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Childhood in Los Angeles -- Family Background -- Learns to play the clarinet -- Church and school.
Life changed by taking "A Course in Miracles" -- Love of travel -- Chico Hamilton -- Plays with Kid Ory and Barney Bigard -- Tours with Lionel Hampton -- Cutting records with Benny Goodman -- Nine years with Roy Milton.
More on Chico Hamilton -- Early playing engagements -- Attends Jefferson High School -- Sam Browne -- John A. Gray's music school -- Presence of many strong African-American male role models in his life -- Takes saxophone lessons -- Playing gigs while still in high school.
Attitudes toward sex and marriage -- Kelson's five-year marriage to a nightclub dancer.
Fellow musicians at Jefferson High School -- More on Sam Browne -- Ernie Royal -- Playing behind the beat -- Influence of Ernest Holmes's Science of Mind -- Benny Carter -- The essence of a jazz performance.
Emma "Ginger" Smock and other early associates -- The danger of drug addiction -- Playing in nonunion bands -- Picketed by the American Federation of Musicians, Local 767 -- Joins the union -- First impressions of the neon lights of Central Avenue -- The rationale behind the union.
Central Avenue before World War II -- The sleek nightclub crowd -- Watching the rise and fall of entertainment stars -- Pride and respect for property on prewar Central -- The post-World Wax II loss of respect for authority -- The Great Depression in Los Angeles -- Resentment about graffiti.
Conducts research on graffiti -- The meaning of life -- The draft board's confusion about Kelso's race -- Enlists in the navy -- Assigned to the navy band at Saint Mary's College Preflight School in Moraga, California.
Older musicians at Saint Mary's and their stories of the road -- San Francisco's wartime clubs -- Discharge and return to Los Angeles -- Playing with Lionel Hampton and Benny Goodman -- Amalgamation of the black and white locals of the American Federation of Musicians -- Union meeting in honor of former president Leo Davis -- A surprise tribute to Caughey Roberts -- Kelso's opposition to nationalism.
Touring in the Deep South during the forties and fifties -- One-night stands.
T-Bone Walker -- Swing and Dixieland -- Bebop -- Buddy Collette's second-string navy band -- Lucky Thompson -- Dexter Gordon -- Charles Mingus.
Kelso's love of books -- His childhood's strong black role models -- More on Charles Mingus -- Rapping with Goodman about technique -- Performers on Central Avenue in the forties and fifties -- Whites who played on Central Avenue -- Rhythm and blues -- Roy Milton.
More on rhythm and blues -- Lionel Hampton's showmanship -- Pushed to new heights by Hampton's enthusiasm -- Transcribing and arranging Roy Milton's music.
Leon Washington and the Los Angeles Sentinel's boycott of stores that did not hire African-Americans -- The Los Angeles recording industry -- Johnny Otis's record business and radio and TV shows.
Models his own band after Big Jay McNeely's -- Cutting records for Don Ralke at Warner Brothers -- Copies Plas Johnson's rock and roll style -- Improvisation based on years of practicing bebop clichés -- Buddy Collette -- Decline of Central Avenue -- Reasons for that decline.
Central Avenue's rising Latino population -- Ruth Washington of the Los Angeles Sentinel -- Central Avenue's enduring significance.