We are filming today for the Hamilton College
Jazz Archive in Los Angeles, and I feel very privileged to have Buddy Collette with me. BC: Well Monk it's my pleasure to be invited
to be a part of this, you know I was happy when you gave me a call and then you sent
the letter and I'm saying boy I could hardly wait for this to happen. MR: Do you know that you're one of those fellows
that when you talk to other musicians, they have great reverence for you. BC: Well that's very nice to hear that, thank
you, yeah. I do have a lot of friends and I've done a
lot of teaching and of course a lot of those, some of them I had the pleasure of working
with, are great players out there today, so I'm so happy to hear them. They send their love and they come to say
hello and they call. You know it's a really great feeling. MR: As long as we're on that subject, why
don't you just drop a few names to me, because I know you have taught -
BC: Oh, some of the players? MR: Yeah. BC: Well one of the greats of course, Eric
Dolphy, I taught him many years ago, probably 1949, '50. And hence he went on to go with the Chico
Hamilton band, not right after I left, but I think Paul Horn, I didn't teach Paul but
he was a good friend of mine, we have a lot in common, and after I think Paul left I think
Eric went in the band after Paul. So a couple of others are James Newton, the
flutist, and Big Jim McNeely, Sonny Criss, let's see the other names, John Stevens, I
wonder if you know him, he's a fine musician here in L.A.
MR: Well that's quite an amazing list. BC: Quite a few, yeah. MR: I understand you had a pretty strong family
upbringing in Los Angeles here, and was it a musical household? BC: Well not really but I was close to the
Woodman brothers, Britt Woodman and his family. They were all musical and they all were playing
when they were young kids, playing quite well. The father actually had them studying and
practicing every day after school, you know he was really pushing them. So when I met the Woodman brothers, they were
all about 13 or 14, and they were like professional musicians, finished already, because their
dad stressed that. So of course that inspired us, Charlie Mingus
and a bunch of us who were from the Watts area, to be like these brothers who were really,
they could read anything, play anything, and they had a little four piece band and they
all doubled. For example Britt played trombone, clarinet
and trumpet, and saxophone. And the other brother played trumpet. So they almost got any sound of any band with
only four people. They didn't have a bass at that time, and
later when they added the bass Joe Comfort, who was a fine bassist. But my mother was saying my dad loved music
but he didn't study. So they allowed me to get into it. My grandmother was the one that pushed me
to study it with the piano. She wanted me to be a classical pianist. But I chose the saxophone later on. MR: Do you recall hearing, was there a certain
kind of music that inspired you to go in the direction of jazz that you might have heard
early on? BC: Yes I think so. There were a couple of friends of my mother
and dad that used to come by and one guy was a piano player and one a saxophone player. They'd come by and just jam two or three days
a week since I guess they only worked at night. They'd come by to practice, we always had
a piano. And so I heard these guys jamming a lot. And that was something, and plus the Ellington
band and Jimmy Lunceford and Count Basie band more later on, I got a chance to hear them,
they were on the radio a lot and playing in clubs. And my mother and dad took us to hear Louis
Armstrong when I was about ten to twelve, so when you hear that sound, especially then,
I was with it just one time and that was it. MR: I read a quote, you're talking about your
mother actually, that she didn't have a bone of prejudice in her body. BC: That's true. That's a good section, yeah. Because when we were young kids and I grew
up in the Watts area, there was all kinds of people there, Japanese, white, and Mexican. You just name it, which was great in a way. I didn't realize it but it sure made life
a little simpler, you know where you would go, it was just people. You don't start judging by the color, that
they're different, it's just people. So I used to bring my little friends by the
house and she'd say, "It's time for your lunch" or dinner. And I'd say, "Oh I'll see you guys." She'd say, "No you're not going to see them,
these are your friends, bring them in." So she would have us bring the guy, whoever
I was with, three or four guys, in different nationalities, we'd all come in and she'd
bring the dinner down. And I used to feel at that time that there
wouldn't be enough food because we only had three in our family, three kids. But she knew how to mix up other things in
food, and make some rice and potatoes and stuff, and there was plenty. And it was kind of fun to have them being
a part of that. MR: Yeah. It's a great lesson too. BC: Yeah. MR: I also read this, this sounds funny, when
you were about fifteen you were already playing out? BC: Yeah I was playing. I think I worked at The Follies which was
downtown, and that was great. Was that a part? MR: Yeah, I can just picture you trying to
play your horn and looking up at the showgirls. BC: In fact one of the ladies just died, it
was in the paper the other day, Lily Sincere. And what was the other lady, great names. One of the comedians was Yule, Joe Yule, Mickey
Rooney's father. MR: Mickey Rooney's father? BC: Yeah, Joe Yule. So he was a comedian. And Lily, she was one of the most beautiful
ladies. In fact I read, I didn't know at this time
that this had happened, but Marilyn Monroe tried to look and act like Lily Sincere. That's how beautiful she was, all the class. And Marilyn said that that's who she wanted
to be like, with blonde hair and the cutsey way and what a body. But you went out, and reading the music or
attempting to, and these ladies are standing and walking all around you, you know, and
you weren't supposed to look up, but I mean how could you not? MR: So when the different shows would come
in, they'd give you different - they all had their own music I would assume. BC: Well what would happen, a show would last
maybe a week. If it was a real special one or a good show
then maybe it'd go two weeks. We'd have a rehearsal possibly, I can't remember
what day now but one day a full rehearsal and do all the acts and the ladies and play
their music. They probably had set music for each new show
you know. And we'd run that down until they felt comfortable
and they knew the timing of it, and then we'd probably stay all day. Maybe we'd rehearse at 11:00 that day and
the show might hit at 2:00 in the afternoon. Maybe it was like a Saturday or a Thursday
or something where they did two shows during the day. Because during the day sometimes they didn't
do shows all day. I think a couple of days a week they'd do
them during the day, Saturday, maybe Sunday or a Thursday. So we'd stay all day that day. Come in early and do the first show as like
a dress rehearsal, and then stay. So by the time the weekend was there we had
it all down. But like I say it was great. And one reason I was there at age 15, there
was a guy who was playing with the Woodman brothers, Jule Grant, who is a friend of mine,
he had a sickness. He was from Texas, so he had to go home fast,
and the Woodman brothers knew I could read okay. But when you're 15, and they pulled me out
of school, I just kind of missed classes for about three days. He was just gone for about three days. But what an experience, yeah, it was great. MR: It must have been good for your reputation
in school I would think. BC: Well I didn't tell too many people about
it. MR: That's true. You just called in sick, right? BC: Um hum. MR: How did the war years affect the employment
for musicians in the area? Did it help out when the servicemen were,
you know a lot of musicians had to go in the service? BC: Oh yeah. Well actually I enlisted and I was in the
band with a bunch of the guys, you will probably know the names, Marshall Royal, Jerome Richardson,
Jackie Kellso, who is with the Basie band right now playing lead alto. We were stationed up at Oakland at the St.
Mary's pre-flight school. There was Moraga I think it was called Lafayette
or something now, but it was that area outside of Oakland about 13 miles. And we worked a lot. We weren't supposed to work in the clubs because
you know we were Navy musicians. But we did it. We put on our civilian clothing and worked
in the jazz rooms so we were doing fine. We got paid for being there, probably a hundred
dollars or so, a couple of hundred dollars a month at the most. Because we had our own homes. They paid a subsistence so we had our own
apartments and we worked a lot though because we were good players. And there was a kind of a rough thing to get
the good musicians at the time. It was hard to find because a lot of them
either were in the service, the ones that could sign up, and the others were trying
to play and a lot of people were starting, you know some who didn't play too well. You could really tell the difference then,
because we got to put on the suits and work some of the jazz rooms and so it was good
for us, we did very fine. We didn't do much recording then but I did
after I came back home, which was like probably in '46. But this was like '43, '43. MR: Didn't a lot of a fellows get sent up
to the Great Lakes? BC: Yeah, I was there. MR: You were there? BC: Yeah, there was a training camp. MR: It was almost like a, I don't know, all
the greatest players- BC: You talked to Clark, right? Clark Terry? MR: Yeah. BC: Well Clark was actually like one of the
leaders, the head of the group, and he was tough then. But I think his toughness was, he had a little
tongue and cheek, because since he could throw his weight around a little bit, then he would
give you a bad time and he'd know you, but you'd have to really toe the line then. MR: Yeah? Wow, that's great. BC: A marvelous player even then. MR: Yeah. Did you ever consider - after the service,
you felt like you wanted to come right back to Los Angeles? BC: Yeah. I got out in December '45 I think, and I stayed
in the area, up in the Oakland-San Francisco area for about six months before I moved back. But we were working a lot. Ernie Royal, who's the brother of Marshall
Royal, we had a combo. I had a combo, four people. And we played in Redwood City every night
in a jazz room. We wasn't making a lot of money but we had
a lot of fun and so finally I knew Dizzy and Charlie Parker were coming to Billy Berg's
in Hollywood, and we took off to come and hear them. Ernie and I, we drove down from San Francisco
or wherever we were living then, and we heard the band the first night at Billy Berg's. And what a night. And so that turned us around too then. I knew I wanted to get back to L.A. once I
heard all that going on. Although they didn't stay in L.A. Charlie
Parker did, and Lucky Thompson was with him, he stayed in L.A. for a while in that period. And then later on Miles Davis came out. So there was a lot of activity going on and
I wanted to get back home. MR: The majority of the L.A. crowd wasn't
quite ready for what Dizzy and Charlie were doing, were they? BC: Well not really. But they were excited about it because it
was new. But a lot of people didn't know what was going
on, and you know it was so fast, and the new notes, a lot of people couldn't understand
it but it was great, really. They were taking care of - they had a great
band as you know. They had Ray Brown, they had Al Hague on piano,
Ray on bass, Milt Jackson on vibes, Stan Levy was on drums, and Charlie and Diz. And then at one point they brought in Lucky
Thompson, I think that was because Billy Berg wanted to be a little more commercial so that
the audience would enjoy it or understand it a little better. Because when they just had the alto and trumpet
it was pretty fast. But at least when Lucky came in he played
more into the - he did a little "Body and Soul" and a few things, that would change
the pace. But the audience liked it because it was still
good music. MR: Had you heard their recordings before
you saw them? BC: Diz and Bird? MR: Yeah. BC: Yeah we were listening to them up in Oakland,
that's where we had to come down to see - on record it was scary, because it was almost
impossible to hear, to understand they could play that. But when you saw them in person it was still
scary because then we could see them holding the horns and still man - but we got hooked
on it, yeah. MR: It's amazing what the little bit of film
that they have of him. You can hardly even see his fingers moving. BC: Yeah I know. MR: It was very, like it made it look easy
I guess. BC: Yeah you're right. His fingers really kind of hugged the keys
quite a bit. MR: Right. BC: Well he spent a lot of time practicing,
he had that finger control I guess, or relaxation or whatever it is. But it was worthwhile doing that trip and
following them in, and trying to understand the music early rather than - a lot of people
did back away from it, oh it's not going to stay around. And it wasn't that popular. You know you really had to listen or you had
to go with a club owner who would hire the band, or hire anybody that was playing Bebop
at the time. MR: When you had your quartets and your small
groups, the audiences you were playing for in the area, was it mostly a segregated type
audience? BC: In Los Angeles? MR: Yeah. BC: No it wasn't segregated, it was always
integrated. Because, well even when we had the Chico band
before I had my group, the Chico quintet, we played in Long Beach, and there weren't
as many blacks there as there are say now. At that time there were very few other than
whites coming in the club but that was just because not too many people lived there then
and then later on the people would come from L.A. because Sleepy Stein, who was a disc
jockey and still is I guess, and the owner there, Harry Rubin, put radio in that club,
which we called The Strollers, three nights a week. And as people heard us in the L.A. area, then
they would drive down to The Strollers you see, so then it got even more integrated. They advertised, and like in the group, they
couldn't believe what they heard because coming on the radio every night with the group with
the cello and guitar and flute and everything, it was really some sound. People would be driving to San Diego and a
lot of the beach cities and they'd say we were just driving and we heard this come on
the radio and we had to come and see what it was. And it was great. MR: It really did have a very unique sound,
especially with the bop that was going on at the time, to all of a sudden have this
different instrumentation. BC: It was very refreshing. We invited a lot of record people at the time
in the L.A. area, Les Keating, who had contemporary bop with World Pacific and Si Waronker had
Liberty, and a few other guys had labels. We invited them and most of them came, but
we didn't know what we were doing and it didn't sound like any - these guys didn't particularly
like the Dizzy and Bird stuff either, but here was another versions of jazz that they
didn't understand, especially with cello in there - what are these guys doing? But it caught on with the public. MR: The cello parts, did he do some improvising
as far as the background figures and all that? How did you work that kind of thing out? BC: Well a story goes with that which is true. When I went with the band I was supposed to
go with them when they started but I was working with Scatman Crothers. So we used a guy named Bob Hardaway, I don't
know if you know that name. A tenor player? MR: Yes. BC: And he brought his book, so then when
I came to join them they were playing basically Bob's arrangements. I brought a couple of charts of my own. And then Fred would actually play just cello
solos on intermission. Because of that great energy he had. He wouldn't take a break. Chico would say, "You want to do some cello
playing?" He said yeah he'd do "Granada" and a lot of
solos. But then what he'd finally do, he'd play too
long and Chico was anxious to get back on the stand, especially if we had a packed house. And the stand was so small, it was about as
big as this little area here. And he had like a spinet piano, like where
you'd be sitting, and then he'd play out here. So we'd all get on the bandstand and Chico's
drums were like in the middle. And then he'd call us on the stand and we'd
come up on the stand and by the time Fred would open his eyes we were ready to play. And he'd say, "Oh I didn't know you guys were
here." But he couldn't get back to the piano without
having us get off again. So then he would play some of his ideas that
he'd played on piano, he'd remember the tunes and chords see? So he'd begin to do that and then we all got
ideas that it was a better sounding band with him playing cello. It really was because Jim Hall was there with
the chords and then Jim was such a sensitive player, and he probably still is the same
way. Fred would play a lot of piano you know what
I mean? He'd be playing a chord, probably right but
too much. MR: Especially with the guitar. BC: Yeah and Jim would stay out of their way,
then he wouldn't play very much. He'd wait until Fred cooled down, or wait
until his solo. So then Fred was on the cello, you'd hear
these lush chords that Jim could do, and then the band was moving much better. So that's the way that kind of happened. We began to kind of get an idea if he is not
on the piano, we could write different arrangements and the arrangements began to go that way. We all felt the same way, without telling
each other, we said well this band really sounds good this way. You don't need the chords. There's much more freedom then you see? MR: Did he like the idea too, Fred? BC: Well I guess as long as he was playing. MR: As long as he was doing something. BC: Yeah something. As long as we didn't cut him off and say lay
off. If we'd said stop playing chords on the piano,
he wouldn't have liked that see? MR: That's really interesting. BC: But you're right, as long as he - well
I'd be playing a little riff on clarinet and he would pick that up playing it on cello,
while some of those things, with good sound - he'd make it on the cello see? And it was a sound that not too many people
had heard at that point, the cello doing the jazz figures. MR: Chico decided to go to New York after
that? BC: Oh you mean after that group? MR: Yeah. BC: Yeah at first he was living in L.A. of
course in 1955, '56. And then after that he went to New York and
he actually had a couple of groups as you know, two or three groups, the same sound,
with Paul Horn, Eric and a few others, Charles Lloyd, and then later on, he had moved to
New York, I don't know what period though now, but he began to do a lot of jingle work
there based on the sound of that group. He made quite a bit of money. MR: Yeah he definitely got into kind of the
commercial end of things too. BC: Well even down here I did some, I didn't
make the money that he made, but a lot of people knew that I was with a group that could
probably do some of the sounds which they did because I did a lot of arrangements. So I did a lot of things for commercials too. We had done some stuff for movies, Mr. Magoo's
thing and UPA and other things and they were very nice, the music. And Chico then did "Sweet Smell of Success"
with the group. The group was pretty popular, they said we
love that sound. MR: How did you learn your arranging skills? BC: Well actually I did a lot of studying
for the arranging and I was always beginning my writing when I was about 15 or 16, I used
to take a lot of things off the record. I guess that was training, hearing instead
of seeing what the parts looked like, and analyzing it from that see? So that helped a lot too. MR: I guess so. That's quite an ear exercise to sit with a
record and try to write down the parts. BC: Yeah, I used to do Jimmy Lunceford's stuff
when they had reed choruses. It was very difficult, so I had to wear out
a few records to hear it. MR: Was there much big band activity in Los
Angeles during those years, let's say early 50s? BC: The 50s I don't think too much. Well big bands were around rehearsing but
not too many of them were making any money. MR: Not making much money, right. BC: Every now and then, let's see, Benny Carter
would put a band together to go to Japan or somewhere, or he would do some jobs. MR: Can I talk about Charles Mingus for-
BC: Huh? MR: Can I talk about Charles Mingus for a
minute? BC: Okay. MR: You actually requested he switch to the
bass, or suggested that he move to the bass? BC: Well yeah, I really did. I think also my friend Britt Woodman, we kind
of came to the same thing, and he suggested the same thing. So we were trying to - who did it? I said well, I said we probably both did it. Because he did have a cello, but I said mine
was more like an ulterior motive. I mean so I had a band at age 12, and I met
Mingus when I was about 12, and before the band we had was a band with a bass tuba. And I was trying to get a string bass in the
band. So I was like saying, "Mingus, if you get
a bass, you'll have a job." I didn't mean you will just be a good bass
player, I guess we knew that because he had talent. I said, "If you can get your dad to trade
it in, I need a bass player right now." We had a little band, we were playing parties
at my mom's house and the neighbors, and in the neighborhood at house parties on weekends,
and they would hire us. So we did it without. We were just piano and saxophone and maybe
a trumpet or drummer. And then when we got the bass I knew that
would be great because that was a period, probably 1936, '37, where a song came out
called "Slap That Bass" and of course we were all aware of the string bass coming in and
somebody made a record for the period, where you slap the bass. MR: That was a pretty significant change when
it moved from the bass, from the tuba. BC: Yeah. So of course like I said I got stories where
I said I told him, which I really did see? And he actually worked about a week after
he got his bass with me. So I didn't say Britt didn't tell him, I just
knew, I said I really had a reason to - it's like telling anybody - I didn't tell anybody
else to get a bass. Most of them got a bass. But he was my buddy and he had this cello
and I said, "You've got to get rid of that and get a bass and you've got a job." And I think Mingus thought about it later
too that he probably, without telling me I did that, he felt that I had done so much
for him just by getting him the start so he went on up of course, and I guess the greater
he got, he said this guy got me into this. MR: He seemed like a fellow, from what I've
read, that was pretty centered on music and had trouble with other parts of his life,
just keeping it together. BC: Yeah. Well for example, yeah, and again he was the
kind of guy that he believed in me so much, plus if I'd tell him something I had to be
very careful, he would follow that right on through, if you ever had a person around you
like that. He'd say, "Well how can I be the best bass
player?" And I would try to tell him, you know just
what people would tell me, how can you be the best anything? I'd say well you have to get pieces you have
to work on, maybe practice six or eight hours a day and make sure you play in tune. I would tell him like you tell a student. And he would follow it. He would just get that in his mind and do
it see? Cut out everything else. He had two kids and he probably didn't pay
much attention to them at the time. And his wife was doing all the shopping and
cooking and all he was doing was trying to be a better musician. He didn't know where his socks were you know? He was that kind of guy. But when I was in the service he used to write
me letters, and they wouldn't start off like most letters, hello, how are you. He said, "You said that if I practice eight
hours a day I'd be one of the best musicians." It would just start off right in the middle. And he said, "I've done that, now I'm one
of the best players, and everybody's mad at me, because I tell them they should tune up
and they should practice and learn the instruments." So he was using that on everybody. So of course he didn't have very many friends. He got to be very tough with those same things. MR: Well if Buddy tells me to do it I guess
I'll tell everybody else that they should do it too, right? BC: Yeah. And then he'd get in fights because some of
them probably didn't like what I was saying. Especially if he's saying well what does he
know about that. But we had some great moments, some of these
things. MR: Did he call you out to New York? BC: For the Town Hall concert? MR: Yeah. BC: Yeah. MR: He felt that he needed you there. BC: He felt that he needed me. I knew he didn't need me as far as the music
goes. I mean in certain ways he liked to hear me
play then, but he had all the players, he had about 35 musicians or maybe 40, and ten
saxophones. So the producer from the record company, United
Artists I think, he got on the phone almost in tears and said, "Well look, we spent too
much money already. We can't send for anybody." I said, "Well you and Mingus figure that out." I said I didn't want to come anyway because
I was busy working, and I knew Mingus could kind of blow things, which he did that too. He got upset with George Wein and he was mad
because George Wein wanted a concert and Mingus wanted it to be an open recording session. MR: I see. BC: An open recording session. Mingus felt that the audience would like it
if he'd just start a piece and then stop and explain why he's stopping. He had all these creative ideas you know. Because what he did, he came out through the
mic in the beginning and he told the people he said, "Well now this is not going to be
a concert." The people started laughing because they thought
he was being funny, making jokes. He said, "This is going to be an open recording
session where we stop and tell you what we're doing." He said, "And George Wein said it's going
to be a concert, now if you want to go along with what George Wein said, you can get your
money and get out because it's not going to happen, it's not going to be a concert." MR: Wow. BC: So we played the first number in that
big band. What a band. You probably heard the line up. Probably Eddie Bert and-
MR: Clark Terry was on it? BC: Yeah Clark and Snooky Young, Ernie Royal,
Bernie Glow on trombones, Britt Woodman, Buddy Jackson - I can't think of the other trombone
player - but all the great guys. In the reed section there was Jerome Richardson,
Phil Woods, Pepper Adams, Eric Dolphy, I was there, on and on. MR: That's wild. BC: But it was a great band, but he stopped
every piece. He didn't record anything through. And he said, "I wouldn't buy that would you?" He asked the audience. And we were being baffled too because we had
no control. You know when a leader stops you, that's it. MR: I can't imagine, you guys just kind of
looking at each other going oh, what are we doing here. BC: Yeah. And I think the guys felt too if I was there,
a lot of this stuff wouldn't happen. That was the first time he kind of got me
caught in it. But I knew if I'd go there things could happen
see? Because I had no control. A lot of times I could talk to him on the
side and say let's don't do this. He'd threatened to quit at the rehearsals
three nights in a row because he said, "I don't want to do this because I don't want
to do a concert." And Jerome and I would go and have breakfast
with him and we'd talk to him and after we'd talk to him he'd be okay that next day. But it was rough. MR: And finally at the end of it - you guys
finally what, jumped into "In a Mellow Tone?" BC: "In a Mellow Tone." Clark Terry saved
us there. Well we had played all night and Mingus' uncle
was there also with a Dixieland band. He did a great job. And then we got back on about 11:00 and did
the same thing over and over until the people were getting so disgusted with the band, well
we just looked like we didn't know what we were doing up there. And all of a sudden the stage people began
to pull the curtain, because nothing was going on, I mean it was very embarrassing. So they thought they could get away with pulling
the curtain and get out of there. And then Clark, you know Clark, - "Mellow
Tone" he just started, you know, nobody told him to do it. He just felt well I've got to do something. And when he did that then the audience screamed
and everybody was hungry for some sounds and something to - and the band started jamming,
setting riffs and everything. It was terrific. So then the audience came and grabbed the
curtains and pulled them back and opened them back up again. It was almost like - it wasn't like a riot,
but it was great to see the tug of war between the stage hands and audience wanting to hear
music. They hadn't heard any all night except the
uncle of Mingus. So anyway, that was the real piece, and everybody
soloed and jammed. Then Mingus finally came back on with his
bass, Milt Hinton and George Duvivier and all those bass players, he had about five
bass players. It was unbelievable, Joe Benjamin. MR: What a scene. Oh boy. Tell me about your entrance into the studio
scene. Your reading skills obviously became quite
important. BC: Yeah, well they were pretty important. When I came back from the service, in the
service I began to read because we played march music and concert band stuff, and I
played clarinet. I didn't play flute then but we began to play,
I was first clarinet player, and Jerome and Jackie, we all played together and we were
very competitive with each other. We all could play well and read. We'd do duets with each other and all that
kind of stuff. So all the guys could read quite well. So when I came home I figured well if nothing
more I'll try to get in the studio because that'll be some good work. I'd heard about it you know. I knew there weren't too many blacks in the
studio at the time, but I figured if you could read and you can do the business part making
time and everything, and knew how to get along, it shouldn't be any problem, it was just a
matter of people finding out you can do that. So when I came home we had a two-fold thing. We cut this band at Down Beat called the Stars
of Swing. That was a great band with Lucky Thompson
who was in town then, Britt Woodman, Spaulding Gibbons, Oscar Bradley, so it was a seven
piece group, four horns and three rhythm. Terrific group. In fact, Charlie Parker and Eric and a bunch
of the guys would be in there every night because the band was so good. We rehearsed for about a month every day. Lucky Thompson had arrangements he had done
and there were some by Jimmy Mundy. I'd done quite a few arrangements, Mingus
had arrangements, Spaulding Gibbons was a good writer, so John Anderson was the trumpet
player, so we had great stuff and it was all right after the bop period, after Diz and
them had been there. Not that we were trying to play what they
were doing, we harmonized with the four part harmony and with the kind of sounds we all
had it was much more melodic, warmer. You just couldn't believe, it was such a beautiful
sound. When the club owners came down, the club owner
and the boss of the club came down, I mean the manager and the club owner, they heard
it, their mouths fell open because - we hadn't heard anything quite like that either. It got so good. But nobody had that much to do other than
just rehearse every day, five or six hours with the band, and the shading and everything,
so it was great. Britt was playing good and with a lot of originals. And the people just were there every night
and like I said Parker was in front and everybody would come in and they'd all be listening
to that band. One of the great bands of all time. It didn't get recorded. MR: Oh that's a shame. BC: It's a shame. The record people came in and heard it and
they didn't know what to call it. MR: There you go. BC: They were afraid, they said what can we
call it? They said well it sounds okay, but what is
it? It was just good music. They didn't want that. MR: They needed a name. BC: Um hum. MR: Post-bop? I guess it was too early for post-bop, huh? BC: Yeah. But anyway it was a great band. I wish they had recorded it. But we did do an album, we did two sides I
think, "Laura" is one, when "Laura" had come out, Spaulding did an arrangement of "Laura,"
it was unbelievable, the arrangement, with the four horns. He had them, the way he wrote it, he'd be
playing the melody and then another horn would just take it off and, the way it was interwoven
between the different horns. And for a while we couldn't play it. We could read it but it just wouldn't work. Because he had this crazy idea that it would
work if we just listened to each other and got used to it. And he was right. Because we had to keep trying to play it. And finally we'd say well now you're playing
too strong there, and then they'd have to listen and finally know that you had the next
part that would take over the melody. And if one person didn't do it right it wouldn't
work. MR: Gee. I wonder if that music is still around? Do you think it still exists? BC: I don't know. We did some great stuff in those days with
a band called Joe Swanson, he was the leader. Joe Swanson couldn't play very well though. There was a lady there with quite a bit of
money that wanted him to have a band. And he had a guy named Paul Villipeig, do
you know that name? MR: No, sorry. BC: Oh he was a great arranger. I think he committed suicide later. But I mean who knows what his other problems
were, but he could sure write. And he wrote for that band and we had, I know
I was there, John Ewing the trombone player and I don't think Lucky was there, maybe Teddy
Edwards or somebody, but what a band. And then Mingus did some early stuff too for
I don't know what record was it - I've got the tape at home by the way, I should remember
it. MR: You were pretty much one of the first
black musicians to get into the studios. BC: Probably on a steady basis, yeah. Because I was doing studio work and I got
hired by Jerry Fielding to do "The Groucho Marx Show." That was at CBS at first and then moved to
NBC. "You Bet Your Life." MR: Yeah. This was live television? BC: Once a week, yeah. For about ten years. It was a good job because at that time, when
we were off 13 weeks - I know we were 13 weeks off so what was it about 50 weeks, or no not
50, about 40, 43. And we didn't start anything but the producer
would say, "What are you guys going to do with your 13 weeks off?" And we'd say, "We don't know, we'll try to
work." And they said, "Well we could pay you, you
know." They were being sponsored by Plymouth and
Dodge at the time. They were supposed to give us a Plymouth apiece
too. We never got the cars. But I mean they were just nice in those days,
they just thought that we were all part of the family. MR: They just offered, huh? BC: Yeah, so they offered. And later on there was re-uses and things. But at that time they said, "We'll just pay
you guys while you're off so you'll have some money to live on." Some of us could work but of course we just
said hey, we'll take it. MR: Wow. Good deal. When you had a group that you wanted to really
get on record, what was it like trying to find a record label here? BC: Oh well I didn't really shop that much
but what happened is I did a thing for Les Keating, a record with Spud Murphy. I played flute on one of his things. And Les was the kind of a guy that he could
hear you and maybe like you, but he was still kind of a little afraid to just take a chance. If he liked you enough he would. He liked Shelly Manne of course, Shelly was
one of the guys, and Andre Previn, but he didn't know me at all. I had no name at the time. But Spud liked me. So Spud said, "Here's one of the guys you
should record." And that meant a lot for Spud to tell him
that he should record me, "because he's got it." So all of a sudden Les called me and said,
"I'd like to do an album with you." But then when I did the album he didn't quite
like what I had done. That was "A Man of Many Parts," my first album. It was a great album, and I had a lot of great
guys on, but he didn't know them either. Jerome Wilson playing trumpet, Red Callender
on the bass, Larry Bunker, I had a lot of people. Bill Green on the alto and tenor. Jule Grant. These were all great players that I knew but
they weren't names that Les would get excited about. So I guess he thought he had blown it by recording
me. He listened to the music and the music wasn't
like he thought the West Coast jazz should be. He had that in his mind because he had heard
Shelly, he had heard Andre, he had heard the lighthouse guys, but here I had different
kind of stuff. But I was doing stuff that was not that different. But I had tried it out on the guys and people
for a long time and it was working, the kind of music I'd write. And so what happened is that near the end
of the session after the second day, I could see Les' face was getting long. It was almost like he was not going to like
this at all. It was just that he thought that I was bringing
him something other than jazz. I tried a couple of things, one with flute
called "Jungle Pipe" and the flute I was just playing it kind of differently, you know I
didn't try to play just like a flute, I had a little rhythmic things and sounds going
on. And so at the end of the thing I could see
that he was unhappy. I says, "What's the matter, Les?" He said, "Well I thought that you're going
to bring me a jazz album." And I said, "I did." I mean, "You don't think so?" He says, "And also I don't know the guys you
brought." I said, "These are all jazz players." He was really puzzled. He was trying to compare it to something he
had heard. And so I could see he was unhappy. He said, "I thought you were bringing me a
jazz album." I said, "Well I thought I did." So I was so unhappy with him, I just said,
"Well okay, I hope we're still friends." And I didn't talk to him for about a week
or so and he called me on the phone, maybe two weeks, because I was unhappy and I figured
wow. And when you do your first album, I put everything
into that, a lot of stuff that he couldn't hear. Well he said the album was strong, well it's
still strong now after being your first album. But what happened is he called me and he said,
"Okay, I've had a chance to listen and I've had two or three of the guys listen with me,
Andre and Shelly and the guys and they like you a lot and they think that it's a good
album." He says, "I've begun to kind of like it too." And I still didn't feel safe you know. But he called me back in and I did one other
album with him, but at least the album got great reviews. It got the top number of stars at that time. They were playing it on the radio. It was almost like an album that-
MR: Was this "Tanganyika?" BC: No. "Man of Many Parts." MR: Oh "Man of Many Parts," okay so 1956 I
think. BC: Yeah. MR: Yeah. It's a good title. BC: What's that? MR: I said I like the title. BC: "Man of Many Parts?" MR: Yeah. BC: It was Lester's. He named it that. MR: Yeah. BC: I mean after he liked it, yeah, he got
with it. But it was a good album. Jimmy Lyons, I guess it was Jimmy Lyons, or
was that - MR: Yeah, he was the jazz DJ? BC: Yeah. What's the other guy, the writer for the San
Francosco Chronicle? MR: Gleason? BC: Ralph Gleason, yeah. Thank you. I'm forgetting good names. Ralph Gleason did a write up on that jazz
album in the Chronicle. I couldn't believe it. Everything was happening for me then. And the title says the Buddy Collette album
is all you could want. MR: All right. BC: I mean what a title, you know? MR: Did you save any of those clips now? Do you have any of them? BC: Oh somewhere, yeah. But I'd have to sort of dig them out. You know when you save things, things are
on top of other things, unless you can figure, well you can put it on the wall I guess. But anyway that was great. Les and everybody loved that album. And most of the jazz stations, it wasn't like
now, we've got about one jazz station. There were quite a few little small, different
hours. They were all riding that album. They wouldn't just play one track, they'd
play the whole, one side. You know that was a big LP. And then I guess in Gleason's thing he sounded
like I had arrived. I was not just here, I was in the league of
Teddy Wilson and Benny Carter, he named all the giants see? So that did wonders too. It just kind of moved me from wherever I was
into, without me working very hard, you know I guess my approach to the music and everything,
it was very musical I think, more than anything. I had worked with some of those guys, especially
with Benny I had worked with him, and doing that - you know I was still on the show with
Groucho and everything. I was working with first rate musicians so
my taste was pretty good I think, and I wasn't rough and the way the music was, I played
great music. Jerry Fielding always wrote great stuff for
the saxes and everything. So I was influenced by a lot of that. MR: Gee you're one of the first jazz flute
players. Where did you - did you hear anybody else
doing it before you? BC: Yes I did. The first one I think was Waymon Carter. Is that his name? Carver. MR: Carver. BC: Carver was with Earl Hines but I didn't
hear him very much, maybe on Skylark or something, just little fills here and there. Then I heard Harry Klee, who passed away maybe
a year or so ago. Harry Klee worked a lot with Nelson Riddle. He did something with Lee Young's band, "Route
de Flute" he called it. It was kind of like a chorus or two, and he
did a very good job. So it made me think about it. And I don't know when I heard Frank Wess,
much later of course, but Frank is a dynamite player. And I also heard Julius Baker and he did something
of Alec Wilder's. It was where I think Alec did this piece,
there was a different instrument on each track, oboe, clarinet, flute and maybe trumpet. And that was the first time I heard a flute
play a long time, you know, usually a flute from a symphony orchestra, you'd have a little
bird call or something. MR: Right. BC: So are you a flutist too? MR: Yes, I play some, yeah. BC: Saxophone, flute, okay. MR: I wanted to play a little piece, as long
as we're on the subject. BC: Okay. MR: Totally improvised? BC: This is, yeah. I wish I could write that way too. MR: Good point. It's great. That was like, I just love that. Like how did he know to do that right then? It just seems to fit so well. BC: Well we knew each other pretty well. See he'll change tempos anytime, and as you
know with the way time is, I could play slow or fast, and he could -.
MR: Right, so this is off the "Reunion" album. And you had just about, let's see, for the
exception of one fellow, this was the original -
BC: Except for Jim Hall. He had John Procento. The other guys were all there. But Jim wouldn't go, he didn't want to go
back. MR: He didn't want to go back to re-visit
something. BC: Yeah. He liked Chico and they liked each other but
he didn't want to go with any of that anymore. Well I understand in a way, it was a big switch. I went back only because I set this up when
I was in Europe. A fellow from Verona, a guy that does jazz
there, he said, "Who can you bring here that would get a big crowd?" And I was just being as truthful as I could
by saying, "Well I could bring my group but in order to get a big crowd you'd do better
with the Chico Hamilton quintet because the band never got to Europe when we were playing
before. So he got excited right then. He said, "You think you can get him?" I said if I can talk to Chico to do it, because
Chico's not playing that way now. He only plays that way if we meet up. But he likes doing that. In fact he wanted just to do that, he and
I would go to Europe, and play like that every night. I said no because I'd lose too much, meaning
that after a while you want some other horns to come in. But we can do that in between. MR: Yeah that's the beauty of that, it's a
change in texture. BC: And sometimes it's unbelievable. This was good. We did a thing at my birthday party about
four or five years ago at the Wadsworth Theater, and we had the band there and a lot of bands,
and all of a sudden when he got on he looked at me and I knew he wanted to do one of those. And we did one that was unbelievable also. MR: I had one more little selection here. This is quite different I thought, and I noticed
- see if you recognize this. MR: One of the many sessions you've done,
this is all clarinets, with Hammiet. BC: Yeah, some of these things I've never
heard. MR: You've never heard them, yeah? BC: Well maybe when we recorded them. MR: I think that's you right there. The notation on the album wasn't quite sure. BC: That's me, right. I kind of know the way I sound, at least I
used to. It's good to hear that because I don't listen
as much now. MR: Do you listen to your own music at home? BC: No. MR: Well you should, I think you're pretty
good. BC: Well thank you. Well to tell you the truth, nowadays I hear
that playing and I'm just wondering, boy that was much better than I thought. MR: Well that particular album was pretty
experimental I think, if I recall. BC: It had some good players on there. MR: Yeah. It was a live concert, wasn't it? BC: Yes. It was a live concert. Mostly what you've got is a young guy, he's
playing good now? MR: Byron? BC: Yeah. MR: I can't recall. BC: Was the first name Byron or last name
Byron? MR: His last name is Byron. BC: He plays a lot of the Klezmer stuff. MR: Well that just kind of shows how many
different areas you've been into. BC: Oh yeah, lots of things. But yeah, that did sound pretty good. That was my approach to the clarinet. It's different in a sense but I don't know,
but I'm drawing from a lot of different areas, you're right. Naturally I heard Goodman and Shaw and all
those guys, and Barney Bigard and Jimmy Hamilton. You put all that together and you've got a
big span of sounds. And then doing a lot of the classical stuff
too. MR: What were some of the films you recall
playing on in the studio work? BC: Some of the films? MR: Yeah. BC: In the series we did, with Oliver Nelson,
"The Six Million Dollar Man" and those, yeah. And also some things with Henry Mancini, "Peter
Gunn" things, some of those. Quincy Jones "Ironside" or something, whatever
he was doing. Benny Carter, we were doing "Chrysler Presents,"
the singer Wiley? MR: Lee Wiley? BC: Yeah, "The Lee Wiley Story." Benny did the music and I played the tenor,
Jack Sheldon played the trumpet, and let's see what else. We did one thing called, gosh that guy from
New York came out, it was "77 Park Avenue" with Lee Ann Warren. It was great. The Nelson Riddle band and the producer wanted
a sound kind of like either Coleman Hawkins or Ben Webster, New York 50s, that's what
he called it. And so Nelson, as sharp as he was, certain
things he didn't get into. He just used guys he thought, he might have
used, it's hard to say who, but guys were playing like Lester and playing like many
people. But this guy who wanted that sound knew that
sound. That was the meat of the picture. And so I got the call about the third day,
after about two or three guys had gotten the ax. You know the guy said, "That's not it." It wasn't that they couldn't play, but he
just said it's either that sound or it isn't. So when Nelson saw me that day he met me at
the door, he just waited for me. So when he saw me coming he said, "Can you
sub that low B on your horn?" I said, "I think so." MR: He wanted that -.
BC: Yeah. Because it was a certain sound that those
guys had done, you know, those guys that could play that way. Both of them, they could get down there and
it wasn't a harsh thing. So I kept wondering. I still didn't have any clue exactly what
they wanted except that sound, Hawkins and Webster. So I figured well heck I should be able to
do it. It didn't sound like it'd be too much technique. But he had written stuff all day that was
hard, piccolo and flute and everything, and I'm a part of that too, right? Harry Klee, Willie Schwartz and those guys. I'm playing all of them. And I'm wondering why have they got me here,
what am I going to do? They waited until after lunch and they brought
out this piece, Cue 34 whatever, 348. And I'm looking at it and it looks familiar. And guess what, it's "Body and Soul" but it's
in the key of D instead of B flat. In a D concert of course. And that was nice too because it was kind
of a treat to have that. Nelson did it I think maybe because of the
strings and the set ups with the strings. He wrote pretty well for strings, get them
in sharp keys. So as I played it over just one time and I
began to feel very comfortable, this is going to be a breeze, and maybe I was enjoying it
more because it was fresh, but gosh if I knew "Body and Soul" of course this was going to
be a real treat. And the bridge went to E flat I guess. So anyway we played it once and it sounded
gorgeous except I knew at that point I didn't really want to rehearse it. You know? Why rehearse it? It was written, a few little chords here on
the end there's a little cadenza, and I'd be wasting stuff that I thought, was just
running through my head. He says, "You want to do another one?" I said, "No, why don't we make it." He says, "What!" I said, "Yeah." The producer is still in the booth. He didn't come out. So the lights turned on and this is my time
to really go why wait. The lights are on now this is it. And it was so beautiful. Those strings - I heard what they were going
to be playing, those nice lush chords - I could do a little stuff that wasn't too fast
or too fantastic, just kind of milk it a little bit. And when the tape was over on the end, I did
an ending that I didn't want to rehearse and let them see that I had to do the same thing
or something, or something similar. I just did something pretty and didn't want
to repeat it there for you. You know how you can do that. That's just part of a performer. So after the lights went out, you know the
red light, the guy ran out of the booth and came and grabbed me and said, "That's it." MR: You've got it. You nailed it, huh? BC: Yeah I nailed it. And the guys were hitting their little caps
on the stand, the reed players, "Man you did it, we knew you could do it." And I said, "That was the easiest thing I
did all day." Not saying - which it was, because that sound,
if you got that sound you're halfway there, and I just played some pretty tenor. Stay in the low register. So Nelson came over and shook my hand and
said, "Yeah that's what we wanted." And I kept, you know I shouldn't have said
too much, I said "yeah but I do that, I mean I got a chance to hear those guys." MR: Nelson. What a great writer he was. BC: Big talent, yeah. MR: Did you play on that record he called
- it had "Flute Salad" on it and "Adventures"- Oh I'm trying to remember. It had a big band on it with French horns. BC: "Flute Salad?" MR: "Flute Salad" was one of the numbers,
and "Girl Talk." BC: I might have, yeah. MR: I think you were on that. It's a great album. BC: Yeah he was a talented writer all right. But it was an interesting personality. Kind of dry and his tempos were very weird. On the records we would do pretty well. We'd finally get a tempo that worked. But to go out on the road with his band which
we did, he'd keep going 1-2-3-4 without even getting a beat going. You know every night, I mean you'd kind of
hear him do something. He'd just say 1-2-3-4 -. Sometimes it would
be slow, or it would have no punch and would almost be dying right there. And they didn't have the kind of drummer that
- you know some drummers will kind of beat it up. MR: Boost it up to where it's supposed to
be. BC: Where it feels a little better. But as I say he could write though. I loved his writing, especially for vocalists,
especially Sinatra and a few of them. Nat Cole he wrote well too but Nat was so
talented, you didn't have to write much for Nat. You'd just write the whole notes and Nat would
make a hit of it, he was so musical is what I'm saying. He could sing almost any song. And I guess for a while they didn't think
of him as a singer. But when he first started singing he had whatever
singers need. He could feel the rhythm and find the tempo
and everything. But Nels would, he knew how to fill in behind
a singer. And that's why he was great for Sinatra. After Sinatra didn't have the long notes,
over the period. In the beginning he had long, long breath
notes and his voice was so clear he used to booze it up a little bit you know of course. But Nelson knew how to fill in to make him
still sound straight. I've got you - he'd fill there you know - under
my skin. He was cutting everything off. But as long as an arranger, it's like a tailor
fitting you with the clothes. And that's why I played with both of those
singers, Sinatra and Nat, and I'd sit there and say boy Sinatra really knows how to get
Nelson to write for him, and Nat didn't seem to care. It was a good arrangement, the chords were
good, but not a lot of movement, not a lot of ideas, just everything was right. But I think Sinatra worked with him and said
I've got to have that thing to fit me. But he was talented because he made a lot
of them sound good. MR: Most of those records with Sinatra, were
they done live? Was he there or was the background laid down
first? BC: He loved the band to be live. MR: Yeah. BC: Yeah. In fact, many times he wasn't on target, he
would just quit. He would say, "Let's cut it tonight" and then
we'd go back the next night and start it again. His voice might have cracked or something. But he liked a lot of band because the band,
I mean a live band, because the band would kind of work him into it. But he was pretty strong on tempos. His tempo, Sinatra, you know he liked the
two-four beat. When he would do that he would finally get
the band because that wasn't where Nelson would put it. You would see a night and day between the
time we'd rehearse it with Nelson and then by the time Frank started singing it, he would
start popping his finger, and he could do the drummer - Irv Cottler or somebody like
that, and they'd have the beat going. So it would have different energy. MR: It sounds like he learned it from Basie. BC: Maybe, yeah. MR: Boy, this has really been fascinating. I had a couple of other things to ask you,
and then we should probably have your lunch. BC: You mean it showed up? Well I can do it either way. MR: You had mentioned also something in the
book about Bird's explanation of his nickname. Do you mind relating that to me? BC: Yeah I don't mind doing that because I
just got a thing from a guy from MAP, which is Musician's Assistance Program, and he is
a wild guy, his name is Buddy Arnold, who's sort of been in that wild life, you know with
the dope and the cocaine and whatever and the needles. And he also went into the story on Bird, which
is so different than what I tell. And I only tell this because Bird told it
to me. He said something about Bird was driving his
car and he hit a chicken in the road. And he said, "That would be dinner." So it was like all he did was get in his car
and drive. How do you hit a chicken in the road? I mean that's hard to do I think. But when Bird had this meeting with Jimmy
Cheatham, who is a trombone player, and Stream Man Ewing, he said that all those stories
are phony. He said that's not what happened. He said when he was 14 years old he used to
go out to the park in the snow with a couple of his buddies, a drummer sometimes or a guitar
player or a bass player or sometimes all three of them. Before school, at 6, 7 in the morning sometimes,
so they could get a little practice in because at home they couldn't get it in. They'd get home from school and they'd have
to do work, so they'd get this hour or two early to play, just jam and do tunes and things. And he said that the neighbors could hear
them. They were about a half a mile from the residential
area, playing in the morning. The cops would come by and he said sometimes
they would even be getting high at that time. They'd wave to them. They were just friendly neighborhood kids
and they'd be jamming. So they said the neighbors called him the
Bird. Oh that's just the Bird out there practicing
in the morning. So it was a kind of a cute story for even
kids. They wanted to play so much that they would
go out there, but that horn would always be going. He said sometimes he'd be out there by himself
but most of the time he'd get the drummer or somebody to go with him. MR: That's very interesting. BC: And with the way he'd played he could
say that. He didn't just play like regular, he had all
kinds of little things he was always doing -. And little things like that again. They'd say, "The Bird is in the park again." And when Leonard Feather, who you probably
knew or knew about, he saw my little clip on that and he was kind of shocked. He said, "Boy I've never heard this story. Where did you get this from?" I said, "Bird told me." He said, "Well I never heard this before." I said, "Well no." And then somebody else came up to me about
a year ago and said he was talking to Jay McShann and he said, "Jay McShann never heard
this story." I said either Bird is making stories up on
himself, right, or I'm making one up on him, for what reason? And I said, "Well when did Jay McShann meet
Bird?" I said, "Was he 20 or was he 14?" He said he was probably about 20 or 21. I said well this happened when he was 14. So I was just trying to let him know that
I didn't try to make this story to get any publicity on me. But he told me a lot of stories, Bird did,
at the time. MR: You mentioned a term when you were talking
about getting into the studio. And you mentioned the term "making time,"
that in addition to being a good reader, the fellows that wanted to get into the studio
had to make time. BC: I used that just today. MR: Yeah. BC: Well making time was something very important,
I realized it too. Me being in the service I realized it more
because in the service we had to make time. You know if the flag goes up at 8:00 and I
had a band, I'd have to have the guys out there and we'd have to hit. If we were late one day you'd hear about it. It was one of those things, you didn't want
to be late. So making time, if you got studio calls at
8:00, that's usually the earliest, maybe you'd have a 7:00 but usually it was 8:00, which
means you've got to get out of the house, get your coffee or your doughnut or whatever
it is, and be ready to play. You don't run in there at 8. They don't like that. In fact you could lose your job that way. They just won't call you. The contractor is worried to death when he
doesn't see you in your chair. So making time was a big part of it. I saw a lot of guys bomb out. They were good players but they said well
they can't get here. So most of the guys that made it well could
do both, they could play and they could be there. And you felt comfortable that they could read
the part. Even Pete Candoli who was a great, great trumpet
player, maybe he had an act though, he would maybe stand outside the door until it was
about five minutes of and then walk in, you know, because he always wanted to be kind
of a star. But they don't like that. Even though you're there, they like to see
you early so everybody can relax and the music goes well. MR: Leave your ego at the door, who said that? BC: Oh yeah, I play that too, don't bring
it in, right? MR: Well this has really been a great pleasure
for me. BC: Well I hope it's okay. It was a pleasure meeting you. MR: You know I just have been looking forward
to this and you know you've made quite a reputation for yourself not only in music but with the
amalgamation of the union and all of that, it's great work. BC: Well it's interesting, this, with especially
not being able to play and I've been going through this, not quite a year, almost, this
month it will be a year. And a lot of the things I've been doing, where
they're honoring me and things, every night there's something in the mail, something yesterday
or the day before, The Urban League, who I work for, they're having a whole day for me. They said don't do anything, just come and
have food and sit and enjoy, we're going to have music for you and everything. So a lot of things have happened, so a lot
of people do know some of the things we've been doing. You know, a lot of teaching for the young
kids, and we do that even when there's no money there. And it's only because I enjoy it. And then like I say you look up and you've
got great players who come back and it's amazing how many of them have come to help me and
I think one of the guys in the service, when I was teaching, he said, "Why do you teach
musicians? Do you want them to grow up and get good and
take your work?" And I said, "Well I never think of it that
way, I figure that there's plenty of work. You can only be in one job at a time, and
I mean with Eric and with Charles Lloyd and a bunch of those guys, they all used to give
me jobs too when sometimes they couldn't make it. But you know James Newton, the same thing,
when I went to Europe about '88 I think it was, James had talked about me in every town,
because he was sounding great and is a great player. But he used to interview, but he'd always
say, "When I went to Buddy, he wouldn't even charge me at times." And I'd forgotten about that. Only there would be times when I could see
that he didn't have the money, and he said, "I had to come but I haven't been working." He said, "I've been going to school and I've
been really practicing a lot." And I said, "Well just go ahead, you'll make
it fine." You know, things like that you just do because
he needed it at the period where he had to come to his lesson but maybe the money was
his last money that week. But you know, so we did a record together
in '88 for Soul Note I think it was. And when I got in all those cities and we
met up together, he used to go on first and play and then he'd say, "Yeah but you haven't
heard anything until you hear my teacher" or something you know. But those are things that you don't expect
to get but it's nice, because it does. In Germany I think it was in Freiberg, it's
amazing, the town opened up, you know when that happens to you. I had a whole house. A young lady and a guy picked me up and they
took me to this house and she opened the door and gave me the key and said this is your
house. The people here, the wife is a flutist and
the husband is the doctor, and they want you to be happy. They had to go out of town but they want you
to stay here, and I had a whole week at the house. And the greatest thing was like I said, everything
was there. He was even my size, I think he had some great
leather jackets, I tried them on because they were on the rack. And there it was so great, when I walked out
on the stage, because there was four flutes there, Paul Horn was there, James Newton,
Danny Manzano and I was there. But they knew about me and in the write-ups
James had been talking about me so long, and they knew Chico Hamilton or whatever they
knew. But when I hit the stage, the audience stood
up, I didn't even hit a note yet. That's never happened. Usually you play and you hope you get a little
something. But I walked out and they were ready. MR: That's great. BC: It's nice when you get things like that. MR: Well when you spend your life doing good
work, I think eventually it comes around and you get some recognition. BC: Yeah there's one other story that might
be interesting, at least I thought it was when I went to the Hague the first time, which
was in '88. Now most of the musicians had played the Hague
many times. You've been there I guess? MR: No I haven't. BC: Yeah, well it's unbelievable, there's
all kinds of band. They have it staggered where for example at
the time that Miles was playing is 8:00, maybe Dizzy's playing at 8:30. They both play an hour, but you have a chance
to get a little Miles and then you could run and catch the last "But It Is" you know, so
you don't miss everybody. But anyways, in the lobby of the - I can't
think of the hotel where the musicians all stay - there could be 2 or 300 musicians in
the lobby just having fun with the beer and drinking and having fun and ladies, their
friends. And I walked in there one day and naturally
I knew all the guys and I was saying hello. And all of a sudden one guy looked at me,
he must have been a writer or a reporter or something. And he says, "You Buddy Collette?" I said, "Yeah, why?" He says, "We've never seen you here." I said, "Well I've never been here." So in two minutes he had about 30 guys over
there, of his buddies, saying, "That's Buddy." Because I hadn't been, you know it was my
first time in Europe alone. I had gone to Italy in '61 but that wasn't
like this. So what happened was the guys all converged
on me with the cameras, and you know 30 guys or so, all trying to get shots of me. MR: Isn't that something? BC: So Diz walks through, and Miles too, and
they said, "How do you rate, what's going on here?" I said, "Well you guys are here all the time,
they haven't seen me before." And it was that kind of thing. It was very special even to see that. It was almost like they had a new find here. Because they hadn't seen me. They knew the name, so one guy tells the guy
who I am and they come and said, "We've never seen him." MR: That's great. Well you deserve it. BC: Yeah but it was very rewarding you know. I had never been to England and some of the
guys from there were with the cameras and everything, took a lot of shots. But I hope to continue of course. MR: Yeah? Well I wish you a lot of luck and I'm sure
we'll be hearing some more from you in the future. BC: Thank you, Monk. Yeah I hope so. Well, a pleasure. MR: Thank you so much.
