yeah. You're in a society, and you're growing up in that society. But all of a sudden we were becoming very, very conscious of the racial thing throughout the world, I guess, for that matter—what's happening with people here and what's happening with people there. And here in Los Angeles, we don't have those kinds of laws. We didn't have to go to the back of the bus or so forth and so on, yet you still knew the areas where you weren't treated quite like other people were. So there were a lot of things you resented.


Isoardi

Weren't there housing covenants? Or had they just eliminated those about this time? I mean, weren't there restrictions on moving above Wilshire Boulevard, things like that?


Douglass

Well, there's always been things. If the restrictions weren't necessarily written into the law, it was kind of an agreement between certain people in certain neighborhoods. "No, you can't sell to so-and-so," you know. So there were always certain restrictions about blacks maybe buying in a particular area and this and that. Some of them got around it eventually by just fenagling around and getting somebody to make the purchase for them and this and that. But they did have their


171
problems. That type of thing happened. There were restrictive neighborhoods. We used to hear about those things all the time. Even where I live right now, we can pull out our deed to the house. The wording is right in the deed that they weren't supposed to sell this property— This property right here was not supposed to exchange hands with anybody other than the Caucasian race.


Isoardi

No kidding?


Douglass

Yeah. It's still on the original deed except that it's just been overlooked now. It doesn't count anymore. You see what I mean?

Okay, now we're in the union, so we began to get together. We said, "Well, maybe we should go to one of these union meetings. We've been to meetings before, but maybe we should go to one of these union meetings. And then, all the old guys that I'm telling you about, they're still there. I guess 767 used to have elections once a year.


Isoardi

For the union offices?


Douglass

Yeah. But nobody was ever interested in the union offices, so the same bunch of guys would get down there and vote for each other, and the same people stayed in office year after year after year.


Isoardi

I just meant to ask you something real quick. You mentioned that Lloyd Reese was encouraging you guys.



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Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

Do you know if there were any earlier attempts to change this?


Douglass

I don't think so.


Isoardi

He never— You don't think so.


Douglass

No. He was always very progressive minded. As I look back upon him, it seemed like he encouraged us to do things because we were the guys who would get up and start fighting and get it done. I don't know. I remember him being a very great teacher, a very great adviser, but I can't say that I necessarily remember him being the guy who carried the sword and this and that. He would say, "You guys should so and so," and then he would back you up and he would advise you.


Isoardi

He was an idea man, really.


Douglass

He would encourage you and advise you as you went along. "Yes, you should do this or you should do that." So that's the way I remember him. So, naturally, I guess, to interject right here, well, then when the war came along, I told all about the enlistments. I heard Buddy Collette on the radio this morning talking about when he enlisted in Saint Mary's [College Preflight School] up in [Moraga]. How he stayed there three and a half years, right there. That was on the radio this morning. Yeah, Howard Lucraft's show. Is KLON the station out of Long Beach?



173
Isoardi

Yeah.


Douglass

From Long Beach. It's on the campus there.


Isoardi

Yeah, Cal[ifornia] State [University, Long Beach].


Douglass

Yeah, Cal State. Well, they have these little interviews, or recorded interviews, with different people like every Saturday morning, and I guess a lot of times all during the week, too. And every so often they'll get ahold of somebody, and then you'll get somebody like Buddy or somebody I know, and you hear them tell about these little instances and what went on.

Well, we had the little army stint. I told you that Lloyd Reese went in the service with me [in the Tenth Cavalry Band]. So was Fain. There were a lot of guys from Los Angeles who all went down there [Camp Lockett, Campo, California] together. Some of the older guys at that time, like Reese and Fain and a few others, managed to fenagle their way out of the army through whatever means and whatnot, when we finally got our overseas call. So the rest of us younger guys, while we tried our best, well, it didn't work, and so the next thing you know, we were going up that gangplank. I've told you about a lot of my experiences overseas. Of course, then we finally came back. And one thing that was nice was we were welcomed back into the waiting arms of the union, and we hadn't lost any of our seniority as far as membership. We didn't have to pay dues


174
during that time, and we came back throughly reinstated. So all of that was very good. Then we resumed our musical careers, such as they were.

But then, all of a sudden, that's when this talk about— I had an awful lot of experiences, you know, like racial-type things. In fact, that was the first time I was really exposed to a lot of things.


Isoardi

When you were in the army?


Douglass

Was when you were in the army. My trip across the continent to the East Coast, Newport News [Virginia], the debarkation center, and then coming back, it was really— I mean, I could tell you some more stories about what happened in these instances. As I told you, you can talk about one thing, and you can be in the middle of talking about one thing, and all of a sudden here's another detour, you know, whatever you—


Isoardi

Well, take the detours, Bill. [laughter] We've got plenty of tape.


Douglass

Well, we're trying to talk about the unions, so I'm trying to get back to that. Sometime or another we can talk about the other things.

Anyway, as a result of all this, we finally got back in. Here we are. And then, when we finally got to hassling around like, "What's going to happen?" We're going to go to a union meeting, and we're going to bring this up on the


175
floor. I was the individual who was going to stand up on the floor and ask to be recognized and then bring on this question.


Isoardi

Now, who are the group of you guys plotting to do this?


Douglass

Well, all the same guys I've been talking about.


Isoardi

Same guys you mentioned?


Douglass

I'm talking about Buddy and Charlie Mingus. I mean, there was Benny Carter—


Isoardi

He was with you guys?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. He was with us. Benny Carter— Marl Young wasn't with us at first. I know you've heard of him being very influential. He was somebody who joined us a little bit later. But basically, all of the younger guys, not just younger guys, but all of the progressive-style musicians who can't see this type of— You know, Benny could never see anything like this. However, Benny was just one. He had his own thing going, and he's working, he's doing this and that. I mean, golly, he was writing for the studios and the whole bit. He had his own little thing going. I guess I'd say that he was just so well respected, but I guess he probably had problems, too. But it just seemed like he was so great and so far above all these things. However, he wasn't so far above it that he didn't feel the same way that we did, and he could not stand to see


176
this thing like it was. Probably because of his experiences and where he was, he could not see any reason why we should be separated in any way. I'm just conjecturing this myself. I could imagine what he was feeling. But I know that that's the way he is.

Well, anyway, we went to this union meeting and tried to bring up the subject on the floor, and then we were gaveled down. We were "out of order." They didn't want to hear it. We said, "Well, what is this bit?" Like, we come there—


Isoardi

You just wanted a discussion. You didn't put forward a proposal.


Douglass

Yeah. "Oh, no. This is out of order." Bam, bam, bang. And we began to realize, "Well, gee, you're not even going to get a voice in here. These old fogies, they're not going to let you say anything. You're just gaveled down." So then we said, "Well, the only thing to do—" Fortunately, they had elections every year. Nobody had ever opposed anybody down there, so we said, "Well, then, what we could do, let's run for office. And if we get into office, then, when we have a union meeting, then we'll get a chance to say what we want and let people say what they want." So that's the way it happened. I think we kind of caught those guys by surprise, because, when we got organized— And, of course, in the middle of this time, Marl


177
Young finally joined in with us. He was from Chicago originally. I don't know how long he had been here at the time but— You know, like a lot of guys hear or feel a movement going on— And then, he was very ambitious. He was a real, sort of politico or whatever you want to call it. He was very knowledgeable in the ways of law and all that type of thing. He joined us. So we got in there, and they tried to give us a lot of opposition, trying to find legalities and technicalities as the reason why we weren't supposed to be eligible to join. Well, then, all of a sudden, we got our books out, and we used to have our little meetings, and we'd study up on the bylaws, how to go about this and— So that's where we began to get union-oriented: Study the bylaws. Find out what's it. We studied the national bylaws. "Well, what's this? And how does this happen?" So then we knew what we were up to and what we were up against.

Well, what we did is we had our little organizations, and then we started giving our little fund-raising parties.



178

Tape Number: IV, Side Two
February 17, 1990

Isoardi

You were saying about the fund-raising.


Douglass

Well, this happened at the place over on Saint Andrews Place. I forget the exact address, but you probably have that from someone. I was telling you who stayed there and my association with them and so forth.


Isoardi

That was Buddy Collette—


Douglass

Buddy Collette, John Ewing, Jimmie Cheatham. I guess that was the three of them. It was like a large duplex. So we used to get together over there. It was large. We used to have a lot of rehearsals and things like that over there. So then we started having— I can't remember. I guess some of it was after hours. Little fund-raisers where we had kind of a little session, and we used to sell our booze and this and that, had little tickets, raised funds, and things like that, to get a little money together so that we could print pamphlets. So we had these pamphlets printed with our pictures and things and the fact that we were— Well, we were running for these various offices. If I'm not mistaken, I think Buddy Collette was at the head of the ticket. He was running for president. I was running for vice president. And then, we had several others. You know, we ran for all these offices. We had people who ran against Paul Howard, who was a very well


179
loved individual, and Florence Cadrez, a very well loved individual, and so forth and so on. And, of course, Leo Davis was the president at that time. He was very well loved. No matter how popular we were and the whole thing, we could not move these basic three officers. Yeah. They had three officers. There was a vice president, but only three of these other people sort of resided on the premises there, as far as their offices were concerned. The vice president did not have an office, except that he acted as a member of the board of directors, and then he would act in absence of the president himself. Well, anyway, the election went down. You know, I won the vice presidency.


Isoardi

Did you?


Douglass

Yeah. Buddy Collette lost. And whoever ran against Florence Cadrez and Paul Howard, they lost. However, we did gain a vast majority on the board. Benny Carter was on the board, and so was Marl Young, John Anderson, and— I forget who. There might have been one or two others. But anyway, we had won because we had the majority. Well, then we started to take control of those meetings, and we got ourselves heard. And then, when we finally had a real good turnout for a membership meeting, I remember I was the one who was elected, for whatever or reason or another, to get up and make the antidiscrimination speech. So we got them all riled up, and they went after it.


180

Naturally, with all of us working around with different musicians, there was also another faction made up of musicians that was hard working over in 47 at the same time. They wanted it this way. So they're working on the membership over there.


Isoardi

Are they?


Douglass

Yeah. We've got to bring it to a vote in each local. We've got to bring it to a vote and then see what happens. And if the majority vote happens in each of the locals, well, then it has to happen.


Isoardi

Do you know who was doing this in the other local?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. I know an awful lot of them. I don't know. I can remember— Well, I don't know just right now. I remember a fellow— He's gone now. George Kast was one fellow I was very much acquainted with. I guess Buddy could fill you in on an awful lot of those things. But I knew an awful lot of guys. And then, as far as just the feeling and the popularity of it, I mean, most of the good musicians over there, none of them would have been against this thing. The same thing that was happening in our local— I mean, the people who were in the offices in 47, John Tegroen was the president, I'd say Maury Paul was probably the secretary. I think there was a guy named Henning who was the treasurer, and just who the vice


181
president was, I don't know. But the people I got acquainted with as we got over there, well, they were definitely against it. However, members, musicians, playing musicians who have developed a lot of love and respect for one another sort of felt that this is the way that it should be.


Isoardi

Did you guys coordinate at all? Were you meeting with any of the musicians—?


Douglass

Oh, yes. When we had the little jam sessions and all the little functions that went on, yes. They attended these things. Of course, as we began to grow a little bit, well, Buddy will probably tell you about the Humanist Hall Project, when we sort of moved our thing out of their residence, so to speak, and went down on Union Avenue to the Humanist Hall, and every Sunday we'd stage these little things. Sometimes they were very sparse, and other times we made it. But whenever we were able, each one of us would sacrifice our time to go down there and play and help it along. And it went on and on.

And then, Buddy will probably or probably already has told you about the time that Josephine Baker, the great star from here who made such a great reputation abroad, France, namely, came over here. She was also one of these who was definitely in favor of this movement. We were gathering a lot of momentum. The word was really getting


182
out. It was being very much publicized. So when she came there, I don't think I was there that particular Sunday. I think I was probably working somewhere else. But when she came there, that was when they finally just filled Humanist Hall to capacity. They made money, and money went into the treasury.

And then, I remember another election came around about a year later. Trying to get the presidency, we ran Benny Carter, you know, like, how can Benny miss? [laughter] So here we go again. And then Buddy ran for the board. Now he's on the board. Here we go. I ran for vice president again, and I won again. Benny lost. [laughter] You couldn't move these guys! You know, everybody wants an amalgamation, but they all love these— Yeah, they'd just say, "Well, what are those poor guys going to do if we vote them out of their job?" So it was really a funny thing. And then, it seemed like Benny Carter, when that happened, well, he got really riled up. I mean, that kind of pissed him off real bad.


Isoardi

Because he lost?


Douglass

"Dumb so-and-sos, how can they vote against me?" So then, that's the next time we gave an event, a real event for something or other. At that time, this thing was coming up for a vote in both locals. Shall we or shouldn't we? It's coming up for a vote in both locals.


183
So, now, Benny Carter, he was influential. All of us had a certain amount of influence. But, God, we gave this big thing, a great big to-do, a show at the Club Alabam, which was a big place at that time. We had all of Jerry Fielding's entire orchestra, which Buddy was a member of. We had I don't know how many big bands, name artists. Nat King Cole appeared on this thing, Nellie Lutcher, just about everybody you could think of. All the big artists came down to appear on this one show, and people came from everywhere. They just packed this place. And all of it was based around the amalgamation, raising money for the amalgamation committee. So Benny just called everybody he knew. He had every great singer, everybody of any renown at all. I guess I wouldn't dare to name all of the— Some of them would come to my mind, you know, and I don't want to just mention them just for the sake of I'd leave somebody out or maybe mention somebody that maybe wasn't necessarily there. But just about everybody we knew who was anybody or anything at all, they were all there on that show. So, therefore, we made the money, we swung this thing, and, of course, with the money, you put out your little pamphlets and your bills and whatnot.

Then people started playing dirty politics. They started to name various ones of us who were being "influenced," you know. We were being "communist


184
inspired."


Isoardi

Is that what they started doing?


Douglass

Yeah. We were "communist inspired." That was popular at that time, to blacklist people. That was during the [Joseph R.] McCarthy days and all that. So all of a sudden, now you're getting this bad publicity. I'm a "communist" or Buddy's a "communist" or this and that. Or "They're being led, they're communist-inspired, those who want that." You know, the people who hire up in our local, they're preaching this type of thing.


Isoardi

They were doing it?


Douglass

Oh, yes! And then, the people in 47, "Yeah, that's what wrong. That's what's stirring these poor young guys up," this and that. So now we went out and got as much support as we could from everybody else. We went to all of the black stars, entertainers, the baseball players, football players. And then, we went to the NAACP, and they were scared to touch us. To this day, I am not a member of the NAACP. I mean, I resigned my membership. I said, "Well, this is what we're supposed to be all about." Now, they listened to all of that crap and got just a little bit nervous and a little bit scared.


Isoardi

You went to ask them to endorse the amalgamation?


Douglass

Yeah. We wanted them to tell them like, "These boys are members of the NAACP," and "this is the way to


185
go." That's what the NAACP was supposed to be all about. "How can you be against this? This is all these guys are trying to do. They're trying to clean up this thing."

There was a thing that we had to attack that was in the national bylaws. [James C.] Petrillo was the president at that time. It was a definite rule, a definite law, that in the places—and there were a lot of places throughout the country—where there were two locals, a black local and a white local, a white local would not be allowed to take in a black musician, and then, by the same token, a black local could not take in a nonblack. That was the federation law. We wanted to attack that thing. That's what we were really after. We were really after that because, when we finally— We finally won the vote. We won the vote in both locals, the popular vote that says we should amalgamate. Now we've got the federation trying to block our way.


Isoardi

Using that bylaw?


Douglass

Yeah, using that bylaw. We're attacking that kind of thing. So we're asking Petrillo and the IEB [International Executive Board], whatever it is, let's make a determination. This is the mandate of the membership out here. I remember Marl was a real fighter, and I remember Leo, our president at that particular time, he got out. He decided to go to the hospital and have his appendix removed


186
or something. He was getting out of things. So now I'm in the so-called hot seat, or the driver's seat, trying to lead the guys through our last membership meeting.


Isoardi

Had Leo Davis resigned? Or were you just taking over while he was in the hospital?


Douglass

No, he just took sort of a sick leave, and that's where he stayed until this whole thing was over.


Isoardi

So he really just wanted to bail out of it, then.


Douglass

Yeah. However, we did let Petrillo know that if— We called him. Marl came to the office, and we called him on the phone and told him that, "Whatever you say, so-and-so and so-and-so." We meant it. We said, "Now, if this thing doesn't come around, then, what we're going to do, we're going to become more competitive against 47 than we have been." I used to feel like we had most of the jobs sewn up, anyway, most of the real entertainment jobs. So we had said that, regardless of whatever, we were going to challenge that thing, and we were going to— You know, all the younger members coming in, we were going to accept them. I think our initiation fee was $50 at that time, and 47's was $100. So we said, "All the real good, young musicians, white musicians who are coming up, they want to get into the union, well, this is the place to be. We'll take you." And they didn't mind because, hell, we had all the damn stars belonging to our union.


187

So anyway, they tried to do this and that, and so they finally decided they were going to go along with it. I mean, it was beginning to be a real unpopular thing. And Petrillo was going to send Herman Kenin, who was his right-hand man, out here to oversee our meeting. He sent us a telegram to that effect. We called him on the phone again. We said, "Well, if he's coming out here, we'll let him attend the meeting, but we want him to keep his goddamn mouth shut." [laughter] "This is our fucking union, and we're going to do this thing." He said, "Well, this thing is a little bit too hot to handle right now." So he left us alone, and we brought the whole thing about.


Isoardi

It came about at a joint meeting?


Douglass

Well, all that happened. See, they already had their meeting, like, what you call ratification or whatever it is. The Local 47 membership voted overwhelmingly to accept our local into theirs. So what we had to do, we had to draw up terms. We had to dispose of our property, and all of it goes into the 47 treasury, all of our assets. And then, the things we had to iron out, like a man is already maybe a member of 767 for fifteen years— Their death benefit was a little higher than ours, also. I think that it's always been $1,000, and I think ours was something like $600. So it said, regardless of all that, any amount of membership in 767, you would maintain that.


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Say if I was a member of 767 for eight or ten years or whatever it is, when I join 47 I still have that tenure. And then it just builds up from there. So in 1971, some number of years later, I guess most of us, about that time, became life members. And at that time the life membership— You know, once you reached thirty years of membership, well, then you had no more dues to pay. That's not necessarily true anymore. They've rescinded a lot of that. But that's the way it was at that particular time.

So these were the things we had to work out. We did not want to go over there— Because we were officers, we didn't want to go across the street and then be some kind of subsidiary officers. Say I'll be the vice president—I was acting president at that time—or the president to the black membership and so forth and so on. We said, "No, we want none of that." We said, "We depend upon you and your officers to represent us the way that we feel we will be represented, and if any of us ever aspires to become an officer in this new organization, we will run in the election like anybody else." So that's what we said. We put all that down in our so-called agreement. We had a complete agreement as to the way thing were going to happen.

There were things that we wanted to be careful of that were happening in other locals. Not in New York, but in


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Chicago and a number of other places, San Francisco, a lot of places all over the country had two locals. So we were the beginning of a movement that was going to take place throughout the country. That's all done away with now.


Isoardi

So you guys, after the amalgamation, you weren't given a number of official positions within the—


Douglass

No, no, no. We refused that. We refused that. They wanted us to do something like that, but we refused it.


Isoardi

Why exactly did you refuse it?


Douglass

Because we did not want to be singled out. We wanted to all be the same, no means of identification for anybody else or anything else like that. There were a bunch of us, like Marl, Buddy, myself, Benny Carter, all of us ringleaders. We said that, after we got over there—and we did—we would investigate and see how things were being handled. We found out that when our membership cards or our file cards, their files, membership files— We'd look in there from time and time and look at the membership cards, see if anybody's making— In other words, we didn't want things that were happening in other locals. Like you might pull out a black musician, and then maybe there would be a red flag on his card. "Well, what's that red flag for?" "Oh, it tells you he's not white; he's black." We said, "Well, we don't want any of that kind of thing." So


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we outlawed all of that, and then they had to make up new file cards for everybody, each and everybody, like white, black, and the whole bit, and we'll just be identical. There won't be anything on there, and there's not anything on there now about race. It just says your name, your age, birthdate, blah blah blah, your address, your phone number, what instrument you play. This is what's on your file card.


Isoardi

Now, was that one of the things you worked out upon joining? Or is that something you discovered after you got there?


Douglass

Well, this is a thing we worked out, and these were the demands we were making. Now, we discovered, after we got there, when we looked at the file cards— We went back to examine them quite some time after that. And I forget. There was a guy—I hope the name is right—his name was Barker or something like that. I think he was the treasurer at that time, the same position that I'm holding right now. I run membership. You see what I mean? So the same thing happened there. So when we would start looking through the files, we'd see little things like— Okay, you pull out Marl Young's card: Marl Young, blah blah blah, such and such address, piano, and they would maybe underline piano and so forth and so on. Okay, well, great. Then you might find Buddy Collette's card: Blah


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blah blah blah blah, Buddy Collette, phone number, underlined the phone number. So anytime they'd put any kind of a mark, it's like— And we noticed there was always some sort of a little thing like that in a very insignificant way, but you find that if anything was underlined, well, that means that was a black musician. All right.

Now we went in and we filed charges against this guy. We went before their board and brought him up on charges before the board, so then he was finally forced to explain what it was all about. So now his whole thing, he says, "Well, I'm only trying to protect them," like he knows that there are all kinds of areas around here where people do not take kindly to integration and things of that sort. His whole thing is he was trying to protect us. You know, "Like, if a call came in for so-and-so and so-and-so, I wouldn't want to send the wrong guy out into the wrong area," and this and that and so forth and so on.

I myself got up and told a story. I said, "Let me tell you one thing. I have been black all my life. I think I know more about how to protect me that you do." And then I gave him an example. Just a short while before that, I was living on West Fourteenth Street, right across the street from Gerry Wiggins. I was single at that time, sort of between marriages, and I remembered, at that


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particular time, I got a job. I was quite busy working different places and this and that. And I got a job that was taking place in Oxnard. That's right. I'm going to Oxnard next week. It was taking place in Oxnard, California, and it was with Ella Mae Morris. You've heard of Ella Mae?


Isoardi

Yeah.


Douglass

It was with Ella Mae Morris. So we got a little trio together, and we're going to go up there, and we're to be a trio behind Ella Mae Morris, and it's all the way up in Oxnard. I guess, maybe that must be— Is that more than— That's 100 miles or maybe more— It's about 100 miles round trip from here, isn't it?


Isoardi

Yeah. That sounds about right.


Douglass

We were supposed to open with Ella on a certain night. Now, we've got Ronnie Ball—you've probably heard of Ronnie Ball—piano player. He's from England, a little jazz piano player. Well, English, he's white, right? Okay. Then we had Ben Tucker on bass—he's a black musician—and there's me on drums, and that's it. And we're supposed to drive up there. Now, I'm tied up on a recording date that first night, that opening night. I cannot get away. So I had to get somebody to go in my place. I remember getting Sid Bulkin. He's a white guy. I mean, I wouldn't think anything of it. You know, "You


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want a drummer? Drummer." So I said, "Okay, Sid." He said, "Okay, I'll go with you." So they had to make that long drive all the way, and then they came back the next day. And when I talked to him, I said, "Well, how was the gig? You opened up, I mean, how did it go?" "Oh, man, they had hell out there. The boss, when he saw that black bass player, he said, `Oh, no, we cannot have this!'" I said, "Oh, my God," you know. I said, "What's he going to think when I go out there tonight?" [laughter] You know, "He's going to find that two-thirds of the trio are black." I'm telling this story to the board of directors, you know.

So anyway, this is what happened. I mean, they got their little money and all that kind of stuff, no problem, but the boss was a real screamer. So I said, "Well, nothing to do. Well, fellows—" I remember I was driving. We drove all the way out there, and we were walking in the club and bringing our stuff in, and the boss— "Oh, no! Oh, no! This can't happen! It's not me. I mean, it's the people I have coming in here, the customers. They cannot see this," and so forth and so on. "How are we going to handle this?" I said, "Yes, sir, I understand perfectly. I'll tell you what we can do. We can work it out like this, and we'll never go in the place." I said, "You know, I have a contract here. It


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says we're going to be here for two weeks. All you've got to do is just pay this thing off and we'll get the hell out of here." [laughter] "Oh, man—" You know, I'm just being very cooperative but just showing him the easiest way out. "Well, I don't know. We'll just go on and give it a try, anyway." And then, after that, we went in there, no problems. Next thing you know, we're sitting at tables drinking with the customers, and we had a complete ball for that thing. But he just let it alone.

But, I mean, with the other guy, if it had been his way, we would never have gotten a chance to go out there in the first place because he was going to protect us and see that we were never sent on jobs like that, I told the guy, "Oh, man, we're going in through the kitchen. Oh, well, I won't go out there. God, just pay my contract off and we'll go on home. We'll get the hell out of here." [tape recorder off]


Isoardi

Okay, Bill. You were talking about some of the problems that continued to exist after the amalgamation.


Douglass

Yeah. That was just an example of one of the ways we were trying to oversee that things were being carried on in the right way. In other words, it didn't have any means as far as putting identification on people and this and that. I don't know. Even though we have birthdates, and I think right now we have birthdates and


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things that are on file, that's about the only way you can tell a guy's age. But other than that, we don't really identify them in any other way, other than that they're musicians. I've always felt, like myself, if I were to hire a musician, I wouldn't just go down there and hire him and find out what color he was or how old he was. I'm not going to hire a musician unless it's somebody I know. I think that that's the responsibility of each and every individual, to just try to make your own mark somewhere. If you can get with somebody and meet somebody, and if you can impress somebody, I think that that impression will sort of go along with you, it will stick up with you. It helps to identify yourself. How do people call you for jobs? They've got to know you. And if nobody knows you, then you've got to get out and meet somebody. I mean, it's not simple, but simply it seems to me that's the proper solution. If somebody just called me up and says, "Get so-and-so, he's great," I would say, "Well, maybe in your opinion he's great. He might not mean a thing to me. On whose opinion do you base your assumption? Or for that matter, on whose assumption do you base your opinion?" [laughter]


Isoardi

Were there any other problems that stick out in your mind that you had to resolve after you joined?


Douglass

Oh, I don't know. We've still got all kinds of


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problems, and we're still trying to resolve them. But I don't know. I mean even today I guess we run into some things that could appear racial. And they could be, because people can't help being people, you know. So there's a lot of stuff that exists. None of that really has any great bearing, to this day, on the Central Avenue thing. You're trying to research what happened on Central, so that's another thing altogether. However, we're still talking about union, and we're the same guys, and we're over here.


Isoardi

How long was it before you guys started running for office at Local 47?


Douglass

At Local 47?


Isoardi

I mean, you said you were going to be just part of the membership and see what happens.


Douglass

Well, I can't name exactly. I know that Marl Young was the first one of any of us to hold what you call a major office. There had been instances where I know Buddy Collette and I think Marl and a lot of them started off by just running for a position on the board of directors. I cannot tell you exactly when that happened or how long we were over there before they got into it. I mean, the elections are held every two years. An odd year is an election year, even though we— Like this is '90. In other words, we will vote in December of an even year to


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determine who's going to take office in January of the other. So we came over here in '53. The exact month, I don't know. I guess you would have to research that. But I do know it happened in the year of '53. I can't say for sure whether that happened at the very first election that we were there and that we were eligible. We were eligible, naturally, from the very beginning. I can't really say for sure. Marl Young himself could probably give you a lot more. He kind of stayed up on those things. My interest was playing music, you know.


Isoardi

Was he sort of the first, then, from old 767 to hold office?


Douglass

Yeah, to really hold an office.


Isoardi

Now, when was the first time you held an office in Local 47?


Douglass

I took office in 1985.


Isoardi

So you had a thirty-year layoff from union office.


Douglass

Oh, yeah. They had talked to me many times, like, "Do this and that" or "Would you be a business rep?" I did not want to be bothered with anything that was going to prohibit me from playing my instrument, such as my job does now. I began to look at it more and more. I mean, it's been a nice thing. I've hung on to it all this time, and, I mean, I enjoy trying to do something. I want


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to try to be helpful. And I guess I sort of had—I don't know whether you call it a false notion or what—that maybe by getting into office like this, I could represent musicians and try to do something to help make the field better for all of them. However, I just don't feel like I'm really accomplishing that. I mean, there's an awful lot of politicking and so much stuff that goes on and a lot of the stuff that I feel is very unnecessary. I don't like to get into just what it is, but I just have some very ill feelings about it. I still stay there, and I try to do the best I can. I try to be as helpful to people as I possibly can, and I think the majority of them will bear me out in that. They feel like I'm the type of guy who really takes the thing to heart. I really do want to help people in whatever way I can. And I'm very honest with them. I mean, if I feel like it's not going to be advantageous to them to belong to this union and whatnot, I'll be the first to say so. As far as my musical career and the fact that those laws still exist that say, because I hold an office and have a salaried position, that it would be wrong for me to get out in the field and compete with my members— But that's just an old, old thing that's there, and it's still there.


Isoardi

So you can't play?


Douglass

I'm not allowed to play. No.



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Isoardi

Really?


Douglass

Yeah. Now, a lot of people get into these offices, I mean, they're content. I like my position, for one thing, for the sake of my wife [Deloris Seals Douglass], my family, and this and that. I enjoy the idea that I get a paycheck every week. That didn't always happen when I was playing music. I mean, it would happen for a while in certain instances where, say, I'm going along, and I'm very fortunate, and I've got a little work going, but the work always did come and go. I mean, it was the type of life I've grown very accustomed to. But now just the idea of living in a house and trying to keep a house up and the way the bills and things mount, I mean, I feel very thankful that I'm able to pay my bills. I really don't know what I would do if I got into a position where I didn't have the paycheck coming in every week.

However, I have to tell you that I'm seriously thinking about quitting, getting out of it, because of my music. I mean, my music is my first love, and I feel like this job, the way it's set up, it's really musical suicide. I mean, I've got my instrument, as you know, in my office. I figured, well, I can practice and keep up. I try to do a little teaching on Saturday just for the sake of keeping my hand in it and so forth and so on, because if that didn't happen, I probably would never even pick up my


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sticks. I did a little rehearsal with a group yesterday while on office time. I just want to start trying to do more and more things like that. The little jam session I'm telling you about, I intend to get over there, if I possibly can. I mean, it's a matter of utmost necessity, as far as I'm concerned. I don't practice a lot at home, because, I don't know, when you come in the evenings after a hard day, you don't feel really energetic or hyped up to the point that you want to sit down and practice. You certainly can't study and concentrate. And then, there's such a little thing— Well, I mean, I have my little household chores and things. Those things have to be done. Those things are all interruptions. See what I mean?


Isoardi

Could you play outside of the area of jurisdiction of Local 47?


Douglass

Not really. I'm not supposed to.


Isoardi

Really? You cannot play at all anywhere. I mean, you couldn't even go to Europe?


Douglass

No. Well, if I did that, I would have to take a leave of absence. If I could take a leave of absence, if I got an offer, I mean, I would just give that a try. I'd challenge it and see what happens.


Isoardi

You know, if somebody said, "Well, I've got a one-month tour of Western Europe lined up, big band, you


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know, I want you to drum," you couldn't take that without taking a leave of absence?


Douglass

I think I would have to challenge it. I'd have to find out what's happening and tell them, "Well, this is what I want to do." You know, I was hired to play at the last [American Federation of Musicians] convention, which was this past year, in Nashville. There is a fellow by the name of Ernie Lewis, who is the bandleader for the Tempo, which is the AFM band. That band plays at all the convention functions—dance music or jazz music or whatever you want to call it. It's a good-sized band, and it's made up of members or people who are delegates from all the locals around the country. I was asked to come up and play drums with them this past year, and it looks like I'm going to be asked again. That was great, because that meant I went up there to Nashville and had eight straight days of playing, rehearsing and then playing engagements. And then, while I was there, I began to get acquainted with, in the hotel— They had some good musicians in Nashville. Now, I'm not talking about [country and] western musicians. I'm talking about people who— So like every night, when I got through playing for the convention, which is early, after dinnertime, we would walk through the bar area and get in there and sit and play. And, boy, that was enjoyable. Yeah. It was an enjoyable trip. I took my


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wife with me on that trip, and we had one of the most wonderful times that I can remember for many years. Of course, in that instance, nobody challenged it, because the federation paid me. What they did is just pay my transportation, you know, plane fare, hotel bill, and then gave me so much money per diem for expenses. Of course, naturally, I still draw my salary here, so it didn't hurt anything at all.


Isoardi

So that was a major factor, then, after the amalgamation, keeping you from running for office, then, this law.


Douglass

Yeah, that's one reason why I didn't want in office. I just stayed out of it. At the time that I took it, it was because it was an opportunity. I didn't know how I would lay with it or how long I'd want to stay with it or what the whole thing would be, but I got into it mainly because there was a faction that was running that was trying to get another faction out of office. And when they sort of got among themselves and searched themselves— I didn't know the people, you know, the— [Bernie] Fleischer [president of Local 47], I didn't even know him, never heard of him. Buddy Collette was on the board already, and he approached me, and so did several of them. And the retired president, Max Herman, approached me, and they told the people, "Well, if you want to win


203
this election, you've got to have a good black man for one of the offices." So I was the "good black man" that they found that they needed on their ticket to make their ticket strong. And sure, we got in. In '85, or December of '84, for the '85 term, well, then we swept all offices. So, since then, we've been there. We're just completing our third term, and we haven't been challenged by anyone, except that I was challenged for my office this last time. I won by a vast majority, but somebody did challenge me. However, I think that this coming year there's going to be an awful lot of opposition of some sort or another. They've been working steadily at that. They are all especially opposed to the president. And things are just going down in such a way [that] I feel like, if I run again—and I probably will, unless something else turns up that I can sink my teeth into—I will not be a party to anybody's ticket. I don't want to be on anybody's particular side. I just want to run on my own and show people that I can run independently and still win. Now, if I can't, well, then, that will just be too bad.



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Tape Number: V, Side One
March 3, 1990

Isoardi

Last time we pretty throughly covered the amalgamation of the two unions [American Federation of Musicians Local 767 and Local 47] and your discussion of it. I guess we're getting close to the end of the story and wrapping up with some general comments. Before we get into that, let me ask you what you thought the impact of the amalgamation was on 767 and its membership, looking back now, and how you think it affected Local 47 and its members. Do you have any general thoughts on that?


Douglass

Oh, I don't know. I don't know if I can just answer that question outright.


Isoardi

It's a big one.


Douglass

I do know that, at the time that we started the amalgamation, we, as black musicians in our organization, pushed this thing so thoroughly, and it gained nationwide publicity, because it was the start of a movement all over the country. In other words, we finally broke up that complete thing in the federation about separate locals for black and white throughout the federation.


Isoardi

So your amalgamation was a first.


Douglass

It was the first. And it's responsible for the fact that there is no more, or supposedly no more, discrimination of that sort within the AFM [American


205
Federation of Musicians] at all.


Isoardi

So in a number of other cities in the country, then, other dual locals followed your path.


Douglass

They had to, yes. In fact, we made it law. When we fought this thing, we just put it up to the point that that's what they had to do. I mean, things were happening at that particular point. We were all over everywhere. I guess the Martin Luther King [Jr.] thing was going on and just about any and everything, all of the various black organizations and things of that sort. I'm not an authority on this, but this is what was going on. It became a very unpopular thing.


Isoardi

When you say you made it law, you mean it became part of the AFM's rules that there would be no separate unions?


Douglass

Besides our local bylaws, we have national bylaws, which is the American Federation of Musicians throughout the United States and Canada. They have all sorts of things, antidiscriminatory this and antidiscriminatory that, but it was also a bylaw, a law. A bylaw is a law of the American Federation of Musicians that, in the cities where they're designated, no white musician could belong to a black local and vice versa. No black musician could belong to the white local. They had them separate like that. That was true in several cities,


206
like Chicago. I know it was true in San Francisco, and there were a lot of others. Those are the ones that I'm most conscious of. So anyway, what we did was we had to attack that thing, and we got that erased from the American Federation bylaws. Right after that, then the amalgamation-type thing started to take place all over the federation, all over the country.

While I don't pretend to be an authority on just what the things are, I've learned a lot of things since I've been in this office right here. I didn't know what they meant by a black delegate when we went to the convention. I said, "Well, heck, we did away with all that. You know, in our thing, we said, `Well, we will have no black delegates.'" That if anybody from 767, after we made the move over there, which we were— We were something like six hundred people, and it was a very popular movement. Like we almost won this vote thing going away.

So we made it a fact that, when we went over there, I relinquished my office, which was vice president of 767. There was Marl Young. He was on the board of directors. Buddy Collette, board of directors, and all of us decided that, when we finally amalgamated, we would not take any— They wanted to designate certain offices for you. In other words, "Okay, you're over here, but now you'll be in control of the black population." And we said, "No, none


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of that." They said, "You're relinquishing your offices. Don't you want to hold office while you're over here?" We said, "Well, if one of us becomes inclined to go that way, well, we'll just get into your regular elections and get elected like anybody else. But we don't want to be designated anything one way or another." So that's the way we did it.

This didn't necessarily happen in the rest of the locals who went through the same thing, like in the case of San Francisco and a few others. Now, they attacked this thing with the federation to the point that, in order to wipe their faces clean and whatnot, they finally said, "We will not have this anymore within our organization. From now on, such and such a local will amalgamate or they will join or this one will dissolve and join the other." The black locals were forced to join the white locals in the same town. And it wasn't the most popular thing in all of them, at least from my understanding. What they did is, when they amalgamated or dissolved one local— I noticed there are some locals, like in San Francisco, I think— I forget the name of the local, but it's Local 10 plus something else, 300 and so-and-so, which means that there were two locals, and they're still identified by the fact that the two of them were put together.

While the convention does not have any provisions for


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a black local, therefore a black local would send black delegates to the convention. Well, then, all of a sudden, when I got in office over here, I heard that term "black delegate." I said, "What is this bit?" "Oh, it says they're sending the black delegate to the—" I said, "Well, what is this all about? We never knew any such thing existed." I found out many years later, since I've been here in my capacity at 47, that they allowed them a black delegate in the case of the locals who did not integrate voluntarily. In other words, it became a forced thing. For some reason or another, they came up with a little special recommendation for them.


Isoardi

I see. So there were a certain number of offices or positions that were set aside?


Douglass

Yeah. In other words, all of the so-called amalgamations didn't happen exactly the same as ours did. But the main thing is we did get that wiped off of the national bylaws. So we did away with that, and that was appropriate.


Isoardi

About this time, were you being contacted by some of these other locals throughout the country as to what was going on or how they could do it? Did they come to you guys for advice or anything like that?


Douglass

Well, yes. I'd say that they did. I'm not saying that I was necessarily— I do remember some


209
instances. I don't know. We used to get, oh, I don't know, people in the news media and this and that, they'd come to us and ask us this and that and— I don't know. We were just busy getting our thing done here, you know.


Isoardi

But you didn't have calls, say, from the Chicago locals or Cleveland locals or San Francisco locals, saying, "What are you guys doing? We like it. How do you go about doing it?" Things like that?


Douglass

Yeah. I'm sure we did. However, they all had their own ideas about it. Not all of them were just throughly anxious to just follow the same path that we were. They didn't know what the situation was.

Like I say, there were locals who were against it, just like in our local. We had people who were deathly against it. Some of the people who were against it were some of our best-loved people. Like our president at that time [Leo Davis]—he was our opponent. Florence Cadrez, who was the one who did the— Well, she was the recording secretary, as they called her. She was against it. Paul Howard was one the most popular, one of the most well loved people in the world. I love him like a father today, but he was against it. So we were opponents. And then, on top of that, even though we ran people, when we ran for elections, even though we ran people for the top offices up there, we never could unseat those three people, no matter


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what. Yet everybody was in favor of the amalgamation. I mean, we ran Benny Carter for president, and he didn't make it. We ran Buddy Collette another year for president, and he didn't make it, strictly because Mr. Leo Davis— "Well, what's the poor old pres going to do? We're going to take his job away from him." So there they are. People are voting in favor of this thing, yet they weren't in favor of doing away with these people's jobs. Well, they did maintain their jobs until such time as it actually happened, and then, of course, there was no job then.


Isoardi

What happened to these people?


Douglass

Well, Florence Cadrez, for one, and Paul Howard, especially, were offered positions within the Local 47 organization, which is loaded with all kinds of offices and, at that time, many, many positions—this person under that one and so forth and so on. So they were offered jobs which they were qualified to handle. So that went on. I didn't keep up with them very closely. I was busy out trying to play music. But I did see Paul Howard down there. He kept track of all of our records, and he was the one who notified me at the time that I had served my— You know, we didn't lose any of that tenure from our time over in 767 when we came. That was one of the things. When you become a member of 47, it's as though you were a member from the time that you first joined 767, if you follow what


211
I'm talking about. So I know he was the one who informed me, because he had all of the records when they brought all the records across town. He notified me when I had become a thirty-year member. And many of us were the same way. We were quite young fellows, too. All of a sudden, after thirty years, you attain what you call life membership, which is absolutely free of charge. It isn't quite like that anymore. That's been reversed a bit. Except that the life members we have, they have what you call a life membership status now, which simply means that you don't pay the amount of dues that the regular members pay. But you do have to pay a portion of it.


Isoardi

So Paul Howard, then, got his job with 47 and stayed there for quite some time.


Douglass

Yeah, I don't know. One minute he was working in the mailroom and then other things. I mean, he was always there, and he assisted, I guess, to a certain extent, in the membership and the financial status, just kind of helping to keep the records and things straight. And then, at one time, then, he finally became the administrator of our credit union. And to this day—I mean, we have other people connected—he's the only black administrator that we've ever had in our credit union.


Isoardi

What about Leo Davis? Did he retire or—?


Douglass

Well, Leo Davis just remained very inactive.


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He's still around today. I went to visit him very recently. Through an action of our own, we decided we were going— We had a— That was last year we had a— Every year we have a membership meeting, at which time we try to honor a life member of the past or present or what have you, for whatever reason. But then we decided, at this particular meeting, which was last year—that was in January of '89— through myself and a few of the other fellows who were on the board and who were members of the other local, we brought up the name Leo Davis. Everybody else asked the same question that you did: "Well, who is Leo Davis?" We said, "Well, he's just like some of the other people we've honored. He's the last living president of Local 767." "Well, gee," you know, so forth and so on. So then we decided, well, we would just honor him on that particular day. We went out and we got together a gigantic— I've got photographs of all this stuff. That meeting is one of the last meetings where we had a quorum. A quorum is when you bring enough people— Well, the minimum for a quorum, you have to have 150 members to come to a regular membership meeting. Even though we had the band, the entertainment, and then we had like a buffet set up and everything— You try to make a real nice gathering. And then, when you have a quorum, well, then you're able to conduct union business for the entire membership.


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We did that same thing just this last Tuesday, which was February 26. We did the same thing. What they were doing was posthumously honoring Don Linder, who was not the president but the administrator of the credit union, and had been for many, many years. He was kind of elderly in age, and then he passed away just recently. So we decided to do that with him. We had a big band. We had supposedly an all-female band, which is Ann Patterson's—


Isoardi

Oh, yeah.


Douglass

You've heard of her, the Maiden Voyage.


Isoardi

Maiden Voyage.


Douglass

Yeah. Well, we did that this past Tuesday night. We had a big buffet, all the food and everything, and I think we had about forty-six people who showed up. So, I mean, we have trouble getting quorums.

But I only said that to say that, when we did honor the past president of 767, and, therefore, we were honoring all of the former members of 767 who happened to still be in the neighborhood or in the vicinity or who happened to still be with us, well, that's the last time we had a crowd. It was a quorum. In other words, when you have a quorum, that's what you call an official crowd. The thing like we had the other night is not an official crowd. It's just a matter of record that they came out and they tried to have a good time and what have you.



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Isoardi

Did Leo Davis come over to 47 and work in any capacity?


Douglass

No, no. He never did. That's what I said. He didn't. There were three officers. I mean, he was president, and then Paul Howard, who was considered a financial secretary over there, and then Florence Cadrez, who was the recording secretary. I guess that would be equivalent to what we call, in our local right now, the treasurer, which is my position, and then the secretary. We have a treasurer and a secretary of the union. A lot of locals have those two positions combined. They call you a secretary-treasurer. However, because of the fact that we have a lot more members than most locals, I just don't see any one of us like holding down the job of two offices like that. So anyway, Leo has just been around. I mean, I've associated with him because one of—

Well, I told you about the Clef Club, which is the organization made up of basically the older fellows who are left over from 767. We still get together. I have a club meeting tomorrow afternoon. And Leo, I saw him quite a bit. He attended a number of these meetings, and, of course, he was always in attendance at our annual jazz festival, which will be happening on May 20 this year.


Isoardi

I've already marked it in my book.


Douglass

Well, okay. And then, we have a little thing


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where we entertain ourselves. After we get through with all of the Christmas festivities and whatnot, well, then, in the early weeks of January, we usually get together, and we have a dinner party. This dinner party is the time when we take the proceeds from our annual jazz festival and buy scholarships for people who we've researched and found to be deserving students, to help them with their career. As a club, we've done a great service to a lot of people. Our festivals are always very successful. We've raised quite a bit of money, and we've been able to help a lot of people, to advance them in their careers, in their training and what have you. So that's what we call scholarships.


Isoardi

So the Clef Club, then, is pretty much an organization of old 767 musicians.


Douglass

Yeah, that's right.


Isoardi

How far back does it go? When did it start?


Douglass

Well, I don't know. From what I understand— I never paid a lot of attention. I knew that I used to attend these things from time to time. It's been going on about twenty-four years. They've been doing things with that regularity. It's the thing that everybody just looks forward to seeing happen, and they all show up for it. It's a success in spite of itself.


Isoardi

It's a hell of a bash! [laughter]


Douglass

Yeah. So Leo has been around all this time, but


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now he's quite elderly, and he's sort of incapacitated to a certain extent. A few little ailments. So he doesn't get out very often. I received my little mailing today. I can show you the mailing from the Clef Club that's announcing the fact that there is a meeting tomorrow. And then, they have a list of the guys who are ailing and who want you to keep in touch with them so you can call and say hello, drop by and visit. Of course, Leo Davis is on that list. He's been on that list for quite some time. However, I did go over to see him. He did come out. One of the few times he's been out, he came out for the meeting that we had in his honor. And then, I saw him at our Christmas party. We call it a Christmas party, the thing that happens in the early part of January. That's a little dinner banquet that we give for the club members and their guests. He was there for that. I guess he just makes an effort to do what he calls the very special occasions. Otherwise, he doesn't try to get out very much.

So I have been in touch with him. Well, I handle the relief committee at the union. What we do on the relief committee, we get together and that's what we try to do. We try to contact all the people who are disabled or incapacitated for some reason or another, and then we try to come up with ways to benefit them, help them to get their dues paid. In many instances, we do little monthly


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cash payments. Nothing very large or significant, but something that just sort of helps them along in order to try to do this. Leo is on that list, and so, for that reason, I have been in touch with him off and on for quite a bit of the time.


Isoardi

Do you know much about his background as a musician on Central Avenue?


Douglass

There are a lot of guys who would know more, and I can't say that I know. All I know is that I was around there, I was a young fellow, a young kid coming up, and I knew that at one time or another he was a saxophone player and he led a band. I never worked with him myself, but there were a number of fellows—I imagine Buddy Collette and a few of the others—who would know a lot more about him. But I'm sure, as you talk with the other fellows, you'll learn a lot about him.


Isoardi

Let me ask you. You mentioned earlier that the bylaws of the AFM were changed pretty much, eliminating the dual locals. How did you go about accomplishing that? Was that something that was done at a convention, that you guys pushed through a change in the bylaws? Or was it just something that pretty much the leadership of the AFM recognized as happening and simply changed the bylaws? Did they propose it themselves? Or was there any kind of struggle to get that changed?



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Douglass

I don't think there was— The biggest struggle took place here. We were going about the process of creating an amalgamation. I told you that we finally brought it to a vote in our local, and it had to be brought to a vote in 47. There were a lot of people who were opposed to it. The people who were in opposition— I told you about how, because of what we were doing, we tried to seek the help of the NAACP [National Association for the Advancement of Colored People], and they turned away from us out of fear, just pure fear. So these kind of things. I thought we were up against tremendous odds.

Then we had the vote that this was supposed to happen, and at the same time, when the federation tried to intervene— You know, [James C.] Petrillo was the president of the federation at that time. He was going to send Herman Kenin, his right-hand man, the fellow who later became president after Petrillo— He was going to send him out here to oversee our election. Marl Young and myself were on the phone. We told him, "We want you to know that if your guy comes here, we'll welcome him, but we want him to come here and keep his mouth shut. This is our local, and this is what we're trying to do." And, of course, it was really a battle. It was a fight. During the course of the fight, we made it known that we would either accomplish this amalgamation, or then we were just going to keep our


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own little local, and then we were going to be in direct competition with the white local. And by doing this—


Isoardi

So you're trying to recruit black members, then.


Douglass

No, no, no. By doing this, we were going to attack the part of the bylaws that said we couldn't take in white members, and we were going to take white members in. Our rate was much lower than 47, so we thought we would have been very attractive. Plus, there were an awful lot of guys, the jazz kids, white and whatnot, or Latino or whatever they happened to be, well, they were all very anxious to join our local. And so we would have become— To this day, I almost wish that we had gone the other way. [laughter] I think the whole scene would be interesting, to this day.

This is what we had, and this is what we were going to do, and then, when anybody tried to stop us, then we were going to have grounds to really attack that thing. I think they saw through that, so, someway or another, I don't think it was a real battle. I think they just squashed it. Petrillo, he's a hard man himself. When you see the handwriting on the wall, they finally decide which is the best way to go.


Isoardi

So as a result of your battle, then, they more or less went about changing the bylaws, because they could see what was going to be coming up, anyway.



220
Douglass

Yeah. They could see it, because we were going to attack it all the way. So it was really a matter of not just fighting against us, but it was a matter of not letting an attack be directed at them.


Isoardi

You mentioned this alternate strategy you were thinking about pursuing. Is that something all you guys agreed on? That if this wasn't going to work, then you were going to start taking in white members?


Douglass

Oh, yeah.


Isoardi

That was something you guys were set to do.


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

And Local 47 must have known it, then. That was really clear.


Douglass

Oh, yeah. We made it clear to the federation. There's no way in the world 47 didn't know it. And there was a faction in 47 that wanted the amalgamation. Well, all those guys, you know, we all worked together, we mingled together, we had meetings together. Yeah, it was a combined effort of the black and the white musicians.


Isoardi

It doesn't sound like it would have taken you long to develop the biggest union.


Douglass

Oh, yeah. But it did take us a long time. In other words, there were obstacles. We just had to overcome these little obstacles. Then, finally, we just got it moving. We were just like a steamroller. And when we


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threw that gigantic party, I mean, Benny Carter used his expertise, and he had that big thing at the [Club] Alabam, the Nat King Cole Trio and— I want to tell you about Nat King Cole in a few minutes, too.


Isoardi

Oh, good.


Douglass

Yeah, I've got thoughts about that. But anyway, we just finally gathered so much momentum. We had all the supporters. That was one of the biggest shows ever put on. It just made everybody conscious of what was happening. It was the way to go.


Isoardi

That had publicity. The media covered that?


Douglass

Oh, yes.


Isoardi

Well, I guess that's most of the questions I had on the amalgamation that I wanted to follow up with. Do you have any other thoughts on the amalgamation? Anything we didn't cover or mention that you think are important to remember about that? About the unions then?


Douglass

I don't know. It seems to me that I told you all about how we oversaw the thing. I think I mentioned the city of Oxnard and how significant that was. I don't know. I guess there will always be things. I can't think of anything offhand, but there will always be other phases or other stories about it, things that pop up.


Isoardi

But pretty much the main outline is pretty well sketched out.



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Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

So what was the Nat King Cole story, then?


Douglass

Well, did you see the special on TV last night? Did you know about that?


Isoardi

No.


Douglass

The Nat King Cole— It was advertised. It was kind of built up and this and that on [KCET] Channel 28. What is that? Is that the public channel?


Isoardi

Yeah.


Douglass

That must be it, because in between they were really— It was like a telethon. They were—


Isoardi

Oh, the pledge drive.


Douglass

Yeah, trying to hustle the pledges and all this kind of bit. It was a very beautiful story. You know, they told the story of Nat King Cole and he this and he that. Well, you know, he was one of ours: 767, Los Angeles, Central Avenue. I mean, he was one of those on the scene. That was the thing that I was very disappointed about in the program last night, because they just told about him as a singer. I mean, I noticed that they always had the big band behind him, Nelson Riddle or whoever in the world it was, and then sometimes the big band supplemented his trio or whatever he was carrying with him during the time that they photographed it. I looked on the screen, and I recognized the guitar player, Irving Ashby,


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who was with the trio. He left us, oh, maybe two or three years ago. And then, last year, we lost Joe Comfort, the bass player. I saw him in there. They weren't even mentioned.

And then, on top of that, the thing that gets me is they didn't go back far enough, because right here in Los Angeles, among his peers of musicians, we looked upon Nat as just the greatest thing that ever happened around here. And the rest of his trio, his original trio, which is Oscar Moore—everybody knows who Oscar Moore is—one of the world's greatest guitarists ever. And then, their original bass player was Wesley Prince from right out of here. The thing that broke that part of it up was that Wesley had to go away in the service during World War II. He was replaced by Johnny Miller, the bass player who stayed with him the rest of the way, all through his thin years. When he succeeded at first, it was with his trio. It was the Nat King Cole Trio. I mean, terrific musicians. The rest of us guys around here worshipped them. They were the greatest things that we knew. So they were making it as a trio, and when they were the King Cole Trio they were— I don't know why the words escape me— They were equal, you know, not a leader and two men. Oh, God, it's a shame I don't think of the word I want to use [co-op], but it's a simple thing. But anyway, that's what


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they were. They were a trio. And we were the people who used to go to the clubs where Nat played, and when he'd get two or three drinks and whatnot, then we finally coaxed him into singing a couple choruses of the blues. We liked his little old style, you know. He was actually sort of inhibited about singing, but maybe, after a couple of drinks or so, you could get him to do it.


Isoardi

So he never sang with his trio, then? It was straight instrumental pretty much.


Douglass

This is when he started singing with the trio. No, they were instrumentalists, and famous among musicians and the rest of us. I know that because that bass, guitar, and piano sound became the familiar thing in almost all the little trios around town and everywhere else. All patterned themselves after the King Cole Trio. Even the great Art Tatum, who was the greatest pianist who ever lived, probably who ever will live, well, he got a trio together. He had the same thing; he added the bass and guitar. He added Slam Stewart and Tiny Grimes, bass and guitar. Everybody was on that kick. It seemed like all the trios were that way. I worked in a number of trios that carried that sound, except, in my case, I was fortunate that they added the drum to kind of tighten the rhythm thing up a little bit. Nat King Cole's trio did a lot of novelty things with the three of them. They did a


225
little, not harmony singing, but they'd sing the little catchy tunes in unison, the little tricky tunes with the instrumentals mixed in with it. Then, of course, we'd say, "Hey, Nat! Come on, do one." You know, everybody. It got kind of popular.

And then, all of a sudden— Well, first thing they made, they made a little trio instrumental. It was kind of an instrumental record, but with the three of them singing, you know, "Straighten Up and Fly Right," right? Then Nat took the little solo lines in there. That's the thing that started it off. Pretty soon, they decided, well, he'd sing a ballad and this and that, and pretty soon, as the thing got going and he started to really make it, then the producers or whoever they are, they all got onto him. They made him a star. They were going to, like, it was X and X amount of dollars, and "We'll give the guys so and so and so and so." That's the reason why that trio broke up. You know it was— They're working together as a unit. Everybody's splitting the money, and it's going down the same way. They made a success together, and now, all of a sudden, they just single this one out. The same thing happened with the— What was the name of the group that Diana Ross was in?


Isoardi

Oh, the Supremes.


Douglass

The Supremes. Yeah. You know, then it was


226
Diana Ross and the Supremes. And pretty soon it's Diana Ross. Who needs the Supremes? So that's the way things go. Big business. I mean, they glamourized Nat, and they gave him voice lessons and vocal coaching and helped him with his— I guess they had him practicing in front of mirrors for the way he's supposed to look, how he presented himself.


Isoardi

Making him more mainstream.


Douglass

They made more of a big thing of that TV show that he was on, the Nat King Cole Show. That was a thing that nobody really accepted. They had a lot of trouble with that. At that particular time, he was just a star, and he carried a little group around for his own accompaniment. The original guys were gone. They were replaced by Irving Ashby and Joe Comfort. We said, "Well, gee, that's nice," because I know they made good money. I mean, as far the groups that traveled around at that time, the figures that they were getting were superior in those days. It wouldn't look like an awful lot today, but that's the way things have changed. So there they were. They were in the group, and it went on and on and on. But then, finally, it just got to the place where it was just another good job as far as guys going around the country. In the case of Joe Comfort and Irving Ashby, I was right here when they finally left the group. Then, the other guys who


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replaced them— The last guitarist was John Collins. You've heard of him.


Isoardi

Yeah, sure.


Douglass

Well, he was the last guitarist with the group. And then, by that time, they had— Oh, as I saw on the TV last night, you know, he had a conga drummer at that time. Jack Costanzo worked with that thing. So they formed a little bit of a quartet. And then, after that period ended, when he got this last group together—and they showed a portion of that—well, then Lee Young was on drums for that. That's Lester Young's brother. He was on drums. I don't recall just who the bass player was, but I do know that John Collins was the guitarist at that particular time. But they missed the whole boat. I mean, when they started this Nat King Cole Story on TV last night, hell, they picked him up at the height of his career. And they went on through to when he got sick and when he passed away, but they didn't—


Isoardi

Terrible.


Douglass

I mean, he could not have made it without those other guys. That's how it happened.


Isoardi

So he was really a product of Central.


Douglass

Oh, yes.


Isoardi

And all of his musicians.


Douglass

Yeah.



228
Isoardi

And it's interesting. You guys, in the after hours or whatever, actually had to coax him to sing.


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

I mean, he was really reluctant to do it.


Douglass

Yeah. You know, we'd go on the job where the trio was working. At that particular time, I was on the good job. I was at Earl Carroll's Theatre Restaurant, and after we played a forty-five minute dance set, well, then this big show started. We were probably free for two hours or so. Nat was working right around the corner at the Radio Room on Vine Street there. Well, gee, we'd just run in there and say, "Let's go down and have a couple of drinks and listen to Nat." We always listened to him because he played so fantastically. And then, if you hung around him long enough and drinks and this and that, and you see him kind of enjoying himself, then he'd loosen up, and then he'd sing the blues for us. We'd say, "Gee, that cat sure has got a good style." [laughter] Yeah, you know. Somebody else finally recognized the fact that he had a good style, and bam!, they made a record, and then that record sold, and then, after that, you'd go in a store and say, "Well, just give me a pound of King Cole records." [laughter] You didn't care what they were. Yeah.

I can remember— I mean, like all the things that they


229
played on TV, they were all great hits, the things that were vocal, with the full accompaniment, the strings and all that, and then the little bits he did in the movies and all those kind of things, and the calypso-type things. Well, he was versatile. He did a little bit of everything. And they made a little mention of the fact that he was a piano player, and he did this, and blah, blah, blah. I don't know, but—


Isoardi

Too bad.


Douglass

I thought they missed the whole point. I mean, they missed this guy's entire life.


Isoardi

I bet most people who know of Nat King Cole don't know that the guy was a great jazz pianist.


Douglass

Well, that's what I'm saying, that they have to keep telling people about that. I mean, he was one of the world's greatest jazz pianists. He was one of Art Tatum's favorite piano players. And that was one of the reasons why Art patterned his little trio, with the guitar and bass and piano— That's what all the trios were at that particular time. Even Oscar Peterson. After that, he came up with a trio. For a long time, his trio was Ray Brown on bass, and then he had Barney Kessel on guitar, and then he had Herb Ellis on guitar. Then, when Art Tatum used to go around Central Avenue and came down to catch Red [Callender] and Gerry [Gerald Wiggins] and I working at the


230
Turban Room on Central Avenue, and he would sit in— I think I told you all about that. Then, when he sat in, well, then, the next time he came to town at the Radio Room to take a steady gig here in town and use a trio, he didn't use the bass and guitar. He liked so much what he was doing down there on the avenue with us that, when he called me for the job, he said he wanted to try something else. He said it was a little more relaxing. He said he felt like he had a little more freedom working with a good drummer behind him, because then he didn't have to go through a lot of rehearsal working out all those little intricate things with the thirds between him and the guitar. Now he can just do whatever he wants to do whenever he feels like it, and he's got a good, steady rhythm section and everybody behind him. And that's what happened. And so, as soon as that happened, well, then that sort of changed the whole picture and the whole outlook, because, next thing I knew, Oscar Peterson hired Ed Thigpen and did away with the guitar. You see what I mean? So here we go again, you know.


Isoardi

Well, between Tatum and Nat King Cole, those were the styles.


Douglass

Yeah. Well, that's it. They set the pattern, and everybody else kind of went along that way.


Isoardi

You mentioned the problems with that Nat King


231
Cole thing. There was a short thirty-minute thing [documentary film] that was also on public television called Ode to Central Avenue. I don't know if you saw that or not.


Douglass

No, I didn't see it.


Isoardi

You would never know that Central Avenue had all these clubs and great musicians.


Douglass

Oh, my goodness, yeah.


Isoardi

It was terrible. I couldn't believe it.


Douglass

Yeah, I've seen so many things they've done about Central. I've been all the way over to UCLA a number of years ago when they had some kind of Central Avenue thing. They had a bunch of guys up there. I don't think they even knew where Central Avenue was. [laughter] And the bands were integrated, but they were a little too well integrated. Because all those guys— They couldn't find Central Avenue if you gave them a map. [laughter] I mean, there's an awful lot of talk going on about it, like right now.


Isoardi

Yeah. It's getting hot.


Douglass

So now, all of a sudden, people are asking, "Well, what happened here? What happened there?" I'll tell one story, and another guy will tell you another story. But all these things happened.



232

Tape Number: V, Side Two
March 3, 1990

Isoardi

I guess, to wrap it up, Bill, I'd like to turn to some general things, see if you have any thoughts. First off, the recording industry. I guess at the time on Central Avenue, in terms of musicians getting recorded, you didn't have the major labels down there so much. You were dealing mostly with independent labels, smaller labels.


Douglass

Well, a little bit of both. We dealt with the major labels, yeah.


Isoardi

Could you talk a bit about what it was like down there as the musician getting recording gigs, what the conditions were like, what the pay was like, or who some of the labels were, some of the owners, etc.?


Douglass

Oh, well, let's see.


Isoardi

Or maybe you could talk about some of your own recording experiences and who you recorded for.


Douglass

Well, during the course of recording, depending on what was happening, there were a lot of the top rhythm and blues groups and things that were happening, and I guess some labels who did a lot of it— Well, there was John Dolphin. Dolphin [Records]. He was located right on Central Avenue. He was kind of a wheeler and dealer, you know, had his own record shop, and he would go out and then he'd pay you money to record music. I mean, you can ask


233
Red Callender about that, because we did an awful lot of things for John Dolphin. He had his own thing and studio— And a lot of times, if he didn't have his own studio, I mean, the guys with the money to work with, they'd go out and get the Capitol [Records] recording studio or the Radio Recorders, which was at 7000 Santa Monica Boulevard. There were all kinds of studios, and I guess they're available for just whoever would rent them or hire them in order to do their recordings. There was a company called Modern Records, which was operated by the Bihari brothers, and they were located in Culver City. But they had their own studio and everything. I mean, I know that I did things over there at that studio with Maxwell Davis as— Well, he was the main guy in charge of all the music over at Modern Records. He was a musician, tenor saxophone player, and an arranger and so forth, and he'd set up most of the dates. He was in charge of whatever went on. And I'm telling you, between myself and a fellow named Jessie Sailes, there was just a few guys, we had a very nice thing there. They just kept us busy working. You know, we were recording four and five times a week.


Isoardi

No kidding?


Douglass

Yeah. And then, on top of that, we were doing people like B. B. King, Jesse Belvin, the Platters, you know, all these people. They all came from somewhere.


234
All I know is a job is a job. "Well, what do you want to do? Who's it with? Blah blah blah." I'd get there. But I do remember these things happening. We made an awful lot of—

And we didn't just do it for them; we recorded for Capitol; we recorded for [RCA] Victor. And like all of those big companies, you know, there was no surprise that we recorded for them just as well. We didn't have to record for black companies, because that was the music that was going. Just like they did with Nat Cole and everything else, I mean, hell, they'd come over and get whatever it is they want. They made their own records and we recorded for them. There was really no great amount of difference in that. I mean, I have to say the union is not very influential in getting you any jobs at all. They still aren't. I'm ashamed of the union for this, but they still aren't. It's who you are and who you know and what happens with you, you know.


Isoardi

One of the things that always sort of impressed me about the [International] Longshoremen's [and Warehousemen's] Union was their hiring hall and the way they had control over the jobs and made sure things were distributed equally and fairly, etc.


Douglass

Well, [Local] 47, I know, even before, or when we first came over, they tried all sorts of things like that.


235
I mean, they had a quota system where they tried to stop a guy who was working too much from taking all the work. He could only accept so much work so that they could— That's bad. I mean, a guy can only do what he's physically able to do, and nobody can be in two places at the same time. I never did believe in that type of thing. If you're qualified and people want you, well, then, more power to you.


Isoardi

The type of recording you were doing for these labels, was it mostly popular? For instance, was Dolphin recording jazz? Or was he recording R and B?


Douglass

I would say it was R and B. We didn't call it rock in those days, but it was mostly the R and B thing. I mean, some R and B has a somewhat bluesier, jazzy flavor. But, anyway, there were all different types of things.


Isoardi

What about the majors? You mentioned Capitol and Victor. Were they coming down looking for you guys as sort of studio musicians for backup on popular tracks?


Douglass

Well, we weren't just known as studio musicians. I don't know. I don't remember. I never liked that term applied to me. I mean, I'd work in the studios and so forth. We always figured that—

Oh, we had a thing that happened, for instance, in the motion picture studios quite a while back. A guy I forget became a contract musician for one of the major motion


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picture studios. Well, that was what you called a staff contract musician. They sign a contract, you know. This is the guy who's going to work there for the next two years—every day, whatever happens. Now, they'll still bring in other— I've never had a job like that. But I would get called in for the extra work in the specialist-type things. You got paid well and good for what you did. Always, as young kids, we said, "Gee, if I could just get on staff somewhere. That's where the good money is; you don't have to work every day. All you do is just report in every day to find out if you're going to work tomorrow." After that, you could just go to the golf course and then— You know, they used to have a pretty nice thing. But through all of the things, the quota and this and that, and then trying to stop one guy from doing too much this and too much that and so forth, then the factions began to fight among themselves, as they're still doing.

I mean, that way another group—you can just read up on your history—called the Musicians Guild came up. And then, all of a sudden, they went to the Department of Labor, and then they won the right to represent the so-called musicians who were in the recording field. That's when the Musicians Guild got started. Then they won the right to represent them in the studio. Well, they got in there. When they got through with the studios, there were


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no jobs there for anybody. At the same time, I was working in the studios, I mean on a particular movie, and they tried to force me to join the guild. I said, "Well, I don't see any reason for that. I mean, I got the call anyway, and I'm already a member of 47. I'm paying my dues and taxes. I don't see why I have to join anywhere else. I'm already out here." So I didn't go along with it. And then, there was a thing when I was on recording dates and whatnot, there were some guys on the dates who belonged to the guild, and then I didn't go with the guild. They said, like "blah blah blah blah blah."

And then we had this Cecil Reed, who was in direct opposition to the factions at 47 at that particular time. They said all the guys volunteered to donate their recording checks for this date to the Cecil Reed fund. I said, "No, no. Mine belongs to my family, and that's where it's going." So we had all those kind of things. I mean, it's always been a kind of a sickening situation, a sickening proposition.


Isoardi

When was the guild started? Do you remember when that sort of began?


Douglass

I don't know. There's an awful lot of data down there. If you research it, you can find it out. All I know is it was a number of years ago.


Isoardi

But it was after you guys amalgamated?



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Douglass

Oh, yeah. This was after the amalgamation. That was another thing. I always felt that, when we were fighting for the amalgamation, well, here we're a bunch of black musicians, and there were a lot of white also— Like when I mentioned the steamroller thing, I mean, like, we were powerful. We got to a place where we could go in and do anything we wanted to. I wish we could have kept some of that. We could be out here fighting our own battles and this and that. Now, we got over here and we integrated— And what is integration? I don't know. It's like you take a bottle of chocolate milk and you mix it in with enough white milk, after a while, integration is an act of disappearing. [laughter] Yeah, all of a sudden, you know, "Oh, gee, we didn't know anybody over here was having any problems. We thought everything was okay." I don't know. In the cases of some people, yeah, a lot of us were working with the white bands and this and that. But everybody wasn't. So some of us were for a while, and there's a few guys, a lot more than myself, they got in this, they got a show here and this and that. So there was a certain amount of representation. The thing about it, when the racial issue came up, you know, "Gee, why don't they use any black guys on that show there?" And you check and there was a guy in there. So you got your "adequate" amount of representation. That was always the answer back


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to you.


Isoardi

Yeah. It sounds like, although you're certainly one of the leaders of the movement, there are some reservations about the benefits of the amalgamation.


Douglass

Yeah.


Isoardi

It wasn't a clear plus.


Douglass

Yeah. Well, like I'm trying to say, a few guys get going, and things are working all right for them, so, hell, they weren't concerned. I mean, a guy, it's happening with him, so he's working on this and that, so they're not concerned about the guy who's not doing anything. I mean, I know a couple of movements came up. There was an all-black movement that came up a few years ago. I attended some of those little meetings, but they weren't very well organized. You know, they tried to make a little noise, but they didn't have any— I guess they thought they had a purpose, but they had no real direction. So things just fizzle out, you know. We don't need that type of thing now. I don't think we need that type of thing from a black standpoint or a white standpoint.

But I do feel like in the case of the musicians who are not— Like I said, only a small minority of guys are actually doing the Recording Musicians Association, the RMA. That's another outfit that we have going right now,


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and there's a big political mess going on with them. But I don't want to miss my point. I'm just saying that, in the cases of the musicians, the fact is that I feel like, in the union, we're not really representing the people or getting a chance to represent them like we want to. There's a lot of activity going on, but there's still an awful lot of unrest. I mean, things are not being done to sort of help the guys along. Everybody's just making it the best way they can. And we do need to get a little bit of organization. Like I said, not a black movement or white movement, but just players in general to get together and then start to iron out, "Well, what is the problem? What's the problem you're having? What's the problem that guy's having? What is it you're dissatisfied about?" We all need to sit down and talk about it. Maybe we'll get some ideas. Maybe somebody will come up with a direction that we should go.


Isoardi

Did you think 767 did a better job of looking after the majority of its members?


Douglass

No, I don't think so. [laughter] No. No union ever does. [laughter] It's sad. I had my hassles in 767, too, and that's one reason why we wanted to get rid of it. [laughter] All the guys did was sit down there and play cards. I mean, the booking agent, you know, he'd sit in his office and book horses. [laughter] And he's the


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same business rep who went in with me to the service, the army, and when he was in the army he was a loan shark. [laughter] On top of that, we used to get the studio calls, like they're doing a movie out here, and they need so many so-and-so's and this and that, and sometimes they would call the black union because they needed like an all-black-type scene. Sometimes it was a jungle movie or whatever it is. But this would happen. So anyway, when the call came in, the business agent, he would call the guys up and say, "Do you want to make a movie?" like blah blah blah. He said, "Well, follow me." And he was on the job, too! [laughter]

So things like that are the reason why— It's like I am in my capacity. I'm not legally allowed to go out and play, to compete with the members. That's because of this type of thing that went on. I mean, a call comes in, a chance to put a bunch of musicians to work, here's a guy sitting down in the office, he gets paid already, but "Okay, blah blah blah," then he's going to be on the set, also.

And that's happened in a lot of locals, not just here. It's happened in a lot of places. I mean, when 47 took over all of this jurisdiction that we have right now— Our jurisdiction encompasses, as I told you, Riverside County and San Bernardino County. That takes you all the


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way to the Nevada border. There used to be a local there, a union there, and that's what happened with them. They had a president and officers and board of directors. Whenever a good job came in, well, then they all got together, and they went out and played it themselves. They never looked out for the members. It's just a shame that things are like that, but that's the way it is.


Isoardi

You mentioned you did a lot of R and B recording, and certainly, I guess, by the late forties, by the time R and B started coming in, L.A. was one of the centers of R and B.


Douglass

Oh, yeah.


Isoardi

And so many labels sprang up, etc. Do you remember what it was like when R and B started coming in on the avenue? Vis-à-vis, what's it like as a jazz musician to be confronted with something sort of different? Did it make jazz jobs harder to come by? Was there a kind of tension between being a jazz musician and an R and B musician?


Douglass

Well, I don't know. It just seemed to me like most of the R and B was happening on records. It seemed like you'd get more records like that, more than jazz record dates. There was a jazz record date here and there and now and then, but, of course, I was lucky enough to do those things because of the caliber of people that I worked


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with sometimes. In the clubs, there were some clubs that had jazz, but then the R and B was a quite— I guess it thrived, because it all depended on what the general public really bought. And it was no big deal, except that sometimes you didn't like to be bothered with playing behind the moaning and groaning singers and doing the old slap, you know, the afterbeat and this and that. We wanted to play the loose [Count] Basie style and this and that. However, a man who is a musician, who is a true musician, he's out to make a living. You don't make a big deal out of that. I mean, I have to say that I don't care what kind of music you're playing, all of it makes you a better jazz musician. All of it. I mean, I've played classical, I can play operas or what have you, I've played the society casuals, I've played marching band, I've played Latin, I've played just about a little bit of anything, you know. However, to me, a jazz musician is a guy who creates. He's creating continually. He's drawing from all of these resources. If I learn to play every kind of music there is, imagine the type of stuff that pops into my head when I get a chance to express myself. And I never know what I'm going to play. It all depends upon what the guy standing up in front of me does. Hopefully, he does something that inspires something in me, and then, next thing you know, we've come up with something. I don't know if this makes
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any sense to you.


Isoardi

No, it does. I see what you're saying.


Douglass

You know, I've never tried to stop and analyze, well, "Why this? Why that? Well, when did this and when did that?" Heck, we were just living from day to day and from year to year and taking just whatever comes.


Isoardi

Did you ever have a regular gig in an R and B group or anything like that? Do you stay pretty much playing jazz?


Douglass

No, sure. I mean, I played R and B groups. I played every kind of group you can think of. I've even been in rock groups. I've been on some good rock jobs that I just couldn't take any longer; I just left. Yeah. You know, we're talking about jazz versus the other things, like, okay, you strive to make a living.

I mean, I remember there was a spell when I had one, very good paying, I should say. It was out on Lankershim Boulevard. I forget the name of the place now. It was a burlesque house. And, boy, there's nothing more degrading or sickening than playing burlesque, you know, and watching the people who come in there. You're sitting here by the stage, and here's a girl up here doing the bumps and grinds, like this and that and so forth. You're just making all kinds of sound effects. Catch the bumps. Bam! And the crash. The groups we put together, we


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usually had a piano and a saxophone and a drummer. We didn't have the bass and the guitar and things that mellowed out the sound. You just carried on like that.

It was a very monotonous gig. You know, we'd start to play. We're going to pick this tune, we're going to play for this girl. She comes out there, and she walks around slowly. Gradually, she takes a little something off. And then, around about the second number, you're playing something a little brighter, and she's taking a little bit more of it off. And then, around about the final end of her twenty minutes, well, then she's dancing ninety miles an hour, and everything comes off, and blah blah blah, and then, bam, she's gone. And then, pretty soon a little of this and that, and then soon another girl comes out. So we start with the slow stuff. And then, we just work straight around. We're on the stand, and as soon as we were on the stand for forty-five minutes, well, then a comedian comes on and tells a few jokes while we get a chance to run outside and take a fifteen-minute break.

This would go on and on and on, but we got paid. As long as we took care of the business, we got paid. There was nothing to it. I mean, we had our little ups and downs with some of the people on the show and this and that. And this boss, he was very strict. I mean, the girls, they had their job. When they came off the stand, they went in the


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dressing room and then jumped into something for them there to come out and sit at the bar, because somebody's going to buy them a drink. He didn't allow them to drink. He was serving them iced tea or something. He made it look like a fancy thing.

Now, I'm just saying, that job would go on and on and on. And then, all of a sudden, somebody comes to town, a real good little jazz gig, and I got a chance to do it. I mean, it might not last for two or three weeks, but I would take that. I mean, this is jazz, you know, and I'd quit this job. I'd go out and do this thing and have my ball, and the next thing, then I find myself right back here, and my old job's right back there waiting on me. So, I mean, all of it was just a matter of survival. I mean, it was great to be working, and you did whatever was necessary to bring the bucks in. But then, when the good little job came up, well, you just took advantage of it whenever you could.


Isoardi

The studio gigs for people like Dolphin or the Bihari brothers, did they pay decently?


Douglass

Oh, yeah. Well, we had a recording scale. I think the recording scale was the same. It should have been in most of the cases. It was the same in both locals, even though we had two locals at one time. And even after we came over here, things didn't really change that much.


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We had our certain guys that we recorded for.

But, see, the scales for recording, that's the national, the federation. They maintained control over this. They maintained control over all radio, over all of TV, all movie work, and everything. Now, you wonder, why is that? I mean, like this is the movie capital of the world. There's probably more recording going on here than there is anywhere else. But why does the federation maintain control over that? Even though we're a local here, they take that out of our jurisdiction. We monitor the stuff and all that kind of stuff, but then we have to pay a gigantic tax to the federation. And all the scales and everything— See, in other words, they take control of all the big money-making things. So all we're left with, just to be truthful about it, as far as our local jurisdiction, all we've got is nightclubs and casuals. Who wants that? There's no money in that, especially the way it is right now with most of the nightclubs. I mean, they're hiring musicians, but, heck, they're not signing contracts with anybody. Therefore, we don't get the revenue coming in. The whole thing is in a sad state of affairs right now.


Isoardi

It sounds like this is the way it's been all along.


Douglass

Well, it's always been like that all along,


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except that, at one time, when we all worked in the nightclubs, we would just get a union contract, for whatever it stood for. And then, all it amounted to was that you paid your union dues, and then you paid your work dues, which was a certain percent, like 2.5 percent on the dollar—not on every dollar that you made, but on all scale dollars. A lot of times, a job books a scale that's so much— Well, most good musicians always get a little something extra just because it's them, you know. But now the way they've got it set up, they've got the pension plan, which is federation, so that means that there's a certain amount. Okay, you have a scale amount, and then there's a 7 percent of that amount which is paid extra towards your retirement or your pension plan. Well, that's great, because you don't ever lose that. That's always back there building up for you. Or, by the same token, we have a health and welfare plan, hospitalization plan, which is local. We operate the whole thing from right down there at the union. That costs another 9 percent. This is what guys are vying away from. We have that. But it's like law in our books. All of this stuff is added to the particular scale. It's added to the contract price. So right there, 9 and 7, there's 16 percent right there that has to be added onto the scale, and it's supposed to be employer paid. So you can see why employers are reluctant to sign
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contracts in which they assume that responsibility. See what I mean? It's a real funny thing right now. Some of them do, but the great majority of them— I mean, like, "If you're going to play for me, how much do you want? I'll pay you, but, no, I'm not going to sign any contract making me responsible for this and responsible for that."


Isoardi

Well, I guess by way of conclusion, Bill, [there's] a couple of things I wanted to ask you. First off, in looking back, why do you think Central Avenue declined over the years? I guess pretty much, what, by the early fifties or so, the club scene was pretty much gone. It wasn't what it was ten years earlier.


Douglass

Well, it wasn't just the club scene. Clubs come and they go, and they're up and down wherever you are.


Isoardi

True. But the avenue is also a real center for the community.


Douglass

There was a certain time years ago when everything east of here— I mean, things have always been integrated all over the place, but I'd say that, basically, the black population was east of Main Street, you know, over there going towards— That's what we call Eastside. Most of the blacks lived over there, and just a few lived over in the Westside. It just seemed like, just little by little, as people began to move out of their homes and then get another apartment somewhere else, next thing someone


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gets an apartment over on— When we talk about Westside, we're talking about now all of a sudden we're over here at Western Avenue. I can remember when Western Avenue was predominantly white. You see what I mean? But as we were all starting to better ourselves and move up a little bit, we're moving up in the world, well, it wasn't that we were just running away or deserting Central Avenue. It just happened. I guess you'd call it a process of evolution. All of a sudden, you begin to move over towards Western Avenue, what we call the Westside. That began to extend over, and pretty soon, after a few, then pretty soon it's Crenshaw [Boulevard]. Now we're all over Crenshaw. If you go up and down Western Avenue right now and up and down Crenshaw, I mean, it looks like a black neighborhood. That's predominantly what it is. But I can go back to when things would happen on Central Avenue, when this was all— Over here. When this was all white over here. So things have just kept moving.


Isoardi

So people just gradually moved away from it.


Douglass

And now we're getting to the ocean. The people who are moving out of here, I don't know where they're going, but now they're spreading in the [San Fernando] Valley. So it's just an explosion that just keeps spreading out. And then, I guess the newer people, if you go back over there now, you find the Mexican population


251
coming in from Mexico and whatnot. They've taken over everything there now. So you can't just say it was just because this club went out of business, or you can't say it was the clubs that kept the people over there. It was the people over there that kept the clubs. And then people, even though they moved away, when there was something happening in a club over there, well, I mean, heck, I told you people came from the Valley and from Hollywood and everywhere else. I'm talking about whites and blacks. Voom! You went over there because that's where the action is. And the same thing would still happen today if there was some action going on somewhere.


Isoardi

Was there any problem— Especially in the late forties and early fifties, I know the climate in L.A. became much more conservative, kind of very moralistic. Was there any trouble with the police coming down and harrassing people in the clubs or anything? Was there any kind of friction with [Los Angeles] City Hall? Did they put any pressure down there to try and close clubs? Was anything like that happening?


Douglass

No, I don't recall anything like that. I mean, it might of happened maybe incidentally somewhere, but I don't think there was anything of that sort.


Isoardi

I see. So as you remember it, then, it was pretty much the population growing, people moving out—



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Douglass

Yeah, people just migrating from one end to the other.


Isoardi

Spreading into other areas?


Douglass

Yeah, yeah.


Isoardi

Let me ask you, finally, then, maybe, as a way of summing up—unless you want to raise some other issues—looking back now, how would you sort of assess the importance of Central Avenue? Central Avenue in general, and also in terms of jazz history? I mean, what was important about it? Why should it be remembered?


Douglass

I don't know. I mean, it wasn't my idea to interview me, you know. [laughter] You're asking me just because I happen to be here and because I can certainly remember. I haven't said that it should be remembered. But all the same, I do think that it should be. I've never been one to get out and say this is what it— I mean, myself and all the people I know, we've talked about it. You know, we talk about old times. That's all we do when we run into one another. We can talk about what went on.

The only thing I think about is when people talk about like the East Coast, "They did this and that." You had your Kansas City jazz. Here was your Chicago jazz. Now, what did they think we had here? We weren't running all over there bringing in this and that. And then, when I tell you about this farce that happened over on this side,


253
well, they started talking about the West Coast sound versus the— I told you who the original West Coast sound was. That's Nat King Cole and Lionel Hampton and Louis Armstrong and all of those people. All these people were here in the first place. They moved all over the country and around the world. Lester Young came from here, and when you heard from him, he was— I don't know whether he came from here originally, but I know his family was here. Then Lester Young came into prominence with the Basie band out of Kansas City, and that was the "Kansas City sound." And there were several bands that had that sort of a sound. So it didn't really matter where you came from. It just mattered what you were doing when people picked up on you. The first time they heard you, you came from Kansas City or whatever.

These guys, the so-called West Coast sound, these are a bunch of guys who migrated out here after the war. Musicians come through here, and all of the sudden they dig the California weather, and they settle down here, and they get a little thing going. Some of them are lucky enough to get into some of the studio work and all that other kind of stuff. Whatever it was, it just kept them here for some time. All these Kenton alumni, Stan Kenton alumni. Well, I guess Stan Kenton really got started right here, but he wasn't the original or the first anything. Where did they


254
get that "West Coast sound"? I've been here longer than any of them, and I don't have that sound that they had. So what are they talking about "West Coast sound"? I don't know whether I've got an eastern sound or a Kansas City sound. All I know is I was influenced by the people that I heard come out of Kansas City, or maybe this guy's from New York. I didn't care where they were from. If I liked a guy, that's what I like. You see?


Isoardi

Well, are you sort of saying, then, well, there wasn't a West Coast sound? You couldn't talk about, say, a Central Avenue sound, but there were a lot of different sounds, then.


Douglass

Yeah, yeah.


Isoardi

Very individual in that sense.


Douglass

Yeah. People didn't all play alike. I mean, to this day, there's many and many a great musician, and some of them I admire equally as well as the other, but they don't play alike. I mean, I recognize this guy's sound just like I'd recognize your voice on the telephone. Everybody has a certain identity. So I don't think you can take it and just put it into a category. That's what people try to do. They try to put you into a category. I don't ever want to be in a category, you know, or put a label on something that I'm doing.

Just as an example, if you go to the store and you


255
look in the canned goods section and the label says this is "tomatoes." Okay, you looked at the label carefully, and then you buy the tomatoes. Why did you buy them? Because you know there's not a damn thing in there except tomatoes. That's all you've got. That's what a label does for you. So when somebody puts a certain category on you, that means that that's all you do. You don't know a damn thing else, and there's not supposed to be anything else in there. I mean, when I'm talking about jazz, I'm talking about a guy who's a world traveler. Whether he's actually been there or the people have come around him, he's absorbed a little of something from everywhere and all his experiences, all types of music that you play. You have all of these resources that you draw from and that you tap from. That's what a true mussician is. I mean, the idea of calling it jazz is not that it's supposed to sound this way or that way. You can have a hundred different guys and it will all sound a hundred different ways. And yet, some way or another, they can meld and come together and do something. I get kind of warmed up on this stuff and then I can't—


Isoardi

It's good. Go! One of the things that struck me, I know, in finding more out about Central Avenue, who came from Central Avenue, and what was happening down there, is that it deserves a place right up there with so


256
many of the other places that people traditionally talk about.


Douglass

Yeah. Well, people are becoming more and more aware of it, and that's what they're all doing. They're all getting into it, they're capitalizing on it. Just this past summer, KLON, the radio station, they did a series of concerts, and then one of them—


Isoardi

One of them was on Central Avenue.


Douglass

One of them was called "Central Avenue Revisited." I was there that day. I've got photographs and everything. You know about that. Well, we had some good people and some good players. They made a stab at it. It was pretty good. They had Ernie Andrews and Gerald Wiggins and a few others. I dare say that there were some people on that concert who don't know where Central is. [laughter]


Isoardi

Well, Bill, any final thoughts, then, before we turn the tape off? Anything else you'd like to say about those years and experiences?


Douglass

I don't know. Probably a lot of things will pop in my mind when we wind it up. Well, you'll probably be talking to me sometime or another.


Isoardi

Yeah. We may not have a tape recorder going then.


Douglass

Yeah, well, however, I'll be able to say things,


257
and sometime, when you're jotting down your little things, you'll probably just be able to say some of the things. I don't know. There are a couple of things I missed today that were kind of bugging me. I couldn't think of what I wanted to say.


Isoardi

About the union, about amalgamation, musicians?


Douglass

No, I guess not. I don't know. I had a lot of things— I don't know. It seems like, as you're saying things, ideas are running through your head, and then they get lost while you're saying another thing. I don't know. All of a sudden, you're kind of running a blank, and I'm sure there are a lot more things. Well, well there has to be, because you're talking about a complete lifetime.



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Index

About this text
Courtesy of Dept of Special Collections/UCLA Library, A1713 Charles E. Young Research Library, 405 Hilgard Ave, Box 951575, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1575; http://www.library.ucla.edu/libraries/special/scweb/
http://content.cdlib.org/view?docId=hb2d5nb4g6&brand=oac4
Title: Central Avenue sounds oral history transcript : William Douglass
By:  Douglass, Bill, 1923-, Interviewee, Isoardi, Steven Louis, 1949-, Interviewer
Date: 1990
Contributing Institution: Dept of Special Collections/UCLA Library, A1713 Charles E. Young Research Library, 405 Hilgard Ave, Box 951575, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1575; http://www.library.ucla.edu/libraries/special/scweb/
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