This would have been in the 1960's when I worked frequently in the San Francisco area. I sang quite often at the hungry i, and at that time, jazz clubs were thriving in that fair city, i.e., The Jazz Workshop, The Purple Onion, El Matador, Sugar Hill and Basin Street West.
It was a customary annual concert concept new to me: Sponsored by the city itself and/or the SF Penal Commission, any and all performers who happened to be working in town on New Year's Day were asked to voluntarily participate in a show for inmates at San Quentin Federal Prison. I was there and so were Sarah Vaughan, legendary blues singer Jimmy Witherspoon, and Louis Armstrong. An accordion band, a group of Hawaiian dancers and a ventriloquist rounded out the cast.
The prisoners were assembled in the huge dining hall, and guards were posted at strategic positions on catwalks above the floor with rifles drawn. Their presence failed to convey a sense of security as far as I was concerned, but I stood in the wings, ready to follow Spoon's set.
At one point, he began to sing a blues containing the words "Did you ever find your woman with another man?" As if on cue, a large man seated down front jumped up and shouted: "Yeah, Spoon! And I killed the M....F'...er!" to which the rest of the audience responded with loud laughter and applause.
There is a photograph of me, now long disappeared, smiling bravely as I cautiously and tremblingly stepped from the wings toward the microphone placed center stage. The men seemed to love my songs and me, but you should have seen their faces when the girls did the hula. Several hundred men became rather quiet. I have always thought it was rather sadistic to allow those women to swing and sway sensuously before those female-companionship-starved men. Their grass skirts alone could have inspired a riot.
As we walked toward the vehicles which would take us back to the city, some hands were viewed waving at us from high above. "Death row" one of the officers informed us, many of the ill-fated calling Jimmy Witherspoon by name.
One of the more memorable afternoons of my life.
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
SloaneView Introduction
My name is Carol Sloane and I sing jazz.
I knew I'd be involved with jazz from the time I was a teen-ager. The radio was a major influence. No television in those early days. Radio programs filled our days and nights. Mother listened faithfully to "Breakfast Shows", Kate Smith at high noon ("When the moon comes over the mountain ..."), soap operas Stella Dallas, Our Gal Sunday and Helen Trent, and news commentators Lowell Thomas, Gabriel Heater and H.V. Kaltenborn. In the evenings, we heard Jack Benny, Fibber McGee And Molly, Duffy's Tavern, Allen's Alley hosted by Fred Allen, Bob Hope, The Lux Radio Theatre featuring the voices of familair movie stars, The Lone Ranger, Bob & Ray, The Green Hornet, Edger Bergen And Charlie McCarthy and so many others.
Mostly, the radio stayed tuned to music stations. The popular voices of the day, among them Tony Bennett, Ella Fitzgerald, Vic Damone, Fran Warren, Bing Crosby, The Andrews Sisters, the bands of Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw. This was the Swing Era and the music filled the house and the houses of my eight aunts and uncles with all their children. Everyone knew how to jitter-bug, and we all wore socks and saddle shoes.
One day, with idle teenage curiosity, I explored the radio dial, discovering a new station that featured the voices of Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, Carmen McRae, Billy Eckstine, the bands of Count Basie, Jimmie Lunceford, Duke Ellington and Fletcher Henderson. In later years, I'd hear the new sounds of be-bop from my very own radio, a Christmas present I begged for.
The sounds of jazz became the most important entities in my life as I learned the names of the players and singers and the exotic jazz titles such as Ornithology or Straight, No Chaser or Joy Spring; collecting recordings ... these activities filled my days and nights (some disc jockeys broadcast late at night) and my education began. It was thrilling to me. It still is.
I knew I'd be involved with jazz from the time I was a teen-ager. The radio was a major influence. No television in those early days. Radio programs filled our days and nights. Mother listened faithfully to "Breakfast Shows", Kate Smith at high noon ("When the moon comes over the mountain ..."), soap operas Stella Dallas, Our Gal Sunday and Helen Trent, and news commentators Lowell Thomas, Gabriel Heater and H.V. Kaltenborn. In the evenings, we heard Jack Benny, Fibber McGee And Molly, Duffy's Tavern, Allen's Alley hosted by Fred Allen, Bob Hope, The Lux Radio Theatre featuring the voices of familair movie stars, The Lone Ranger, Bob & Ray, The Green Hornet, Edger Bergen And Charlie McCarthy and so many others.
Mostly, the radio stayed tuned to music stations. The popular voices of the day, among them Tony Bennett, Ella Fitzgerald, Vic Damone, Fran Warren, Bing Crosby, The Andrews Sisters, the bands of Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw. This was the Swing Era and the music filled the house and the houses of my eight aunts and uncles with all their children. Everyone knew how to jitter-bug, and we all wore socks and saddle shoes.
One day, with idle teenage curiosity, I explored the radio dial, discovering a new station that featured the voices of Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, Carmen McRae, Billy Eckstine, the bands of Count Basie, Jimmie Lunceford, Duke Ellington and Fletcher Henderson. In later years, I'd hear the new sounds of be-bop from my very own radio, a Christmas present I begged for.
The sounds of jazz became the most important entities in my life as I learned the names of the players and singers and the exotic jazz titles such as Ornithology or Straight, No Chaser or Joy Spring; collecting recordings ... these activities filled my days and nights (some disc jockeys broadcast late at night) and my education began. It was thrilling to me. It still is.
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