high-rise buildings of downtown. I read each street sign to see if we were there yet. We sped past downtown, away from the lights, but we weren’t going fast enough for me. I wanted to get there before Johnny Clay changed his mind and went home or took off somewhere else.
Hurry hurry hurry.
We turned down one dark road, little box houses on either side, close together. We turned down another dark road, and then onto a broad street, empty field on one side, a few clapboard shacks on the other.
Then, all at once, I could see the lights ahead. Hal swung the car toward them and into them, pulling over and parking so that we could get out and walk. He said it was the only way to see Central Avenue.
Pool halls, barbershops, barbecue joints, restaurants, five-and-dimes, doctors’ offices, furniture stores, and jazz clubs lined the avenue on either side. There was an office for the colored newspaper, the
California Eagle
. The sidewalks weren’t big enough to hold the crowds of hot dog hawkers, shoe shiners, street musicians, newsboys, fortune-tellers, bums, and men in brightly colored zoot suits. An armless boy shot marbles with his toes. Across the street from him, a little boy with a telescope was charging a nickel to look at the mountains of the moon. I could hear the music, blazing hot, coming from open doors.
The farther we walked, the more elegant and beautiful the people—beautiful suits, beautiful gowns, beautiful faces. Hal said the heart of it all was the Dunbar Hotel, where everyone from Langston Hughes to Billie Holiday to Duke Ellington stayed, and the clubs that surrounded it—Club Alabam, the Downbeat, the Last Word.
The Downbeat’s address was 4225 Central Avenue, which matched what Johnny Clay had written down. We ducked inside and off the street.
The club was built like a box, with a bar along one wall and the bandstand the other. The only seats we could find were at the bar, but there were mirrors behind it so you didn’t have to turn around to see the stage. A tenor sax player named Gene Montgomery led the house band, which played a kind of wild and rowdy blues. Except for five or six others, we were the only white people there, and it reminded me of the juke joints I’d been to in Nashville and North Carolina, the music throbbing and pulsing until I thought my eardrums would bleed.
No one danced because there wasn’t room, or maybe because they wanted to concentrate on the music. There were no live palms or stars on the ceiling, no green silk curtains and matching sofas, no revolving stage. The space itself was pretty plain. But I’d never heard music like this before.
“What in the world is it?”
“They call it bebop,” said Hal.
The music was ugly and lovely and wild. It went off in every direction, like it couldn’t be contained. Just when you thought it would go one way, it would switch on you and go another. It was a frustrating jumble of notes and phrases that didn’t seem to be linked by anything. But you could hear the steam rising off the stage.
Just before ten o’clock, a new group of musicians wandered onto the stage. Three colored men—one with a hat—on piano, saxophone, and drums, and there came Johnny Clay, carrying a trumpet.
I said, “Since when does he play trumpet?”
Babe raised her eyebrows. “That’s the best-looking boy I’ve ever seen.”
Hal nudged my arm. “What’s wrong, Velva Jean?”
I was staring at the fifth member of the band, who had just walked on, carrying a steel guitar, cigarette in his mouth, talking to someone in the crowd. He leaned down, grinned around the cigarette, and came back up laughing, sweeping the dark hair off his face. The hair was a little shorter than the last time I’d seen him, barely brushing his chin. He’d let his beard grow in a little. He still had the gap between his two front teeth. He wore a suit, but no tie, and at his open collar, I could see the Indian medicine beads and the dog tags. There was a new tattoo
Hurry hurry hurry.
We turned down one dark road, little box houses on either side, close together. We turned down another dark road, and then onto a broad street, empty field on one side, a few clapboard shacks on the other.
Then, all at once, I could see the lights ahead. Hal swung the car toward them and into them, pulling over and parking so that we could get out and walk. He said it was the only way to see Central Avenue.
Pool halls, barbershops, barbecue joints, restaurants, five-and-dimes, doctors’ offices, furniture stores, and jazz clubs lined the avenue on either side. There was an office for the colored newspaper, the
California Eagle
. The sidewalks weren’t big enough to hold the crowds of hot dog hawkers, shoe shiners, street musicians, newsboys, fortune-tellers, bums, and men in brightly colored zoot suits. An armless boy shot marbles with his toes. Across the street from him, a little boy with a telescope was charging a nickel to look at the mountains of the moon. I could hear the music, blazing hot, coming from open doors.
The farther we walked, the more elegant and beautiful the people—beautiful suits, beautiful gowns, beautiful faces. Hal said the heart of it all was the Dunbar Hotel, where everyone from Langston Hughes to Billie Holiday to Duke Ellington stayed, and the clubs that surrounded it—Club Alabam, the Downbeat, the Last Word.
The Downbeat’s address was 4225 Central Avenue, which matched what Johnny Clay had written down. We ducked inside and off the street.
The club was built like a box, with a bar along one wall and the bandstand the other. The only seats we could find were at the bar, but there were mirrors behind it so you didn’t have to turn around to see the stage. A tenor sax player named Gene Montgomery led the house band, which played a kind of wild and rowdy blues. Except for five or six others, we were the only white people there, and it reminded me of the juke joints I’d been to in Nashville and North Carolina, the music throbbing and pulsing until I thought my eardrums would bleed.
No one danced because there wasn’t room, or maybe because they wanted to concentrate on the music. There were no live palms or stars on the ceiling, no green silk curtains and matching sofas, no revolving stage. The space itself was pretty plain. But I’d never heard music like this before.
“What in the world is it?”
“They call it bebop,” said Hal.
The music was ugly and lovely and wild. It went off in every direction, like it couldn’t be contained. Just when you thought it would go one way, it would switch on you and go another. It was a frustrating jumble of notes and phrases that didn’t seem to be linked by anything. But you could hear the steam rising off the stage.
Just before ten o’clock, a new group of musicians wandered onto the stage. Three colored men—one with a hat—on piano, saxophone, and drums, and there came Johnny Clay, carrying a trumpet.
I said, “Since when does he play trumpet?”
Babe raised her eyebrows. “That’s the best-looking boy I’ve ever seen.”
Hal nudged my arm. “What’s wrong, Velva Jean?”
I was staring at the fifth member of the band, who had just walked on, carrying a steel guitar, cigarette in his mouth, talking to someone in the crowd. He leaned down, grinned around the cigarette, and came back up laughing, sweeping the dark hair off his face. The hair was a little shorter than the last time I’d seen him, barely brushing his chin. He’d let his beard grow in a little. He still had the gap between his two front teeth. He wore a suit, but no tie, and at his open collar, I could see the Indian medicine beads and the dog tags. There was a new tattoo
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