Klarinet Archive - Posting 000032.txt from 2008/01

From: "Daniel Leeson" <dnleeson@-----.net>
Subj: RE: [kl] Re: [spam] [kl] Could Benny be heard unmiked??
Date: Wed, 02 Jan 2008 21:17:28 -0500

No sir, it would not. Maybe they played together prior to 1939, but I saw
him in 1944 when I was 12 or 13.

Dan

-----Original Message-----
From: danyel [mailto:rab@-----.de]
Sent: Wednesday, January 02, 2008 5:52 PM
To: klarinet@-----.org
Subject: [kl] Re: [spam] [kl] Could Benny be heard unmiked??

Daniel,

Some story...
if you heard Goodman with Krupa and Wilson -- would that not date this event
prior to 1939?

curiously,
danyel
www.echoton.de/clar.html

----- Original Message -----
From: "Daniel Leeson" <dnleeson@-----.net>
To: "klarinet@-----.org>
Sent: Thursday, January 03, 2008 1:09 AM
Subject: [spam] [kl] Could Benny be heard unmiked??

> Since the question of Benny Goodman and how loud he played has arisen, I'd
> like to offer this brief story because it describes what it was like to
> hear
> Goodman at the Paramount Theatre in 1944. I heard him as plain as day, but
> then again, I was in the first row. This story originally appeared in The
> Clarinet, Fall 1986, under the title "Reminiscences of Benny Goodman," and
> was written in memory of the great player following his sudden death.
>
>
> THE KING OF SWING (1945)
>
> World War II was still being fought. I think I was 13 years old. It's
> hard to remember. At 5 a.m. I took the 45-minute, combination, train/bus
> ride from Paterson, N.J. to New York City, walked from the bus terminal to
> the Paramount Theater -- an enormous, art-deco monstrosity -- and got in
> line at 6 a.m. to buy tickets when the box office opened two hours later.
> The police did not permit the ticket line to start forming earlier than
> that. Barriers were erected that caused us to hug the walls instead of
> blocking the sidewalk. The line went down the street from Broadway, bent
> around the corner at Eighth Avenue and continued uptown for at least
> another
> block. I was in the front of the line. An aggressive, short kid who
> plays
> the clarinet can get to the front of a queue anywhere in the world, but
> you
> have to be short.
>
> If you were not in line by 6 a.m. you would never get tickets for the 9
> a.m. movie which was, in turn, followed by the first of five or six daily
> live shows with which the movie alternated. The shows were invariably big
> band spectacles that started around 10:30 a.m. The reason why I was at
> the
> Paramount that particular day was because Benny Goodman was playing there
> and I wanted to see and hear him live.
>
> For a fee, I would hold someone's place in line to allow them a break for
> coffee. I don't remember if it was summertime, or if I was playing hooky,
> or if it was inter-session vacation, or what. It's all a haze. But I
> remember Benny Goodman. Oh boy, do I remember Benny Goodman!
>
> Most of the attendees tried to get aisle seats between rows five and 20.
> Not me. I wanted the seventh seat left of center in row one. I had been
> to
> the Paramount Theater before and knew the ropes. While row one was a
> terrible place from which to see either the live show or the movie, it
> was,
> paradoxically, perfect for what I had in mind.
>
> The live show at the Paramount always began with the rising of the
> orchestra pit, the musicians in place and playing during their ascent into
> the audience's view. I had come to look into the pit as the artists set
> up -- out of sight of everyone else in the audience except those in row
> one -- before the live show began. And the seventh seat left of center
> was
> the one nearest to the pit entrance door that all the players used. For
> those 15 minutes I could look at Benny Goodman all by myself. I did not
> have to share him or the band with anyone. It was during those 15 minutes
> that I was alive. The rest of the time was just waiting.
>
> The film portion of the show consisted of a "Movietone News," "Selected
> Short Subjects," and then some turkey of a film where either Robert Taylor
> saved the world from the Nazi horde or John Wayne prevented a "Yellow
> Peril"
> assault on American womanhood. I forget. Besides, it was almost
> impossible
> to see the screen from the first row of the Paramount. The angle of
> perspective was too steep. (The scene of Benny Goodman's Paramount
> Theater
> success as seen in one of Hollywood's worst biographical movies, "The
> Benny
> Goodman Story," shows the theater as rather small with great lines of
> sight
> from all rows. Don't believe it. The Superbowl could have been played in
> that theater.)
>
> As everyone else looked at the enemies of America being destroyed in the
> movie's final scenes, my magic time began. I would lean forward, look
> over
> the rail and there, just a few feet below me, was Gene Krupa, perhaps, or
> Teddy Wilson, or Peggy Lee. Then, a few minutes before showtime, Benny
> Goodman would come in with his Selmer clarinet tucked under his arm, just
> like that, as casual as could be. And he carried it under his arm just
> like
> a salami. I imitated him for years by carrying my clarinet that way.
>
> When everyone was in place and the movie over, the lights went up and the
> pit began its slow ascent. To the tune of "Let's Dance," the stage and
> its
> players rose until the full glare of the spotlights were on them. But
> before that happened I was at eye level with Benny for an instant. Then,
> suddenly, he looked at me. He actually LOOKED AT ME!!! And the instant
> passed. The stage continued its upward rise and the show began. And
> while
> I could not see the show, I could hear it all quite clearly. I could hear
> Benny and Gene Krupa do their drum/clarinet duet in Sing! Sing! Sing! I
> could hear Benny, Teddy Wilson, Lionel Hampton, and Gene Krupa do Moonglow
> as a quartet.
>
> Benny talked a little and, on occasion, he even sang. It wasn't a vocal
> solo. He had a terrible singing voice. It was a tune where the whole
> band
> sang and Benny sang, too, but he was closer to the mike than anyone else
> so
> I heard him better. Peggy Lee sang, in a voice dripping with sexual
> innuendo, final syllables clipped, hands on hips, "You had plenty money,
> 1922. You let other women make a fool of you..."
>
> Benny punctuated her singing with ornaments that were cleverly conceived,
> brilliantly supportive of her artistry, and extraordinarily well executed.
> (If only my ornaments in the Mozart Clarinet Quintet were half as
> imaginative.) And I sat and listened, thinking of the instant that Benny
> had looked at me, while waiting for the show to end so the orchestra would
> begin its descent.
>
> Then maybe he would look at me again. Maybe he would even talk to me and
> say, "Hi kid. Enjoy the show?" Maybe he would ask me if I played the
> clarinet and I could tell him that I did play, though not as fast as he.
> And I would tell him about my metal clarinet and how I tried to play licks
> just like he did, but they didn't come out the same way as when he did it.
> And maybe he would tell me the secret of how to make it come out right.
> And
> maybe ...
>
> But when the show was over and the pit began its descent, Benny was off to
> the side talking to Teddy Wilson and did not see me staring at him with
> eyes
> like laser beams. That didn't matter too much because I stayed there the
> entire day and saw every show. But he never looked at me again.
>
> Benny Goodman died yesterday (dated from the writing of this reminiscence)
> and with him goes this magic moment of my childhood. Years later I met
> and
> played with him. He was soloist with an orchestra of which I was a member
> and we chatted briefly. I was still in awe of him.
>
> Today I have become somewhat jaded. A four-hour stint playing basset horn
> in Strauss' Frau Ohne Schatten is enough to make the performance of music
> something less than a joyous experience. It tires you. It jades you. I
> have a nice family, a big house, a bunch of clarinets, and a good
> portfolio.
> I play a lot of Mahler, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Stravinsky, and
> Strauss.
> I have a very sweet life. But no other experience has ever matched that
> magic instant when I was almost a teenager and Benny Goodman looked at me
> as
> the stage rose in the Paramount Theater in New York City.
>
> Dan Leeson
> dnleeson@-----.net
> SKYPE: dnleeson
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>

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