Leonard Feather Blindfold Tests

[Plays "No Wine, No Women" by Mr. Google Eyes, from No Wine, No Women/Rough and Rocky Road, Okeh Records (1951). Personnel: Billy Ford and His Musical V-8's.]

Leonard Feather: You like that kind of music?

Lester Young: I do, but I mean it's kind of over my head, you know?

Leonard Feather: Over your head or under it?

Lester Young: Over it. That's way over my head. But it's nice, I like them. But I can't get at that rhythm that goes like that.

Leonard Feather: That shuffle rhythm.

Lester Young: Yeah. That's the only thing, other than that I could make it.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: If it was straight rhythm or something like that but that...

Leonard Feather: Monotonous.

Lester Young: Yeah. What class? Just give them a number. The way I would say it. Yes.

Leonard Feather: Two stars then?

Lester Young: Yeah, mm-hmm.

Leonard Feather: What did you think of the...

Lester Young: I thought all of it was nice. Just other than the-

Leonard Feather: Other than the rhythm.

Lester Young: ... the rhythm. You dig? It would've been much better if they hadn't of had that kind of rhythm, just a straight line. Hit it like that.

[Plays "Little Pony" by Count Basie, from Little Pony/Beaver Junction, Columbia Records (1951). Personnel: Wardell Gray, tenor saxophone; Neil Hefti, arranger.]

Lester Young: That's real crazy.

Leonard Feather: Mm-hmm.

Lester Young: Mm-hmm. I like that jazz. I think I heard it once in Chicago.

Leonard Feather: Yeah? You know what it is?

Lester Young: The only thing I would say would be Woody Herman or either Stan Kenton. That's about my best bet.

Leonard Feather: You don't know the guitar player?

Lester Young: No, all I know is the name of the tenor player. But it sounds crazy, the way the arrangements and things are. I think that's real great.

Leonard Feather: All right.

Lester Young: Yeah.

Leonard Feather: I like it too.

Lester Young: I do like that. In fact I'm going to get the address from you so I can get the record.

Leonard Feather: I'll get one of them for you. You're the foreman, huh?

Lester Young: Sure.

Leonard Feather: What was that? You missed the prize again.

[Plays "Tia Juana" by Bud Freeman, unknown record, Decca records (unknown year). Personnel: Bud Freeman, tenor saxophone; PeeWee Russell, clarinet.]

Leonard Feather: Well that's a different style of music.

Lester Young: Yeah, I'll go for that too. I like it because we play it in Chicago with [Margarite Thanner]. And they was wailing with the Dixieland arena. People like things like that, it's real nice. I think it's crazy jazz.

Leonard Feather: You think it's done well in there?

Lester Young: Sure.

Leonard Feather: Do you like Bud...?

Lester Young: Who is that Bud Freeman?

Leonard Feather: Well, if it's Bud.

Lester Young: Yeah, whoever it is. Yeah, I thought it was nice. When they got to the solos and things. Yeah, I thought it was real nice.

Leonard Feather: Did you ever hear that style of tenor playing a long time ago?

Lester Young: Like that?

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: That's played there?

Leonard Feather: Uh-huh.

Lester Young: Sure, and all the time it used to be Bud Freeman. Didn't he used to play with Tommy Dorsey?

Leonard Feather: Yeah, that's right.

Lester Young: Or something like that. And I use to hear them when they used to play those records and things like that. Nobody never played like them so I like the style. It's a style of his own.

Leonard Feather: Individual, yeah.

Lester Young: Sure, like that. It was his own style. I don't think you could say nothing but it's nice.

Leonard Feather: What would you give it then?

Lester Young: I think on account of the Dixieland, I think. I say three, that's a nice size.

Leonard Feather: Okay. Fair enough.

[Plays "Corcovado" by Artie Shaw, from Modern Music for Clarinet, Columbia Records (1950). Personnel: Artie Shaw's Orchestra conducted by Walter Hendl.]

Lester Young: All the layers, I think that's real nice. The clarinet, and I don't know the band or nothing like that. But it's beautiful music, I like that too.

Leonard Feather: That's really classical.

Lester Young: Yeah, I don't know what it is, but I think it's so pretty.

Leonard Feather: Mm-hmm.

Lester Young: That's nice.

Leonard Feather: Yeah, I like the people who flavor it with a classical component.

Lester Young: No, I never been into that, into the classical.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: I wouldn't know what to say. Because I never dug that deep.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: Yeah, I'd give them four, whoever it is. I don't know who the band is, but it sure is pretty. I'm going to try to get the record too, yeah.

[Plays "Mordido" by Norman Granz' Jazz At The Philharmonic, from Norman Granz' Jazz At The Philharmonic Vol. 9, Mercury Records (1949). Personnel: Ray Brown, bass; Jo Jones, drums; Hank Jones, tenor saxophone; Flip Phillips, tenor saxophone; Illinois Jacquet, tenor saxophone; Bill Harris, trombone; Howard McGhee, trumpet.]

Lester Young: The only time I ever let Buddy play the drums was with Tommy Dorsey. Right.

Leonard Feather: The only ones we discussed was the trumpet I think. Do you know who that was?

Lester Young: The trumpet that was playing on there?

Leonard Feather: Yeah, the first time.

Lester Young: I think I would go just one, and I'd say Al Killion. Other than that, I'll put it down.

Leonard Feather: Okay, yeah. Do you think the whole performance sounds good on record?

Lester Young: I have to. That's my people.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: So I have to say it. That's what makes a great artist.

Leonard Feather: You like the... I know what I want to ask you now, though. What do you think about the general new school of tenor playing, all these young kids like the Four Brothers and Ollie? The whole new school of tenors who were inspired by you.

Lester Young: Uh-huh, everybody want to ask me that. I'll tell you, they just fascinate me. Because I hear little things that I've played. And it just knocks me out, things like that.

Leonard Feather: Do you like the way the tenor is going down?

Lester Young: Sure. I always liked it like that, do you know what I mean? Because when I first came to New York, I got boos because I didn't play like Coleman Hawkins. I used to do a lot of teardrops behind that. But I say some people just don't have eyes for certain things. Just listen, the way you feel. When I hear those people play like that, I'll go and buy their records too and things, and sit up and listen. And it knocked me out.

Leonard Feather: What records do you buy?

Lester Young: Records?

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: Just the ones I like, same way like you playing now. If I hear one and I like it or something, or they play one over the radio or something, I'll go and get it, something like that. I like to be mostly a variety. I wouldn't like to get hung up with one thing. That's why I speak like that.

Leonard Feather: I've played quite a wide of variety of things and you like almost all of them.

Lester Young: That's right. Mm-hmm, just all music. And all day and all night, the music and things. It's just like that.

Leonard Feather: Do you have any particular all-time favorite record that I can put down?

Lester Young: Record?

Leonard Feather: Yeah, like a thing that you wanted to give 12 stars to. Including your own, if you like.

Lester Young: No, not myself. I don't never go like that. But just you'd be surprised. Do you have the record by Al Hibbler?

Leonard Feather: Which one?

Lester Young: Something like the stars fell raining and something, he was in the jail in his cell.

Leonard Feather: Is that Teardrops of Love? No.

Lester Young: No, it's not off that.

Leonard Feather: Probably, is it a blues?

Lester Young: It's a blues. Yeah, have you heard that?

Leonard Feather: I'm not sure if I know that one, no.

Lester Young: Yeah, Al Hibbler, yeah. It's real crazy. That's the way I buy them. I hear one and I'll go to the store and get it then. That way. But it says something like the storm was shining and something, and I sit here in my cell. It's beautiful.

Leonard Feather: It must be that new one off Atlantic Records...

Lester Young: Some kind of red label, whatever it is.

Leonard Feather: Yeah, Atlantic Records, that's right.

Lester Young: Yeah. That's pretty man. He sings the blues, and it comes natural for him to sing the blues like that because he used to go with that band. They was wiling and that Charles, what's his name? Yardbird.

Leonard Feather: Yardbird was...

Lester Young: All of them, you dig? So he knows the blues, yes. And the same things, so you know he can sing the blues because he's been singing in his trees, things like that. Which is nice, he has a lovely voice. Because you hear those blues, right?

Leonard Feather: Walking in a dark world..

Lester Young: ..started spinning.

Leonard Feather: ..get the feeling.

Lester Young: Pretty song. Pretty song.

Leonard Feather: What about bands?

Lester Young: Who is that?

Leonard Feather: What about bands? Any particular favorite band?

Lester Young: Band?

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: They broke my heart, so I can't say nothing. But if I would go, I would go with the... They sound just like Count, play things like that. That's the way I would go for big band, Lester...Count Basie a small band, then we'd play.

Leonard Feather: ...a band like that?

Lester Young: I haven't heard him but right on with Woody Herman. If he keeps jumping like that, that's new. All the time. That's straight.

Leonard Feather: Okay. I think we got a good interview there.

Lester Young: Mm-hmm.

[Skips]:

Leonard Feather: Would you have liked to form a big band of your own?

Lester Young: I would've loved it. But I didn't go for the... With them evil spirits in there, you dig? That's too much. I can barely make it with five, like I'm playing now.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: Because I would say like that old lady told me, "There's always a bad one in the bunch." You'll never know who it is, you dig? If it's in five, they can get it. In a trio, they can get it. You dig what I mean? But a duet, like you and me, you dig? Him and I ain't going to be like that because there's two of us. That's one and one is 11. What? Then here comes three and we are about that one lonely one. That's the.. You think he's tight, but he'd say, "Let me get to four now." There's another one. Well he knows we're tight from the beginning, right? So now they get tight. Now it's two and two, it's 22. That vibe you get to when you get five. Then they'll give him and everything and leave me, and then I become one out of five, right?

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: Sure. Then I'm the one that goes, you dig?

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: When I started off, it was one and one, you dig? They had to build up on me. One and one to ten, right? It was two. I won't go there, but the next one, that other man is coming. Me and him, right, that's two. We have two, but then they'll take him out, right?. Then you get another one... Yeah, one of them. I said it's two. I did that, I don't have nothing famous. Yeah, that Lester has more a more descriptive language.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: In the room, he was talking to me and he very rarely talks like he talks to you. He usually talks to me pretty much in our language, English, you know? But otherwise, we just talking, and he sure can make one word speak volumes.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: I would've thought... I heard everybody talking about Cooley. He was the first person I ever listened to that way.

Leonard Feather: I'm sure.

Lester Young: There's a lot that hasn't been written about Lester and shouldn't even.

Leonard Feather: I want to get a lot more...

Lester Young: He contributed. No eyes for instance. I thought that was the most descriptive phrase. I don't care how long you talk, Leonard, or how much you think. When you say you don't want to do something, I don't care how you say it. The bare fact is that when he says no eyes, that just wraps up everything. Love what he said. You just can't say it, that's all.

Leonard Feather: Yeah. Did you ever consider joining...?

Lester Young: I had one chance with him, but I'm in the franks. I loved it though.

Leonard Feather: ...a big man over there and you can have the time of your life.

Lester Young: That's why I wanted to be real nice when I did go. But the American dollar, you dig? The franks, I don't want them franks. That's the only reason I ever went.

Leonard Feather: And where is really the best audiences you think? When you're on tour with Norman, where did you find the most enthusiastic audiences? Out here, the middle-west, or the west coast, or where?

Lester Young: I don't know. It's always comme ci comme ca. Because some nights you'll get in the people and sometimes... You know how it is.

Leonard Feather: Yeah, I guess it just varies, right?

Lester Young: Yeah. And then sometimes you'll have a sweepstakes ticket and things like that. But it's just a job, though, but the people like music. That's what counts, you know?

Leonard Feather: Yeah, for sure.

Lester Young: Even some of them places where they play, they have them ropes and things like that. That's when people are there, so you know they must love music. Because I wouldn't make no rope to go hear nobody, myself, you know? If it was like that. And I said they sure must like it, that's they way they do it. And then rope the sides, play it on the third, come in on the side. They sure must like it.

Leonard Feather: Are there still that many places that...?

Lester Young: Very few, you know what I mean. But there will be one or two on the tour. Like Texas, that's usually where it happens.

Leonard Feather: Is it that bad in Texas?

Lester Young: In Texas, well at some places, I don't know. I don't try to dig them that hard, but I know some place is segregated, I know that. You dig?

Leonard Feather: ...were doing it.

Lester Young: Know what they're doing.

Leonard Feather: They did?

Lester Young: That's why they put a rope there.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: That's what I was brought up in. Rope, you dig? But you don't want to talk about that, and make everybody feel bad. But it's still like that. It's hard for me because I'm standing out there playing with Gray bars. All I have to lean on is... what is that? ...and Freddy and Hank, you dig? But they're sitting down mostly, but me and Flip and Bill Harris, you dig what I mean? It's sweet when we're out there, you dig? And the people love him, you know you can....

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: It didn't look when we come through, but we just feel a draft. Imagine, then why you don't let...? I don't know, that's fair.

Leonard Feather: ...both sizes on stage, you know?

Lester Young: You know what I mean? But one thing is half and half, 50/50, you know what I mean?

Leonard Feather: They're all into it, yeah.

Lester Young: Mm-hmm, they seem to be enjoying it. But like that whole thing, we'd all be happy and everything and...states. It would make us feel better. But mostly, on my side, though. Because I'm like that, I feel real sorry for them. A lot of them was leaving and coming up to New York, while they could just go somewhere for themselves. That's the way I feel, man. I wouldn't sense it. But, if you're living you have to go in time.

Leonard Feather: Yeah.

Lester Young: What was that thing? Yeah, that's right.