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Armstrong by Bill Bailey |
Armstrong |
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Bill Bailey |
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Face
by Rachel Busnardo |
The
flier was printed on yellow paper. I Held it in my hand (Was my hand trembling?
I don’t remember,) The message was loud and clear: ONE NIGHT ONLY
LOUIS ARMSTRONG AND HIS ALL STARS-- JANSEN BEACH BALLROOM JULY 20, 1954
8:00PM till MIDNIGHT I took the flier home and took it into the basement. Bob the clarinet player was there and I showed him the paper. “I’m going to ask my dad if he’ll take me,” I said. Bob said nothing. Jansen Beach was in Portland; over a hundred miles away. Fat chance. That night, when Pop got off work, I handed him the flyer and waited. “Why don’t you and Bob drive the Merc up there and see Louis?” Pop said to my surprise. The Mercury was the new family car which Pop let me drive rarely on special occasions. A tomato red hard top--it was a wonderful car with automatic transmission and power everything. The car had more chrome than any other car I knew and a powerful V-8 engine. It was a dream machine. The next morning I drove my 1936 Dodge wreck (a car older than I was) to Bing’s house. Bing was an ex jazz musician who was also the father of my ex girl friend, Donna. I told Bing about the trip to Portland. He was impressed. ”It’s been years since I saw Louis it would be a real treat.” At that minute Donna walked into the kitchen and said, “Why don’t you take Delores; she lives in Portland.” I got the phone number from Donna and called Deloris that night. “I’d be delighted to go to the Louis Armstrong dance with you on the twentieth,” she said to my inquiry. “Do you think you could find a date for Bob?” “I don’t know. I’ll try.” On the afternoon of the twentieth, Bob and I in our blue surge suits got into the red mercury and headed north on highway 101 toward Portland. At about seven, using Delores’s directions, we pulled up in front of Delores’s house. She came out wearing a nice looking pink dress. Her hair was nicely quaffed and she looked very pretty. Bob and I had not eaten and at her suggestion, we drove to a nice local restaurant. We all had burgers and cokes leaving the waitress a generous tip. At the Jansen Beach Ballroom we paid our $5.50 per head for our tickets and walked immediately to the bandstand. The band was just starting and the first tune was “Sleepy Time Down South.” The evening was a pleasant surprise; there was very little “Hello Dolly” type stuff. We were treated to “Potato Head Blues,” “West End Blues,” and all the Hot Five / Hot Seven stuff from the twenties. Armstrong was brilliant and his band was top notch. Barney Bigard did some solo work that was outstanding, Billy Kyle sounded like Earl Hines; Trumm, soft and warm; Young played Jack Teagarden like trombone l solos. Bob and I were particularly interested in a clarinet and drum duet. We were working on such a performance. Bigard improvised on a minor melody while the drummer played exotic rhythms on the torn-toms. It was an expansion on the work of Benny Goodman and Gene Krupa on “Sing Sing Sing” and we got a lot of good ideas from the performance. Throughout the evening we seldom got farther than four feet from the bell of Armstrong’s trumpet. The performance was never less than genius. At times, I danced with Delores but never got far from the music. The evening ended as it had begun with “Sleepy Time Down South.” The three of us left the parking lot and returned to the restaurant for a snack. At Delores’s house Bob curled up in the back seat and became invisible. Delores, soft and warm, snuggled up to me. She kissed me deeply; it was a wonderful conclusion to a perfect evening. We drove home and I pulled into the carport at about 2:30 AM. Pop waited up for us and wanted to know about our impression Armstrong. We were not in any way disappointed.
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