Lou Levy

Speaker And we have speed. OK. You were hired by Norman Grants, right, to play the role. What do you have any.

Speaker I’ll tell you exactly what happened and the. I was going to save this for when I read a book with. You can have this one.

Speaker The we’re doing a record date. We being Stan Getz. Jerry Holligan. Stanley on drums and Ray Brown on bass. We’re doing it at the capital tower. And at that time. I’ve moved out to California maybe two years before that, and I was working a lot with Stan Getz.

Speaker And Norman had recorded as Klatell several times. And he decided to put together this album where Gerry Mulligan and Stan are going to play. And on one side. They’d play the normal situation baritone Jerry. Stand antenna, then on the other side there to switch instruments. So there we were standing listening to the playback.

Speaker Norman walks up to me and says, hey, this is his way of asking, as you like, to work for a real good singer. Now, I have to tell you, at the time, I was working for Peggy Lee.

Speaker I guess.

Speaker Well, I wouldn’t call it a putdown because he was big on Ella. You can’t blame him. And I said, well, I guess you mean. You’re talking about your friend. And he said, yes. I said, well, it rather than an answer tonight. Let me call you tomorrow. And within 24 hours, there I was, Ella Fitzgerald, piano player at the Mutombo on the Sunset Strip. One of the front clubs of all time. And it was it was great from the word go. So kick all the way. And Norman, no, that was it. He mostly had to do except telling me how much I was going to make and things like that.

Speaker So what do you mean?

Speaker Well, I’ve been with Peggy a few years and. She’d take time off, you know. I mean, there are only so many hotels in Las Vegas, you can’t work them all. You got to do one at a time. And we do the sands. And I’m waiting to go home. And a month later, we go back through the sands again.

Speaker I mean, that did it and back and forth. So. And it’s to get it over, I couldn’t turn it down.

Speaker Jazz at the Philharmonic was included in it, and that meant I got to work with Stan. Yes, when we go on, then it’s the instrumental part of the thing. And Dizzy Gillespie. And Bill Harrison.

Speaker And then there is the Oscar Peterson trio. I mean, it was musical heaven. And a paid well and. Well, Ella was divine. I mean, you can’t get better than that. So I was very happy traveling around the world. On my own terms. And Norman and I got along very well. But that’s how it happened in the Capitol Towers in nineteen, whatever it was. You know, she took the word of the people recommended me. I have a feeling it was Ray Brown.

Speaker And Norman. You know, whatever.

Speaker If he listened to me or if he took Ray Brown’s word, I don’t know. But I don’t know that l. L ever heard me. Say one thing would have something to do with it. Larry Bunker was a drummer, them with Ella. And I was thinking, Larry Bunker’s house is terrific musician, and we’d play all the time and I’d play the piano and he’d play the drums, and that’s when it was the bass player. And they might have put in a word for me to. That wasn’t we were.

Speaker How different was it to the difference between playing for Ellen and Pengelly?

Speaker Well. Good question. With Peggy Lee was really.

Speaker Like a blueprint. Everything was done by blueprint. But with a nice, easy way about it, with Ella, it was more like a jazz group.

Speaker And she just singing swing you good time. Great intonation. Great material. I think I learned so much from both of them that it’s hard to compare. But what I learned from that one, I couldn’t learn from the other. I learned different things from both. And if that’s confusing, someday I’ll explain it to you. But what I learned from Allah that I never would learn from Peggy.

Speaker Working with allies like this, throwing this material out one after another, rapidly, everything came fast and taking we cheat. We were two weeks into sun up at her house and then calling Dave Grusin or Billy Mann or Nelson Riddle. They got an arrangement and.

Speaker That’s it. That’s how that with hookers shows are very staged beautifully. Lighting is gorgeous. All moves diagram, but I mccastle. She had the best. She had everybody and the best arrangers, Bill Hohmann and Nelson Lee.

Speaker Marty Page. I had the same people, of course. Right, for her, which was a pleasure. So it was quite different working for both of them. But a real pleasure working for either of them. And we have to travel under the best conditions. They both like me and I love them. A missile an awful lot. And picking up, being in the performing mode anymore. That’s not available. There’s a miss a lot of that.

Speaker The elusive. Really a swing band singer start and Chick Webb. So at a certain point, she brought up modern. Jazz into her to incorporate and be bop in sync. Could you describe that when she did that?

Speaker Well, let’s tell you how it works with me. If you’re a musician and listen. When I was a kid teenager, well, I listened to Glenn Miller and stuff like that in high school. Had and Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey and. All Artie Shaw, big favorite, Charlie Burnett, then. They sit around the house, listen to records, and eventually somebody say, hey, let me play something for you. And to play something for you that you’ve never heard before, that there’s a way, there’s an osmosis, you absorb it. You know, you retain things in your life. When I first heard Igor Stravinsky fireworks later. The riotously. Well, it. Now take Ella. She hears physical Esmie. No, it’s gotten. She’s got to sit up and pay attention and probably observe a lot of it and retain a lot of it. Well, for Senator Dizzy Gillespie, it changed my life. And I’m sure it had a big effect on her heart. Lester Young, whoever she might have heard. She she is a great. Not a music machine, but she just there was so much music. She didn’t take any. I think it was art again. Just somebody had to wake it up. And when she heard all these wonderful people. She had it who she was or. She’s surrounded by all these great musicians. The Philharmonic truth. Oh, Oscar Peterson and Ray in her Bellus Barney Kessel and Bill Harris in the stand. Yes. And she’d like them all. And she listened to. Roy Eldridge. So eventually.

Speaker She absorbed these notes and these ideas, you know, and catalogued them. So it’s weird. It’s like this machine keeps flipping cards over and ideas keep coming up. That’s how it works.

Speaker And.

Speaker I had to do something one day at her house. We’re playing back a track of a concert.

Speaker The take there is a take on take the Adrian. And she was improvising and singing all this stuff. And she started singing harmony parts. I mean, exactly. Like perfect harmony parts. She could have probably done five different harmony parts and made it different.

Speaker These individual harmony parts all mean something. She had those kind of musical ears. And his first swing. Knowledge is power.

Speaker She did it. She was swinging.

Speaker I did a. A show with Ella and Frank Sinatra.

Speaker He has succeeded. Thank you. What is their relationship like?

Speaker Well, it’s always real. He loved her. He just never he told me one night out of this house he’s playing for a party at his house and he’s standing out in the beach. And he said just after I think it was after Ella passed away, he said, Oh, I love that girl. I just loved the way he did volunteer these kind of remarks about everybody, but he just when her name came up, he went into rapture. Let other. If you saw the show, we’re we’re pretty well together. And then he hired her to a. Do all the bond rallies and fundraisers for. JFK, when he when he was a Democrat, I mean, when Frank was a Democrat and a. We did a lot of those, a lot of fun.

Speaker That’s been part of that thing where she did the JFK. She really went to the inaugural. Nuts. We were in.

Speaker You were in Australia.

Speaker You mean remember when we came, we came on to do that, we might be right? I don’t remember exactly the timing of it because we were in Australia. In December, which is their summer. You’re right. Yeah, I remember having.

Speaker A picnic in Australia and Santa Claus landed in a helicopter. The school deferred. Then we went home. He went back to Washington.

Speaker To do the inaugural. Great show.

Speaker The unusual situation. We’ve got the Washington.

Speaker I’m going to get my luggage. No luggage. So this is a day or two before the inaugural is held, the rehearsal day of our.

Speaker I started. Calling around to try to rent a tuxedo. Well, not when there’s an inaugural parade in Washington, D.C., nothing available or forget, it’s a. Two sleepless nights wondering what the hell am I going to wear? So they are the real hero show. This humungous snowstorm. Washington. Stopped everything. Nothing could go anywhere. And in the middle of a rehearsal, I said, ladies and gentlemen, the. I want to inform you that we’re going to do the show tonight in the clothes that you’re wearing. And that was it. Mother Nature came through for me. But it was a great the whole of it is. Well, I’m such a madhouse. He didn’t seem save my ID badges that I. Yeah, I’m a real collector. Well, that’s a start.

Speaker Why? Why would she make such an effort to show up for the JFK?

Speaker Well, the family liked her a lot. You could tell it. JFK is crazy about Peter Lawford, of course. He was about.

Speaker All involved were in love with.

Speaker Harry Belafonte was on this show and Tony Curtis and Gene Kelly in person after the.

Speaker The list went on forever. Nelson Riddle, whether the band.

Speaker Fact they brought.

Speaker All the guys in the band were from here from Los Angeles, just loaded up a plane and took those hot studio musicians. And they played all the big acts. They had acts like you think go free Frederick Margined at her, Betty Davis. They were on the show. Helen Travell. Jimmy, Jimmy Durante. Louis Prima and Kaylee’s Smith.

Speaker Oh, good for people. You dead enthusiastic about Kennedy?

Speaker I will.

Speaker For Frank. She. For frank people, good things. And she went on, did all those things were the fundraisers and rallies and early. We have a lot of case.

Speaker So do you think she was a political person or she did for Frank?

Speaker Well.

Speaker I think a lot of it was for Frank. And she probably had a crush on JFK. Who knows, like a lot of girls. So. I don’t know, she just whatever her reasoning or a political thing, I don’t know. I really can’t speak for that. You know, whatever. If Norman swayed either way. That’s something I don’t know about. I tried to swear.

Speaker Why do you think that she and the senator never recorded.

Speaker I don’t know. There’s a lot of situations I wish would have happened that never ended up. I started the one album that would have been great. We’d been Frank Sinatra and Stan Getz. Perfect for blue eyes. The. Held that the standard caught up with Ella, very lovely album.

Speaker Frank Devall wrote the arrangements were real nice. Can’t remember the name, but. Didn’t you know it just didn’t happen? Unfortunately, it would have been good. No doubt. Well, that TV show is a lot of good music and that.

Speaker Traveling on those.

Speaker I don’t know what role I had a chance.

Speaker That was a Jesuit the Philharmonic concert.

Speaker We’re learning that the album came out about 30 years after. Cancer. We didn’t know that it was recorded.

Speaker Some radio station in Rome recorded it. Hence, Soledad. Well, I got into the cash into the vaults of Norman. Got hold of it and he had it involves when he sold his company out to Polygram or whatever, however that word. And then they put it up. I called up the companies. Hey, you know, we were never paid for the forming of that album. So.

Speaker They paid. Pay the court for the.

Speaker Thank you. I read a billboard, is it? Wait a minute. What is that is an out number one on the jazz charts and the.

Speaker And I didn’t even know it existed.

Speaker Then they came out another one again, alive again in Berlin. They got the second Berlin, the same situation. They recorded a set of fancy.

Speaker You forgot about Pina’s.

Speaker But it’s all taken care of now. Thank you very much.

Speaker Well, if they don’t release it, they don’t have to pay you.

Speaker That’s right. That’s right. Because we’re being paid for the cancer. And who knows if they’re recording. And who knows how many cancers? Well, you have a pirated concert albums either.

Speaker Murder a little harder now, I think. Yeah. Yeah, that’s true. You mentioned one incident when you were traveling with Lowry.

Speaker There’s some riot in room.

Speaker Yeah, if we did a fancier. But on this one. There is also instrumentalists, Dizzie. And Stan Getz and, you know, I’m not too sure that Othello is on this concert. A little vague. But.

Speaker Stan, he has played he played a couple. Everybody played short sets like Stanley, two or three tunes in. And we’re sitting there.

Speaker Finished his third term in the audience. Third, as they do in Italy. And a lot of countries are, they said, stomping on the floor. That’s how they clap. Well, I guess. And I wouldn’t stop. And then I could.

Speaker Getting louder and louder. And then it’s hard to get out of hand. And.

Speaker Norman. Peter, Vello, that was Eleazar Road manager. Wonderful. Paul.

Speaker That’s about all you have to do to have an audience. And. It was quite the. So this is my show. Stand doesn’t do it anymore. That’s it. So he went out.

Speaker If you can picture this, he went up to took a chair like a little. Chair like a school chair and put it right in front of the microphone and sat down and folded his leg over the other leg and folded his arms and sat defied the audience, he just.

Speaker Then they started throwing liora coins. And I think that eventually one of the head of a. Really hit that. So.

Speaker Stan came out of state, stands at a. Let me place it is. Stop this. Stay. No. No. This is my show. I’m calling the shots. OK. Then Norman said to a dizzy.

Speaker Once you either play. Does not.

Speaker We were stuck backstage for two hours while the crowd from emptied out and came around to the stage door and had threatened to come in and kill Norman. It get nuts. So we’re all backstage as Sonny Step presenter and Roy Eldridge, who happen to both know how to tap dance. So we were they were tap dancing and we were doing like the step brothers clapping and keeping time.

Speaker Finally, the Carbonari Rusev, when they call the police. They said, run a little. There’s a little vesper moped type things. They took each one of us back to the hotel.

Speaker One, an individual was one, one cap and a motorcycle. And whoever and that’s how we get back to the hotel alive. So that’s this. The riot unit can’t remember Villa was there.

Speaker I really don’t know.

Speaker You remember me now, you said that the next year, actually, we were back same theater and did a transfer.

Speaker And Norman went on stage and. Apologized. To the audience, just in general, made an apology. Sorry about what happened last year and he went on stage with. Walter Clarey, the. Then. Who I always was jealous of because he used to go with David Gardner.

Speaker That’s about as much as I can come up with on that one.

Speaker Quite a character, Norman says he is quite a guy. I like him a lot and I respect him a lot. He put me like a lot of people, very successful and famous. And he did well. For himself. And he certainly deserves it. It was a wonderful tour. I mean, I said three years touring with that group.

Speaker Yes. Best thing that ever happened to me. Sir. Everything’s apison. So many things to say here.

Speaker Sure.

Speaker Funny, that was it. If you will, if you want to. If you don’t mind, I was something I wanted to say. Well, the last day or two, for that matter, I was thinking about all our stuff that’s going on in this is Serbia in the. The whole mess. I remember going to Belgrade with Jersey Philharmonic in with.

Speaker Ella and.

Speaker And what joy she brought to the country. Now look what we’re getting into here. But to see the way they. Fell on their faces were. They actually had I don’t see this, but a red carpet that went from that airplane.

Speaker They looked like a half mile long. All the way to the. So we got inside for Allawi. She marched down there with all the flowers and she was so cute. I mean, she was just beaming and they’re screaming for you. Then she got to the concert hall when we got the concert. And did the concert.

Speaker Some guy jumped up out of the audience with. Winter flowers. He just liberated by the stage and. It fell on his knees at her feet. He was kissing her feet. He just couldn’t do enough. It was so cuter because. He was in heaven. Just the fact that she was there to make him happy. And as sort of a.

Speaker Strange thought I got today what the whole situation I’m looking at showing Belgrade, the city that I was walking down the streets. There’s hardly any streets there anymore. This is sad commentary with. That’s why I went that way today.

Speaker Economy is playing in the stock with. They used to play Beirut. Oh, yeah. You know, I have to say.

Speaker Looking at the television, shelling, the hotel and things. That’s right. This is a great city.

Speaker Yeah, that’s that’s very true. Well, even going to Berlin. With Ella and. Is that not just because I’m Jewish, but to work through the. Streets and see how Bombed-out still taller, and East Berlin. Forget it there. They hadn’t cleaned up anything there yet. That’s sometimes Stan Getz of the. And I would go to the concert hall early.

Speaker One night in Berlin, we went to the sports bar last fall. That’s where Hitler used big rallies and big speeches. Stand at Mudie. He got up on a microphone and testing for some, it started screaming out over the microphone by imitating Hitler. Here we go. But nothing happened. He liked to have fun, like.

Speaker But those things were going around everywhere. Everywhere you go is a situation like that. He go to Japan and he’s thinking the same thing in many ways.

Speaker Good, Hiroshima. Tokyo, wherever you go, it somehow pops up. Well, it’s added up to about three years, split up in.

Speaker Like a year, a year and a half from then another year, then maybe another six months and once, and I’ll jump into concert if they need it, to a concert at the Santa Monica Auditorium. I remember I sub down there. I don’t even know who’s who was with her or if she was if she had a permanent piano player at the time.

Speaker But I did that. And the. I must say that I feel very honored to have worked. For related, it had the best piano players. When you look at the list of piano players that she’s had. Going back to I don’t know who who it goes back to, would people like Ellis Larkins, who is just gorgeous piano player, and then she did a lot of work with Oscar Peterson, of course, to him recording and Tommy Flanagan. And Donna Abney, I think. Paul Smith, real terrific musician. Ty Flannigan and Jimmy Rules. A real gem. Really great guy and great player. NPR. Carson. I’m sure I’m going to miss someone.

Speaker I’m glad you mentioned it. Thank God for Hank Jones. We’re working at the Walter. And. I had a family situation come up here in California. My wife and mother and daughter got in a real bad car accident and had to leave immediately from the water and come back.

Speaker No. No. I think Norman was there at the time for some reason. To. And they got Hank. I didn’t know who they were gonna get.

Speaker But there’s an old saying like never is sending a sub that plays better than you. Well, I have no control over that. I mean, this guy plays so great. It’s.

Speaker It’s embarrassing. He really has a great maybe the great.

Speaker So that’s it. Hank Jones.

Speaker The one and only terms kind of strange. Experiences with L.A. on the road. I’m thinking about this. Incident at he threw.

Speaker The first one was OK. Said the. Harold, Arlen, Harold. Yeah. Really hard. Do you buy those things to find out who the person is not?

Speaker Well, the personnel is actually only the Gershwin stuff. They have the dates listed, the date and the people on the C.D..

Speaker Yeah. Because I have looked at the.

Speaker You have been Gershwin, but I couldn’t find any information on the island whatsoever. Oh, well, maybe you might be right about the island that made my list. Let’s figuring out it probably was you. It sounded like you. Yeah. There’s nothing. It’s definitely it’s definitely me.

Speaker Now, let’s see what other I didn’t do. Rogers and I didn’t do Cobaw. And what others? Yeah, I did that with Paul Weston, I believe.

Speaker A journey? Well, it wasn’t.

Speaker Yeah, that’s right. I’m not sure if it was on that or not. I mean, that’s my sound, rather blasé, but I’ve done so many record dates that I can’t remember.

Speaker Somebody once told me that they had a record. With me playing with Lester Young. So what do you tell about here? We help with less. I think I met him and that was about it. I said, no, we had an album. I said, well, if you say so, I hope you’re right. But I don’t recall anything. Did you and Al, once Norman grants, you sell as rhythm section to.

Speaker We did an album in a jazz club, a jazz cellar in. San Francisco with Johnny Hodges and Ben Webster, and I was just I thought I climbed the mom, made it and really made it.

Speaker I mean, these these two giants are that someone I never even thought about working with.

Speaker I want to go back to that Heathrow story. OK.

Speaker Well, I have no idea why this happened. And they would never tell us why this happened. We were always guessing that would happen.

Speaker We got off the plane from Paris. And the customs people said the shoes were your. You people. Pointing at the musician, the musicians and misfits to.

Speaker Just please step over here into this area. OK. Then they started searching.

Speaker They took actually took tubes out of her Melissa’s amplifier. They don’t want to the light to see if there is anything any know contraband. And the. We did we’d already smoked all the contraband anyhow.

Speaker Whatever it was, they searched, they went inside the base and they went. In all the sex on cases that really impacted everybody down in the even, I think made a couple of guys.

Speaker Take your pants off. One of them, I pretty sure, was Gus Johnson. And the. Some like rectal examination. Everything. A couple of people. And then they also took apart some of Ali’s.

Speaker Female type. Things torn apart to see if there was something in it. Now what they expect reality. I can’t imagine. But. Then we heard that they had busted another group, jazz group that had come through there about six weeks before that.

Speaker Maybe they’re on full alert at all times. I just don’t know. And the article of. Article came out in a London paper. Where you saw a clip that Ella burns over frisk. And she’s and I don’t blame her for being mad because I really ripped stuff apart, that was really what was embarrassing.

Speaker Well, we won’t name water as we manage and the. That’s that answer that to this day, no one’s ever been able to find out.

Speaker What prompted them to really do that?

Speaker But it certainly was interesting. Side, there is others, some others side things that happened. During that, well. For those of you watching this. When I say this, you’ll understand. One. We walked up to stand in line for the sirtuin guy.

Speaker Freedom is there. Yes. Get the customs and INS. What’s your name? This is Stan Getz. What was like a light went on. I mean, internationally infamous. So I thought, oh, here we go, we’re going to be here for two days.

Speaker Well, they searched Sawada. Thoroughly. They couldn’t find any. They really didn’t find anything.

Speaker But one thing they did find was. Somebody.

Speaker Had a.

Speaker A pipeline is a pipeline that would put it there and the guy behind the counter smelled it and he said something that’s about what is sadly. Well, they didn’t hold us for any reason, then they let us go.

Speaker So I got into town an hour late, and that was it. A strange incident. Really was. I’ve never been through anything quite like that, even in Japan or the very stricken other than in Japan, where you go through customs. A guy said to me, if you got any marijuana. This is this was very funny to a Japanese comedian.

Speaker Well, in a different way, with an.

Speaker I want to get a little bit about some songbooks. The Ellen effect didn’t want to do this.

Speaker She said, Is it really? As I said, so what’s going to make him? Vs..

Speaker It was a lot to learn and I don’t know when and where she learned to because I do not recall going to her house and rehearsing those pieces beforehand. I really don’t recall doing that. So I I’m wondering, when we were sitting there in the capital towers and she’s recording all these Gershwin songs with all these fantastic verses.

Speaker And it’s roaring right through. She really impressed me. I mean, if she’s sight reading this, that couldn’t be. It just couldn’t be.

Speaker But she did flawlessly. I think they’re. One of the greatest packages of music of all time, the Gershwin.

Speaker Five five five LP is actually Susan and the.

Speaker It was the whole task was just mind boggling. Was it you don’t you didn’t know. Nelson Riddle. It was a wonderful guy, said a sleepy eyed guide is slow kind of guy.

Speaker But he must have written fast.

Speaker Anybody and as good as or better than him. Each I mean, every other day. Loaded down with these arrangements. This sort of six arrangements last night, unbelievable in the quality.

Speaker He’s one of my all time favorite arrangers, and you can’t do better than he did for. He’s always been one of the best. Well, he did for Frank Sinatra and Mel and Nat Cole and whoever was down pretty rapidly.

Speaker Yeah, I wasn’t involved in the first one with the Buddy Bragman, with Cole Porter, I believe, and. But I was involved there at least four or five songbirds. Maybe six, and I’m involved in three of them, you know? Yeah, they came in fast. Different arranger’s. Paul Weston, the Dervin Berlin.

Speaker I’m pretty sure. But do you think that it did anything higher than that quickly?

Speaker No, I think spontaneity is great in music, especially elements such as.

Speaker 1980 was her bag. She could. She could throw something together, Fezzan, anybody.

Speaker One afternoon at the old Latin casino in Philadelphia, we did an afternoon show for children.

Speaker I mean, it was like Sesame Street and elephants here. That was really cute. These kids were just roaring and having a wonderful time. And she did like three little fishes in the. Course, this year, the task, it was always obvious. Maybe she did make them, I don’t remember. But she knew what to do. She and those kids were.

Speaker She had him in the palm of your hand. There was a great afternoon. Those kids. Nothing like that will ever happen again. That’s the kind of thing is the great spot maybe in the studio that could happen to with her. Concert stage, of course.

Speaker Billy Billy actually said he would never work for Norman Granz again.

Speaker It’s a lot of people have said that about a lot of people, not just armed guards, but I know I won’t name the other situations.

Speaker The. You know, people say, gee. Well, wasn’t Frank Sinatra had to work for really? It’s a great artist. He was a. Very fair, very generous.

Speaker And one of the guys who was a kid, you know. Believe me, I’m surprised that he would say that because. It’s a surprise. His bill is quite a guy. Quite a guy and a great, superb arranger. Without a doubt, one of the All-Time Best also. A lot of people think. He’s the best. In many ways, very fast. Very creative. Bill is the kind of guy to write an arrangement. And if you were in the room was as he’s writing it, you know, he would write a phrase. And as he’s writing it, he would break himself up. You know, he could hear. I mean, you write it. You can hear it. You know, as you write it. And he was sort of laughing, given several big. The boot. No, not allowed. Not himself. But as far as this thing with Norman and believe me, Adam.

Speaker They deserve the normal and the artistic sense. He didn’t he was too cheap in the studio watching the clock. I mean, he was really a.

Speaker So, yeah, as you say, people say things about a lot of people.

Speaker Well, Norman did have put it sort of complicated behind a lot of ways. I think a lot of people misread him.

Speaker I really do. I don’t think I did a lot of respect for Norman. And I still do even know I can’t take with. He did a lot of wonderful things.

Speaker Your reading of him as well. How did you read it?

Speaker Oh, you mean on a scale of one to 10? Oh, I don’t like it. Well, I give him a. Well, I mean, who do you give a 10 to?

Speaker I really don’t know. I give them closer to 10, I just think he had a lot going for him. So. You know these. I want you to take over, guy. He knows just what to do, how to handle everything.

Speaker That’s been important her. So that was we were talking before bet versus done away with versus.

Speaker Yeah, I found that out. Well, run out of spots. He started with.

Speaker This is a rehearsal. What are we rehearsing? For some reason is just one of those things. Now I know the song.

Speaker OK. When did it fly? She said, don’t do the verses verse. In other words, I don’t think I know. And the.

Speaker So she started.

Speaker Well, she’s really rapid fire with the version agency started. Dorothy Parker once said to her boyfriend, fare well. Columbus announced that he knew he was months. It was swell, Isabelle. Swell. That did that. That did. I did. I did it. Ed. Wait a minute. Where are we? What are we talking? So she gave me the chance to learn it. Then I realized that you got to be quick with her.

Speaker You ready, willing and able? It was a great education. Like going to school. Working for her. Very definitely. All of us who normally give her a list of songs or give me a list of the songs for the concert. There are 50 songs. OK. Don’t bother to take music. I didn’t have enough time to say look in.

Speaker We get the second song, she turn around and say, let’s do some blah, blah instead of blah, blah. You know, we do that. She changed you or she didn’t feel like doing this on fine.

Speaker But boy, she Katcher. Run through rivers and accurately hurry, emancipation was terrific. And her intonation was true. Her timing was, too. What do you mean in her memory was very good, too. She wasn’t allowed for the last year, she’d forget a word ideal.

Speaker Whatever the lyric, I’m pretty good with lyrics, so I good pure in and we go from there. Yes, she is. Pretty, pretty good with versus.

Speaker She could. So in a way, she could really. Fool around, Norman.

Speaker Well, when she got there, she could do whatever she wants. Well, yeah, she didn’t want to do return. She didn’t want to be. It’s a drag to have to play it.

Speaker Well, the plant, you know, you don’t want to play it. I’m sure singing is even worse.

Speaker The.

Speaker Ben, me, quite often you just say. Do that.

Speaker Do you think she ever was doing that to save the to.

Speaker Well, no, I never thought of it that way. I started on things, so it was just is there she didn’t feel like doing that, too. Yeah, she’s you know, she’s like one of the guys, like the guy that I don’t want to play c jam blues.

Speaker I don’t want to play it either. And that’s it. You want to the next thing. Ella was Ella enjoyed her work. And if there’s some song didn’t appeal to Kimberly. She was on a roll. And she, you know, I have to do this. That’s a change. Just change the program.

Speaker What were your favorite songs?

Speaker Remember third of that favorite son that she do?

Speaker Well, I have a favorite.

Speaker Anything that you just sworn, everything’s swung so hard. She is used to sing the hell out of the gypsy in my soul. Who are you? This one here, she could start to. And that first note was already swinging like it was the last score. She just got it all right. Out of the starting. This is a read out of the starting blocks. You know, she was off and running. Never a false start. Never. Never had to restart the race. Marvelous, just marvelous performance.

Speaker Are there signs that you would. Was she didn’t do.

Speaker Well, maybe once in a while you get sort of. Board with something like this here to ask it, not my right to say you shouldn’t do it since it’s a big hit. But she did a lot of she did so many great songs. It’s hard for me to pick out any one.

Speaker They did like that. I did like one song her like a friend of mine, very good friend of mine wrote Donald Kohn, A Beautiful Friendship. This is in fact, I learned it playing for her first time I’d ever heard the term lovely song.

Speaker Quite lovely.

Speaker Most of our life, but music. On the road. She never really seemed to. I have too many successful. Romances.

Speaker No, I don’t think so. I mean, you’re right.

Speaker Successful Arantes. You know, I was with all those users three years. Maybe met someone. In Europe, I think once there is someone for a word for a little while. And who was married to Ray Brown? We all know that.

Speaker And other than that, I don’t know. But any. Think she kept whatever happened, she kept sort of. Quite private. Loki’s you didn’t have a big social life. I remember her going out to. I don’t remember seeing a lot of parties like I play parties in us. Stars would give parties a lot of musical people. I don’t remember seeing Ella around the world. She she likes thing and she liked the soap operas. I think she was pretty heavily into that. Shirley Horn was also a pretty terrific. She likes soap operas, too. Yes, she likes staying home, relaxing. She liked baseball. She loved the Dodgers. I think she went to the games occasionally.

Speaker Yet vacs funny thing that Pete Cavallo, the guy I mentioned earlier, who road manager gave me.

Speaker She’s saying this one of the Super Bowls. I don’t know which city was might have been. One of the ones in Florida or maybe in New Orleans is.

Speaker She sang and I gave her two tickets to the game. It’s there is that he had two tickets to the Super Bowl from like nine years before he even gave me what it says here. He was over there. So I would it of the Super Bowl from 10 years ago. But she was a big sports fan.

Speaker She loved she loved baseball. Which was good because I’m a baseball idiot. So you have to do is have a baseball game on television. It takes me.

Speaker Well, she did finally at one point, I guess, was hoping for some personal lives, bought a house in Copenhagen.

Speaker Did she actually get it? We’ll see. Now, that’s more that one person I was talking about was from a. Now, that’s. Could be great about. I don’t think I was with her when she did the.

Speaker Whichever parent player was. Wasn’t the.

Speaker Shoot. You know, a lot of times we travel and the daytime we do walking around and I see you walking down on the view of an arrow with our lady that helped her with everything. We’ll let her we’ll have a real nice girl. Every sit down in. Jaros is one of the sidewalk tables and the. An aperitif. And sometimes if we’re in a time, we go to a. So let’s go to a movie and we go watch whatever movie that make any difference. A lot of fun. She loved that and. One good thing about Ella. She could laugh. And herself. And laugh at something. Life with the theater and the and the revered cartoons, and they referred to there’s one character, the.

Speaker Then did the obvious of the blacks eating watermelon? Well, that’s all she had to say, that she was going to come about mean that anger.

Speaker Laughter. She couldn’t stop slapping herself on the. It’s hard to get sensitive word about things like that.

Speaker We have a we had a buddy buddy relationship. We’re really good friends.

Speaker We’re good friends.

Speaker Yes, odd. Because we don’t hear that from very many people. You were with. She was really your prime.

Speaker Yeah, maybe so maybe it was her prime. She was so good. I don’t know what her prime was, really. She was always in her private.

Speaker She was when I when I saw that film of the Sinatra show with her. If somebody was watching it, they. And the.

Speaker They’ve never really seen or seeing him personally. And she’s saying that opening sequence in April in Paris. They’re accurate, actually, they couldn’t believe this. Oh, my God.

Speaker That’s a real. Did that really happen? She’s so strong. She’s swinging so hard. I mean, I think she worked hard when she sang, she put a lot of effort into it, it sounded like it.

Speaker A lot of a lot of physical power in it.

Speaker She put a lot of strain, so. She’s usually tired at the end of the night and. Wanted to get out of whatever. So do whatever you like to do.

Speaker Sometimes. After that, usually is like we’d go to clubs.

Speaker And she would actually sit down and sing with the local people or to sit and play to. That she would do after her concert. Night sing in a way like the. She just loved singing. And if I were to vote in a city like the. Yes, he was.

Speaker And to watch the people’s reactor was one of the great pleasure of the job there because. Enraptured like those kids that they had there before she got to everybody, they all became kids.

Speaker Yes, she’s the first lady of song. Is that her nickname? First lady, maybe so. So.

Speaker I worked with a lot of great ones. Sarah was my first choice. I was about 17 years old, so I didn’t know from nothing, but she taught me how to play for her and all that pretty good piano player.

Speaker For Lena Horne, she can seem pretty jenkinson. And the I work for very good singer now.

Speaker Stacks up well below. How did Ellen how did all that you know, what she wanted? How did she know what she wanted? How did you know how she did so?

Speaker Want you to play? Did you just work it out?

Speaker Yeah, I just I just played. And she liked it. She liked to find she never, never complained to me about the. You said if I was being a bad boy. We won’t go into that anyway.

Speaker You can tell you that Norman had put together an album for Clap Hands, Here comes Charley. And let the total freedom. Give me the list of songs on. Find the Keys and I worked out the arrangements and. We’ve got Stan Levie and her as.

Speaker Whoever chairman hindering an.

Speaker Me and Alan, we did it. And it came out great. She loved the album. She just was crazy about, you know. She said she is really good at my love. We’re a swinging. We were swimming in.

Speaker Yeah, it is. It’s really important.

Speaker Even if I have to say so, I sort of agree with you.

Speaker I talked to. Norman fairly recently on the phone. And Geneva, I should say. Norman, talk to me. But he was almost completely negative about Bela.

Speaker And it was such a surprise to me.

Speaker Negative about what? Not abuse it.

Speaker Said, well, don’t you just say things like we were trying to persuade him to do an interview for this show? And he said, well, I’m afraid if I did that, Allah would not come off very well.

Speaker Well.

Speaker I don’t know why. Well, I can’t I can’t speak for him. Like I said, I respect him a lot and I. He did a lot of good things for me. You know, I don’t want to knock him. I told you the story and that stupid scene in Rome. And that’s about the. That’s about the strangest thing I ever saw him do. That surprised me to actually go out there and defy the entire audience. It’s my show. That’s it.

Speaker But I’m surprised that he would be negative about Ella.

Speaker How can you be negative about someone like that?

Speaker She said.

Speaker I kept asking, well, you know. One of the good things to remember and that just no answer.

Speaker Again, I mean, he’s almost. The focal point. Of his music world was pretty much Ella Fitzgerald. Oscar Peterson, of course. And Jazz Philharmonic. They had some terrific guys, you know, before I was there. They’re always people like. Well, the original guy, Flip Phillips and all left kind of slow. They were. Big times, big times, certainly broke the ice.

Speaker And.

Speaker What did you think of those this kind of finales at the end?

Speaker Well, one of the words. Oh, they’re OK. You know, they didn’t always come out.

Speaker Top notch, because this. It’s expecting too much. When you hear it can’t come out, like, totally. Together, it’s not about to happen.

Speaker That kind of spontaneity is quite rare to me where everything comes off. I think it always was rehearsed. You know, it happens sometimes. You know, how high the moon. Okay. To take the HHC Jambos.

Speaker It’s almost too predictable.

Speaker It really is, because everybody is doing obvious things in order to. Let the guy over there know that, OK, this is coming up next, and I’ve to say we tried to cue each other.