Central Avenue Sounds: Fletcher Smith, Interviewd by Steven L. Isoardi
Department of Special Collections
University of California, Los Angeles

Contents

Table of Contents

1. Tape Number: I, Side One February 23, 1992

Isoardi
Okay, Fletcher, let's begin with where you were born and what your family was like and your early years, and then how you got to L.A.
Smith
Well, my real name is Judge Fletcher Smith Jr. That was my dad's name. And my mother passed when I was two. My dad passed when I was about eight. So they didn't have much to do with my musical background.
Isoardi
Where was this at?
Smith
This was in Lincoln, Nebraska. I was born on Ninth and News Street in Lincoln, Nebraska, September 22, 1913. So that makes me kind of old, eh? [laughter] But anyway, there was a band that came through Lincoln named the Lloyd Hunter Serenaders, and there was a guitar player there named Finney. I asked Finney if I could get my uncle to buy me a banjo, would he help me learn how to play it. And he said he would. So he said, "Before I leave, I'm going to make you out a chart of chords, and when we come back through here-" They were on their way to Kansas City. "When we come back through here, if you know all these chords, charts," he said, "we'll go on from there." So, man, when he came back, I was so enthused about this, you know, free lessons and everything. And this is 1928. Nobody had any money then, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
So when he came back through there, he came to the house. I was staying with my grandfather [Sergeant Pullem]. He came back through the house, and he said, "Well, let me see what you know." He had a banjo, you know, but I didn't have a banjo yet. But, man, I started reciting off those chords and charts and things, and he said, "Man, you're ready!" So now the next thing-
Isoardi
So you weren't playing on anything, then. You were just memorizing all the-
Smith
No, I was memorizing all these. So, man, I said, "Now, the next thing to do is to try to talk my uncle into buying me one." I had two uncles. One of them was working at a grain supply company-he had a little money-and the other one was a railroad porter. He didn't have nothing, you know.
Isoardi
You were living with one of them?
Smith
I was living with my grandfather.
Isoardi
Oh, your grandfather.
Smith
Yeah. See, my grandfather had a house. He had a nine-room house. They had a bedroom, my sister had a bedroom, and I had a bedroom. He was downstairs with his master bedroom, you know. But my grandfather was a wonderful fellow. He came out of the Civil War.
Isoardi
He fought in the Civil War?
Smith
He fought in the Civil War. His name was Sergeant Pullem. Everybody called him Sergeant.
Isoardi
Do you know what unit he followed?
Smith
No, I had all the pictures, and somebody stole them.
Isoardi
Oh, too bad.
Smith
I went back to Lincoln when he died. He died in '36, and I went back to Lincoln to collect his stuff and, man, they stole all the pictures and everything. The only thing I got from him was a diamond ring and his gun. That's the only thing. And I'm the only one that knew where it was-where he kept it hid, you know.
Isoardi
It was a Civil War piece? The gun?
Smith
No, it was just a Smith and Wesson metal, silver-looking Smith and Wesson, just a regular, ordinary pistol, you know. I got that and a diamond ring, and that's all I got out of it. He died at- Let's see, his birthday is on the fourth of July. He died three days before his birthday. He would have been a hundred years old.
Isoardi
I was going to say, if he fought in the Civil War and died in the thirties, he must have been pretty old.
Smith
Yeah, he did. He was a hundred.
Isoardi
Geez.
Smith
Nice fellow, though. He was very nice. He didn't do nothing but sit there and smoke a cob pipe, that's all.
Isoardi
What was his background before the Civil War? Do you know?
Smith
He said he was a newspaper boy.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
That's all he ever did was deliver papers.
Isoardi
In Nebraska?
Smith
No, he's from Red Oak, Iowa. He wasn't from the South; he was from Red Oak, Iowa. My mother was from Lincoln. In fact, they got married in Lincoln.But my uncle said, "Do you really want a banjo?" I said, "Yeah, I really do." You know, he's going to make me beg a little bit. [laughter] So then two weeks passed, and every time he'd come in the house, I'd look at him and he'd look at me. He said, "I know what you want to see," but he said, "I haven't got paid yet." I said, "Okay." So really, when he got paid he went down to Dietz Music in Lincoln, Nebraska. He paid twelve dollars for a second-hand banjo. It was one of the best, though; it was a Vigon. And he bought me some new strings to put on it. And, man, you talk about somebody getting busy, boy, rehearsing. When that band came through there again, man, I was playing, man. I was playing with a band around there.
Isoardi
Now, you were-what?-fifteen years old then about this time?
Smith
I was, yeah, I was sixteen.
Isoardi
Now, that's kind of a late starter in a way, isn't it? You had no musical exposure before then?
Smith
No.
Isoardi
What sort of grabbed you at that age?
Smith
I don't know. I had so much trouble in school until I got to the place where I didn't want nothing in school but music. And I couldn't get it in Lincoln, you know. They didn't have that curriculum. They had do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do, but that ain't what I wanted.
Isoardi
And that's all they had in school?
Smith
Yeah, that's all they had in school. That was chorus. That was a chorus class. But-
Isoardi
No school band or anything like that?
Smith
No, I wasn't interested in no school band. I was interested in nothing but that banjo. And I loved piano, but I was scared to leave the banjo alone and get to the piano, because I knew the piano was going to be a long, drawn-out thing, you know. But the banjo seemed to be kind of easy for me, and I learned a lot of music from that banjo. I learned how to read real good. And then anytime a piano player would come in the band, I'd always get some tips from him. But I always had my eye on that piano. So anytime he'd get up from the piano, I'd be right down there on it.So there was a girl out of Lincoln, Nebraska, one of the best I ever heard. Her name was Orvilla Banks. A band came through there and took her away. But Orvilla told me, said- She called me "Bee;" that was my nickname in Nebraska, "Bee." She said, "Bee, you're going to eventually play piano, because every time I leave that piano, you've got your eye on that piano, and you're sitting there playing them bad notes. You're playing nothing, but you just love the piano." So I said, "Well, maybe so. I don't know."So the thing about it, when I came out here- I hoboed out here from Lincoln, Nebraska in '33. It was in wintertime. It was about twenty-two [degrees] below zero.
Isoardi
Why did you decide to do that?
Smith
My grandfather told me, he said, "If you want to play music, you've got to go where it is, and there ain't nothing here. What you want is not here." He said, "If you want to play music you've got to go where it is." So I said, "He's got something there." He said, "If you wait till I get my pension, I'll give you some money." I think when I left Lincoln I had twenty cents, a sack of crackers, and some water.Now, the water- You see, I had been around hobos, and they'd been telling me all these things, which was very true. See, that water- When the trains go through the tunnels, if you don't have some water and a wet handkerchief, you get smothered to death.
Isoardi
Oh, the smoke.
Smith
Because the smoke is going to come in that car. See, it was the open boxcars then. And a man said, "All you need is some water, and be sure you've got a towel or a handkerchief or something. And when you see that train facing to go in that tunnel, you dampen that cloth and put it over your face and lay flat on the car until it comes through there." And he was right, man. Because if you sit up there, man, that smoke will kill you. Because those tunnels are long. From Lincoln to Denver it's five hundred miles. There's a lot of tunnels. Where the tunnels come in is from Denver to Las Vegas.
Isoardi
The Rockies.
Smith
That's where they come in. The Rockies, you know. Man, look here. That smoke, boy, that would be this black. You just couldn't see nothing, man. And we tried to shut the door, but the doors were too heavy, you know. You can't move those doors, you know. And me and two or three guys- If there would be a lot of them, you could move it. But I was hoboing with about, oh, two or three guys. And they showed me where the jungles were and all that stuff, and I learned a whole lot from those guys. They were some smart guys, you know. And people say, "Well, they don't mean nothing. They just don't want to do nothing." But those people are very smart. Some of them are lawyers, man, some of them are dentists. I ran into a dentist who was hoboing. He was just trying to get from one town to the next. When I was going to Las Vegas, he transferred on a D&RGW [Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad] and transferred to go on up to Portland. He wanted to get to Portland. You see, there are different whistles on trains that will tell you where they're going. You see, now, a lot of people don't know that.
Isoardi
You mean the number of blasts?
Smith
That's right. They tell you where they're going, see. Like the guys say one long, two shorts, and a long- that's going to Kansas City. Two shorts and two longs- that's going such and such a place. If it was four longs, that's going west, you know. I was listening for the wests, trying to get out of the cold weather, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
So I got to Denver, and I got in the jungles, and I said, "Well-" See, I rode from Lincoln to Denver on a passenger train. See, a lot of guys don't even know how to ride a passenger train.
Isoardi
How did you do that?
Smith
Well, you get behind the coal, and I had an army belt: a great big thick army belt like this. I'd take the army belt and I'd hook it around the ladder of the coal bin. See, because you're liable to fall off of there from the speed and roll, you know. So I hooked it on there, and man, when I woke up, hell, I was in Denver.
Isoardi
Oh, gee, you'd strap yourself to the side.
Smith
That's right. You strap yourself to the [coal] tender.
Isoardi
Oh, man.
Smith
That's right. And then when I got off in Denver, well, you don't get off at the station. You get off there in the yard, because you'd get killed if you get off at that station. So I got off in the yard, walked and found the jungles and everything. And then the guys were telling me what freight train to catch to go to- I said, "I want to go west." They said, "Well, you have to get that D&RGW which is going- The only place to go is Vegas." You get thirty miles up in the Rocky Mountains and Vegas looks like it was this big. It was just a little bitty town.
Isoardi
Well, back then it must not have been much.
Smith
It wasn't then. There wasn't nothing there but Fremont Street and that one hotel. One hotel downtown. It's still there, but it's built up, rebuilt.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
Man, look here. When I looked out that boxcar, man, and saw this dot, I asked the guy, "What is that?" He said, "Hell, that's Las Vegas down there. That's where we're going." And it was hot then, you know. When we passed Denver and got over in-what's that town?-Provo, Utah, it would start warming up, you know. And man, I started sheeding off clothes. And man, when I got to Vegas, I got off right where the union plaza is right now. That's still the station. Of course, it's a hotel now, but that was the railroad station. I got off right there at the station, went down in the jungles and washed up, washed my clothes and everything. Man, those clothes dried in about ten minutes. It was hot, boy. Oh, that town was hot. See, they were building the [Hoover] Dam then.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
So I went in the tavern there, the town tavern, and asked the guy if there were any musicians around. He said, "Yeah, this guy sitting over there is a saxophone player." So I went over there and talked to him.He said, "Yeah, I'm up here for a divorce." He had to be up there six weeks for a divorce. And he said, "What do you play?"I said, "Well, I play banjo."He said, "You don't know nothing about piano, do you?"I said, "No, I just fool around with it."So he said, "Maybe you can learn how to play it."They didn't have any clubs then. They had what they called roadhouses then. They're out on the highway, you know. So this guy took me to the club where he worked and asked the guy to give me a place to stay. They had those little cabins in the back. And they had what looked like cheesecloths on top, these little cabins with cheesecloths. It was so damn hot there, you know. You couldn't cover yourself with nothing, but you've just got to let some air in there, you know. So, man, I got a place to stay and put my little things in there. And he said, "I'm going to show you something," and he showed me a tune on the piano, and I went from there on that piano. I was tickled to death. Because the man was interested in me learning how to play the piano, and that's what I wanted to do, you know. But I kept my banjo a long time. I kept my banjo till I got to L.A.
Isoardi
So did you play? Did you stay at that place for a while?
Smith
Oh, yeah. I stayed there the balance of his time, which was four weeks. The balance of his time we stayed there. He said, "Now, I'll tell you what you do. If you help me drive over this pass-" The Cajon Pass was dangerous then, you know. He said, "If you help me drive to Los Angeles-" He said, "Can you drive?"I said, "Yeah, I can drive."He said, "If you help me drive to Los Angeles," he said, "I'll pay your rent for one week and I'll introduce you to some musicians that probably can help you."
Isoardi
Geez.
Smith
This boy's name was "Big Boy," named Leonard Davidson. He was a very nice guy, you know. So I helped him drive to Los Angeles. Boy, we got closer to Los Angeles, and I started looking at them palm trees, and I said, "Shit, I ain't going to ever leave here." [laughter] Yes. So man, we got there and I never will forget, man, Fifty-seventh [Street] or Fifty-sixth [Street] and Central Avenue, South Central Avenue. There was a hotel called the Savoy. And sure enough, he went down and paid my week's rent. And that night when he left-
Isoardi
Now, this was-when?-1933?
Smith
This was 1933, yeah. I'd just got there. See, all of '33, with the exception- Let's see. With the exception of- See, I got to Los Angeles in June of '33. But back in Lincoln in June, it was colder than hell, you know.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
It was really cold, yeah. So a guy comes and tells me about cold weather, I say, "You can't tell me nothing about no cold weather, man. I'm from Lincoln, Nebraska." [laughter]So I stayed at that hotel. But when this guy left, I decided to walk up Central Avenue. I said, "Well, what street am I on?" He said, "You're on South Central Avenue, the great Central Avenue." I said, "Okay." So I walked from Fifty-seventh Street down to Eighteenth [Street]. Well, Eighteenth was Washington Boulevard. That's the Clark Hotel. And I saw somebody there that I thought I knew. You know, you don't want to be too brazen. You kind of ease up to them. He looked at me and I looked at him, and he said, "Bee Smith?" I said, "Yeah, that's me." And it was a boy I went to school with. He had come out to L.A. before me a couple of years. And he was just hanging around down there. He wasn't a musician or anything, but he was a good hustler. So he told me, he said, "Well, where are you staying?" I told him where I was staying. He said, "You walked all the way down here?" I said, "Yeah." So I finally met him, and after you meet one guy from home, then you start meeting other people from Nebraska. So I met a lot of people from Nebraska. And then I settled in and started meeting musicians.
Isoardi
How did Central strike you when you first walked down, when you took that walk?
Smith
Man, there were so many people on that street. Coming from a town like Lincoln- When I left Lincoln, Lincoln was fifty thousand. There were that many people on Central Avenue. [laughter] There was fifty thousand; that's all there were. And the blacks in Lincoln, I bet you there wasn't but twenty-some, twenty-five families of blacks in Lincoln.
Isoardi
Total?
Smith
In the whole town, yeah. And, man, that's all I saw walking from Fifty-second Street to Eighteenth. That's all I saw was black people. [laughter]
Isoardi
So you thought Los Angeles was all black. [laughter]
Smith
I hadn't seen a white man yet. [laughter] I said, "My goodness!" I said, "Damn!" They said, "No, this is North Central. If you go back that way it's South Central." And I started learning directions. See, because Los Angeles is not made to a square. Los Angeles is made on an angle like this. That's why people don't know directions in L.A., you know. So a guy was telling me what the west side was and the east side. You pass Main Street, you're on the west side, you know. You pass Main Street coming east, then you're on the east side, you know. I started learning directions real good.Then I ran into a friend of mine; he was a trumpet player. He was the best friend I ever had. He liked my playing, you know. He liked my banjo playing. He hadn't heard me play piano. So when he heard me play piano, he said, "You're just learning how to play piano." I said, "Yeah, I'm trying." So he said, "Well, I'll help you all I can." So I stayed with that guy, I guess-Fred Mason-I stayed at his house about two years.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
Yeah, back and forth. He had a piano in his house. And the way I learned how to play piano was listening to the radio. The band then from California was Les Hite. Les Hite had a band in Culver City at Frank Sebastian's Cotton Club. He'd been out there nine years. But that's where I learned all my tunes, from his band. I'd turn him on at night, and he'd play all the tunes like "Sophisticated Lady," all those kind of tunes. I learned them on the radio, and learned them correctly on the piano. So Fred said, "Well, you're doing all right. Now you've got to get yourself some sheet music and learn how to read the charts right off." I said, "Okay." And so he did that. Man, he helped me. He really helped me.And there was another guy who came along named Buddy Harper. I never will forget Buddy. Buddy was a hell of an arranger. He went with Duke [Ellington]. He studied [Billy] Strayhorn and all those guys. But when he came back to Los Angeles, he had them brilliant ideas, you know. And I used to follow Buddy Harper all night long. Everywhere he went I'd follow him, because I wanted to learn how to write, you know. So when he'd make a big chart like that, he'd say, "You know how to take it off?" I'd say, "No." So then he showed me how to take that chart off, and he showed me how to write neat and legible so you could understand it. So everybody who would play my music, they'd say, "You've been around Buddy Harper." I'd say, "That's right. That's right." That was the neatest guy in the world, man. You could read his music from here to that door, man, it would be so plain and pretty. He'd take his time, you know. He had a little ruler-oh, it wasn't near this long-a little ruler about like that.
Isoardi
About six inches or so.
Smith
Yeah. When he made a note, man, he made a beautiful note. Put a stem on it and everything. It was just beautiful, man. And he was just an amazing cat, man. And he was a nice guy. That's why I stayed around him, because anything you'd ask him, it didn't disturb him, you know. He was interested. And he was glad to let you know what it was. I'd say, "Well, Buddy, how do you join this note with this in the next bar?" He'd say, "Well, I'll tell you what you do. You separate them first and then count them." He said, "Now, there ain't but four beats in that bar. I don't care how many notes you put in there, there ain't but four beats, so you just have to separate that time and make four beats out of it." But all that stuff like that. And then it got to the place where I got around L.A.- See, I didn't associate with too many musicians, because I hung around guys like- There was a boy here named "Snake" [Leroy] White, Buddy Harper, Red Callender. I hung around with Red. Red came here with Nat King Cole. He came here in '36 with the "Brown-Skinned Models." And Red was a hell of a musician. He was another one of those guys who was glad to tell you something if he knew it.So I was just lucky, man. I was just lucky to be around those kind of guys. Because, you see, you could have been around guys that wouldn't pay you any attention, you know. Say, "Well, I'm paying my dues, you just go on and pay yours," you know. But it wasn't like that with the musicians in the thirties. I know a lot of piano players, good piano players, they'd take a lesson- They knew I didn't have any money. So they'd take that lesson and write it down at school, and then they'd bring it to my house and show it to me. They said, "Now, here's the lesson we had today. This is scale twenty-two or this is scale fifty-two," or whatever it is. "This is a minor nine" and all that stuff. Well, they'd bring it over to my house and show it to me. So the guys couldn't understand, when I joined the bands, that I could play all this stuff. They said, "Well, hell, you ain't been to school." I said, "Well, no, I picked it up off of different fellows," you know. "You ain't picked that up off of-" You know. They just didn't believe it.
Isoardi
You hadn't really studied with anyone at all.
Smith
No. No, I didn't study with anybody. You see, the thing about me, I guess I could retain things that people told me. If you told me something today, next year at this same time I'll remember what you said. It's just like the guys got around town who said, "Man, that cat's got a memory like an elephant," you know. But I would remember all that stuff they told me, see.Because when Red Callender first told me what a thirteenth chord was, the first time he said it real fast. Well, I couldn't understand it. He said, "Sixth, third, ninth, and seventh." Sixth, third, ninth, and seventh? What's this guy talking about? [laughter] So I had a band in Arizona in Yuma, and he was the bass player in the band. See now, everybody in the band knew more than me, but the guy that had the club just liked me and gave me the job. Well, one thing about it, I got all experienced musicians behind me. Those guys said, "Man, you don't know nothing!" [laughter] Those guys, boy, they laughed at me. They said, "You don't know nothing!" So Red worked with me. Red said, "I'm going to play this stuff on the piano so you can hear it." So Red was a nice piano player, too. He played the hell out of that bass, but he was a good piano player, too. But he could play those chords; he knew those chords, all of them. Yeah, he knew all the scales and everything. So he sat down and played it, and I listened to him. I said, "There's no such thing as a thirteenth chord." I'm taking this all in, see, but I'm reluctant to give in to what he's saying. I said, "Well, man, you don't know what you're talking about." But he said he knew then- When he was writing the book [Unfinished Dream: The Musical World of Red Callender], he told everybody, he said, "I knew then that Fletcher was taking all that stuff in." He said, "He was real slick." He said, "He was a slick guy, boy." Come the time when I got in his band, I was playing all that stuff, man. I'd cross my legs and sit up there and play all those things, all those charts. He said, "Uh-huh." He said, "You were remembering all that stuff, weren't you?" I said, "I sure was." Yeah, because strange things came up in those days. But you see, the guys in those days were better than they are. They always wanted to cooperate with you, and they wanted to put their arms around you. If there was something you didn't know, they'd put their arms around you. Even when I was with Benny Carter, it was the same thing.
Isoardi
That kind of closeness.
Smith
Yeah. They said, "Man, you're going with Benny Carter?" I said, "He called me. I didn't call him." Yes, sir. And we had a big argument one day up there in Sacramento about "Autumn in New York."
Isoardi
With Benny Carter?
Smith
Uh-huh. Gerald Wiggins had showed me how to play "Autumn in New York," showed me the different ways that they play it-you know, that jazz musicians play it. So that's the way I played it. He said, "Man, we don't play it like that." I said, "What do you mean `we'?" I said, "Hell, you didn't write this tune; a white man wrote this tune." And boy, he laughed so hard, man. [laughter] He said, "I never ran into anybody like you." And the guys in the band, man, they were all scared to death the way I was talking to Benny Carter. I said, "Who the hell is Benny Carter? He ain't nothing but another musician, that's all." So he said, "Well, man, you go on and play what you want to play." So I started singing the blues, man. He got a chair right down there in front, put his saxophone in the rack, and sat there and laughed, boy, and enjoyed himself. [laughter] Yes, sir. He sure did. So every time he sees Gerald Wiggins, he says, "Where's Funky Butt at?" [laughter] He called me "Funky Butt." He said, "I never heard anybody sing the blues like him." So we used to have a lot of fun together.And then I joined-
Isoardi
Let me ask you, how were you getting by then? Were you picking up occasional musical jobs?
Smith
Oh, yeah.
Isoardi
Did you have a regular job?
Smith
I was working casuals all the time.
Isoardi
That was it, eh?
Smith
Uh-huh.
Isoardi
And they were pretty easy to get when you got there?
Smith
Man, you could get a job every day.
Isoardi
Because you'd been playing piano-what?-about four weeks only when you hit L.A.
Smith
Oh, yeah. I was picking it up easily because the tunes that they were playing in those days-they were easy tunes, you know.
Isoardi
So you could hear them once and play them?
Smith
Oh, yeah. You could hear them once and play them. Then the guys you worked with would show you those things. You didn't have a problem. But talking about working, hell, you could work every day. All you had to do was go down there to the union [American Federation of Musicians Local 767] and tell them you weren't working, and they'd have a job for you that night.
Isoardi
No kidding.
Smith
Yeah. But nowadays, man, you'd be a long time trying to get a gig now-that pays any money, you know. I have worked in Los Angeles and gotten fifty cents a night on a job. I worked on jobs where they didn't give you nothing but beer, you know. And when it comes to the time where you make a dollar and a half a night, you wouldn't tell anybody where you were working. That's the truth. I worked on a job out there on Florence and Central Avenue, and the man gave us a dollar and all the beer we could drink. And I was drinking that beer so fast, the man said, "Man, look here. You leave some beer for somebody else to drink!" [laughter] I never drank before, you know.
Isoardi
You didn't back home?
Smith
No. Heck, no. I didn't know anything about drinking. But, you see, when you start drinking, learning how to drink, you don't know how to separate it. You don't know how to drink. You're just gulping it down, you know. So, man, I was drinking that beer so fast, the man said, "Wait a minute! Ain't no beer for nobody else to drink!" I said, "Well, you got your dollar, didn't you?" [laughter] Oh, we used to have a ball then in town.
Isoardi
Did you join the union when you first came down?
Smith
No, I was here in '33; I didn't join the union until '35. Lionel Hampton got me in the union. I did a stint with him in '35. See, there was a piano player coming down here-he's an international figure right now- Ernie Lewis. He was on his way to join Lionel from Frisco and he got in an automobile accident and broke his arm. So the guitar player in the band knew me and asked me would I sit in until Ernie could get straight. And I said, "Well, man, I ain't never played with no big band before." And naturally, I was scared to death.So the first job they had was up there in San Jose in the Victoria Theatre. I worked with Lionel about two months. In fact, I came all the way back here and worked at the Cotton Club with Lionel, because that was his first band. See, he'd been with Les Hite all the time. He'd been the drumming with Les Hite, the featured drummer of Les Hite. So he pulled out and got his own band, and then he brought me back in the club. But it was too much pressure for me. You know, that's quick. Because they had a big show in the Cotton Club and all that stuff, and you couldn't be faking no music. You had to read some music then, you know. They had the Berry Brothers, the Five Hot Shots, and all these guys-acts. They had a lot of music, you know. At rehearsals you had to play it down; you couldn't be faking it, you know.So I went and got a buddy of mine to take my place, a boy named Dudley Brooks. He was a friend of mine, too. But Dudley could read all his life because his folks had sent him to school ever since he was a baby. So he knew all the music ends of it, you know. So Dudley, after he went out there and took my place, then he invited me over to his house and showed me a lot of tunes that I'd been wanting to learn. He was a nice guy. Dudley died here not long ago. I guess he was a little older than me. But, see, I'd run into those kinds of guys in those years, nice fellows. But I didn't beg anybody for anything; I just happened to run into them.And down at the union, I could always get me a little old gig-for that night, if I wanted it.
Isoardi
So back then, a good source of jobs was in the union. The union got you work.
Smith
Oh, yeah, yeah. They could get you some work. You didn't worry about it. But then, too-
Isoardi
Was Local 767 in the same spot? Was it at Seventeenth [Street] and Central?
Smith
Seventeenth, Eighteenth [Street]- No, the first place that the union was was the Double V. It was up there on Vernon and Central. Thirty-three, that's where it was, upstairs. The next place was across from Jefferson High School on Hooper Avenue right there by Cole Dance Studio. That was the second place for the union. The third place was Eighteenth and Central.
Isoardi
Aha.
Smith
Yeah, that's the building they sold to join [Local] 47. But it's not as much action in 47 as there was in 767, because people then used to congregate every day, not on weekends. Every day they would congregate. And this guy over here, you'd ask this guy, "What are you doing tonight?" He'd say, "I ain't doing nothing." You'd say, "Well, I heard of a job over at such and such place." Contact, you know. I mean, that's why those guys were working. Man, they'd come down to the union, and whatever happened, if you wanted a job, just come on down to the union. Somebody will find you a job. It may not pay a lot of money, but it was still work. And then things weren't as expensive as they are now. See, a loaf of bread used to be fifteen cents. Now it's a dollar and a half. There's a difference, you know. My rent used to be two [dollars and] fifty [cents] a week. What the hell! It's a whole lot different now.
Isoardi
That's really changed.
Smith
That's right. And I had a telephone on top of it. The woman had a telephone in the hall, and she put an extension chord on it so it would reach my room-you know, the landlady. The landlady liked me. She said, "I'm going to put an extension cord so it will come to your room, so you answer the phone and take all the calls and everything." So I guess God was just good to me. I would run into nice people, you know. But, yeah, the economy was so much different then. I made more money when I first learned how to play banjo in 1928- Now, this is the Depression, '28, '29, '30. I made more money then than I made out here.
Isoardi
No kidding.
Smith
That's right. That's true. Raise my hand to God, I made five dollars on a job and got my dinner! That's right, that's true. There's a man there in Lincoln named Herschel Lee. He had six pieces. Then he went and found him an agent, had one of those great big sixteen-cylinder Lincoln cars. You could seat nine in there, you know. And he used to come and get us, man, and take us on those weekend jobs. We had uniforms. They were paid for. And we'd go on those jobs, those little country towns out of Lincoln. We'd get our dinner and then play the dance, and then, man, when we got ready to come home and go back to Lincoln, the man had made sandwiches for everybody. Plus five dollars. Now, that's a hell of a lot more than we're making now.
Isoardi
Yeah, in terms of buying power.
Smith
Because, you see, you could take twenty-five cents and get anything you wanted. See, when you bought things then, you'd buy potatoes, you'd get a nickel's worth of potatoes, a nickel's worth of salt, ten cents' worth of sugar- See, you can't do that now. So that's a difference in the economy. So I was making five dollars, man. I though I was rich. Man, five dollars! In 1928, '29, that was a lot of money, babe.
Isoardi
What about when you first hit Central? Where would you hang out? What were the places you'd-?
Smith
Well, the place I would hang out would be mostly the [Club] Alabam. There was a guy there named Dootsie Williams. He had a little band in there. He had a seven-piece band in there. Let's see. All those guys that did that, all but three- Johnny Miller, the bass player, is still living. Curt Bradford, alto player, is living. A boy named Fuzzy Gower is still living. Dootsie is still living. The Harlem Dukes was the name of the band. Charlie Evans, the piano player-he's dead. The drummer, Oscar Bradley, was a very good drummer. They always had Lee Young and Oscar Bradley together on a pedestal. But see, I liked Oscar because he was much heavier on drums than Lee. Now, they both could play. They both could play. They'd cut those charts, I don't care what it was. But Oscar was heavier. He was a heavier drummer. He had a heavier foot than Lee. That band-that's where I hung out, at the Alabam, because that was really the only organized band at the time. Let's see, in '33, that was the only organized band that I know of. Lorenzo Flennoy had a band after that.
Isoardi
A big band? Or was that a trio or-?
Smith
He had a big band in the Alabam. He had twelve pieces in there. See, Dootsie Williams only had six- He had seven, because he played trumpet. Trumpet and three saxophones is four, drums and piano and bass-seven pieces.

2. Tape Number: I, Side Two February 23, 1992

Isoardi
So the Club Alabam was your main hang.
Smith
The Club Alabam, yeah, that was the main hangout. But you see, I was with a guy named Fred Mason that worked everywhere. I packed up with him one day and went all the way to Portland, Oregon. We worked up there and worked in Seattle, came back to Sacramento.
Isoardi
Was this a big band?
Smith
No, it was a small band. We didn't have but five pieces. But I worked with him. He was a good contact man. He would contact those jobs and work all the time, you know. We worked San Jose. Let's see, we worked Stockton, Frisco. We worked Frisco and Portland, Seattle. Never did go to Canada, not with him. But he worked all the time. Came back to Los Angeles, he worked all the time. So really I didn't have a place where I'd, say, hang out per se every night. I'd hang out until Fred got something. When he got a job or something, then I'd move with Fred, you know. But that was the only really big hangout; the Alabam was a big hangout in L.A. See, because when Dootsie left, then here came Lorenzo [Flennoy]. I helped Johnny Otis organize a band there in '44, eighteen pieces. We broadcasted twice a night. That was '44. I had just left the Lincoln Theatre, and I helped him organize his band, because I got some guys from back east. And then I left there and went up to a place called Shepp's Playhouse. That's on First [Street] and- Where was that, on First and Los Angeles [Street]? Yeah. That's the place that during the war they took away from the Japanese, and we were using it. Shepp's Playhouse had two floors. We were on the top floor with the big band. Then they had a cocktail lounge there. Coleman Hawkins was working there. Yeah. It was nice, a nice club. And then, of course, naturally Hollywood was jumping, man. Hollywood was jumping all over. Billy Berg's on back was jumping then. So it wasn't a problem getting no jobs, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah. A lot of work.
Smith
Yeah, wasn't no problem. See, I worked with Slim Gaillard. I did 110 sides of Slim Gaillard in one week.
Isoardi
One hundred and ten?
Smith
Yeah. That's when they put the ban on the recording, you know.
Isoardi
Oh, so they were rushing to do all the recording.
Smith
You had to record at night. You couldn't record in the daytime. Slim called me, he and Tiny [Brown] called me. Hell, I did about 110 recordings with Slim, with the trio. And Billy wanted us to open up the new Billy Berg's there on Vine Street, Vine and De Longpre [Avenue] there. That was a new Billy Berg's. The old Billy Berg's was on Las Palmas [Avenue] and Hollywood Boulevard. See, I'd come from the Circle Bar to Billy Berg's, Streets of Paris, Suzie-Q, all those clubs. This is all in the thirties, you know. So I said, I wasn't worrying about any jobs. You just went from one to another.
Isoardi
Geez. What were the other important clubs on Central when you got in in the thirties then, aside from the Alabam?
Smith
Alabam. Let me see. Well, there was another club down there. Black and Gold was a pretty popular club on Twelfth Street.
Isoardi
Twelfth and Central?
Smith
Yeah. But it wasn't large like the Alabam. The Alabam was the biggest club on the street. That was the largest club. All those other clubs I call small clubs. The Hi-De-Ho, the Memo [Club], the Classic, the Downbeat [Club], the Last Word [Cafe], they were all small clubs. Like New York style. The Double V was pretty good-sized. Cafe Society was good sized, up there on Twenty-seventh [Street] and San Pedro [Street] where the Trennier Twins started out upstairs. Cafe Society. And "Black Dot" [Elihu McGhee] had a club down there on Twenty-third [Street] and San Pedro. It was fairly small. But the Alabam was the largest club that I know of, with the exception of where the Plantation [Club] was; that used to be the Jazzland. That was a very large place, you know.
Isoardi
That was down in Watts, wasn't it? The Plantation?
Smith
Well, yeah, it was on 107th Street. Yeah, that was a very large place.
Isoardi
Before it was the Plantation, was it a club before that?
Smith
Yeah, it was Jazzland.
Isoardi
It was called Jazzland?
Smith
Jazzland, yeah. Floyd Turnham's mother had that place. The Turnhams. Yeah, I knew all those clubs. Blainell's. I stayed at Blainell's. Blainell's was a great big old white building. It looked like an office building, but it was a nightclub. That was before Little Harlem.
Isoardi
What was Little Harlem?
Smith
Little Harlem was a place off of Imperial [Highway]. Two girls had it, two sisters had it; the Brown sisters had it. And it was just an ordinary nightclub, you know. You could go there and buy you some whiskey and dance. That's where T-Bone Walker worked most of the time.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
Yeah, he worked there. In fact, those girls sent for him. They sent for T-Bone from McAlester, Oklahoma, I think it was. But, you see, I worked at Blainell's way before then. The Brown sisters didn't come into being until '36, I think it was. See, Blainell's was '33 and '34, '35.
Isoardi
Where was that at?
Smith
Blainell's was on 118th [Street] and Wilmington [Avenue], a big old white building. A man named Venable had that place. And then there were a couple more clubs out that way. But there weren't any more clubs out that way until the forties, you know. I was just speaking about the thirties.
Isoardi
Right. So those were the main three, then: the Plantation, Blainell's, and Little Harlem.
Smith
That's right.
Isoardi
Did you ever encounter, when you were out there, the Woodman Brothers [Biggest Little] Band [in the World]?
Smith
Oh, yes. The Woodman Brothers started out before any of them.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
Yeah, they started out before any of them. You'd be surprised at the guys that come from Watts, man. Of course, William Green, he's from Kansas City, but there's a lot of guys around here, man, that you wouldn't even believe came from Watts. Even Eddie Davis, a good tenor, man, he's from Watts. "Brother" [William] Woodman. Brother Woodman had a whole lot of brothers. And the old man [William B. Woodman Sr.]-I worked with the old man down there on Second [Street] and Main Street at a taxi dance. The old man was a trombone player.
Isoardi
He was pretty good, right?
Smith
Yes, he was. Good musician. William was his name, William Woodman. Well, he had all those boys playing that music when they were little babies, boy. Yes sir, he had them all playing. But you see, the Woodman Brothers is about the oldest bunch of brothers beside "Big Jay" [Cecil] McNeely that came out of Watts, you know. Big Jay McNeely's from Watts too, him and his brothers. And there was a boy named Joe Comfort that went with King Cole-bass player. He was from Watts.Mingus, Charlie [Charles] Mingus. I met Mingus in '43 when I came from New York back out here. I met him at- Well, it wasn't the Jazzland then; it was the Plantation when I met him. And he was just a kid then.
Isoardi
How did he strike you?
Smith
He was a hell of a bass player, man. He was a natural, you know. He was taking lessons from Red Callender then. But he was a natural bass player. Man, that cat could play fast as lightning, and play correct, you know. Played nice piano. Played nice classical piano. But he was real belligerent, a real belligerent cat. If you hit a wrong note, it would disturb him. He was liable to jump up and want to fight if he heard a bad note. But those guys in New York fixed him, though.
Isoardi
What do you mean? Oh, you mean when he went back there?
Smith
A guy took the bell of his trombone off and had the back of it, and he said, "If you say another word to me I'm going to take it and wrap the rest of this trombone around your head." So he didn't mess with that cat anymore. And this was a white boy. Yeah, he wasn't black; he was a white boy. So these guys used to tell him out here- He was in a band called- I never will forget. Mingus was in a band called Floyd Ray. You've probably heard of Floyd Ray's band.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
They said, "Man, we'll be so glad when you join a white band, we won't know what to do!" [laughter] "You ain't making it in these black bands." [laughter] Boy, I tell you, it would make Mingus so mad, boy.Floyd Ray was working in the T and D Theatre in 1947. I never will forget this. We were working for the Will Mastin Trio. Sammy Davis Jr.-he was topping the bill. Man, Sammy was on, he was just dancing away, man. So Mastin, he liked to feature guys in the band, you know. He'd tell them to put the spotlight on me, and we'd start doing some things together. He'd tap something, and I'd do something on the piano trying to do what he was doing, you know, and just made a real comical thing out of it. This particular night he put it on me, and I did my little thing, and he threw the light back there on Mingus, and Mingus put his bass up, put it up in the rack, and pointed to the drummer. That was Forest [Foreststorn] "Chico" [Hamilton].
Isoardi
Chico Hamilton?
Smith
Yeah, Chico Hamilton was the drummer in the band. He pointed to Chico. Now, he's supposed to take a solo, but he's pointing at Chico. People just roared, boy, because they thought it was in the act. But he just didn't want to play anything. He said it was too short. It didn't give him enough time to do what he wanted to do, you know. He was a strange cat, man. He came outside the theater when we were taking intermission, and he jumped on the man's brand-new car-jumped on the hood of the man's car, the stagehand's car. Put a big dent in it.
Isoardi
Just jumped on it?
Smith
Yeah, just jumped on it. Then jumped on the other side. He'd just do anything, man. Brother Woodman was in the band. You know, Brother Woodman is just like a bull, man. He's just like a big gorilla, man. So, man, he said something to Brother Woodman, and man, when I looked around, Brother Woodman had that cat up over his head, man, like that.
Isoardi
Mingus?
Smith
He had Mingus over his head. That's right. And I'll tell you who was there. I'll tell you today. Buddy Collette was there.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
Buddy Collette was there. He was in the band playing first alto. We were all standing outside the theater. We were taking intermission in between shows.
Isoardi
Mingus wasn't small then.
Smith
No, he wasn't small. He never has been small.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
He's always been huge.
Isoardi
Woodman must have really-
Smith
But, you see, Woodman today is just like that wall, man. You hit him, man, you're going to bounce off. [laughter] See, Woodman's been whopping Mingus ever since they were kids in the backyards and things. He always wanted to jump on Brother Woodman, and Brother Woodman would be laughing and be beating him to death. [laughter] Because he's just like a bull, man. Man, that cat is built to take exercise. He don't do nothing except pull them irons and things, man. Strong as he can be, man. And, yeah, we stood out there and watched that guy. Man, he put Mingus up over his head. I said, "Man, this cat's got to be crazy!" [laughter] And Mingus's eyes got that big. [laughter]
Isoardi
Yeah, I'll bet! [laughter]
Smith
Scared him to death, boy. "Put me down," he said, "put me down, man! Put me down!" Yes, sir. Buddy Collette will tell you the same thing. He was right there. That was 1947. Yes, sir, I think that was our first show at the T and D Theatre.I've worked there with the Ink Spots since then. It's not the T and D, it's not the Grand Theatre. I'll think of it. Yeah, we worked there about a couple of years ago. We were going up north; we were going to Redding, Chico, and Marysville [California]. The time we were with the piano player, the white piano player. We were on tour with him. We came out of Vegas, and they came out of San Diego. But, yeah, we worked there. We worked at a theater there in Oakland together, man. But it was the same theater that it was in '47, T and D. They named it something else.But man, look here, man, that Brother Woodman, man. If you don't know what you're doing, you'd better ask somebody. [laughter] He's a rough boy. He's a rough boy today and doesn't bother anybody. He's always grinning. Every time he sees me he's grinning. Yes sir. Bald spot. Yeah, that's my buddy. His wife [Vernetta Cartwright Woodman] and I are very good friends. We're still good friends, but I just don't see him often, you know.I got this place- We bought a mobile [home] up over here in Villa Park on Atlantic [Avenue] and Artesia [Boulevard] across from Jordan High School. Well, our grandkids didn't have anywhere to stay, so I gave them my bedroom and moved over here, made an office out of this. [tape recorder off]
Isoardi
Okay, Fletcher.
Smith
In 1934 there was a place called the Cabin Inn. That was Twenty-third [Street] and Central Avenue across the street from the Lincoln Theatre. Twenty-third and South Central Avenue. The Black and Gold was on Twelfth [Street] and Central. Let's see, Lovejoy's was on Vernon [Avenue] and Central.
Isoardi
Lovejoy's was going strong then too, huh?
Smith
Uh-huh.
Isoardi
Quite a history.
Smith
Vernon and Central. Honey Murphy's was at Ninety-third [Street] and South Central [Avenue].
Isoardi
What was Honey Murphy's?
Smith
Honey Murphy's was an after-hours spot. He had a club, and when they closed it down they made an after-hours spot out of it. Ivie's Chicken Shack-let's see. I remember Ivie's Chicken Shack. Double V, Vernon and Central, upstairs. That was '34.
Isoardi
Do you know who some of the people were who owned these clubs, who ran them?
Smith
Do I know the people?
Isoardi
Yeah. Who were some of the owners of some of these places?
Smith
Oh-
Isoardi
Do you know any of them?
Smith
Yeah, all of them died.
Isoardi
Who was the money behind these clubs?
Smith
Well, the guy who had all the money on Central Avenue was a man named [Teddy] Lomax. He was the one that bought the Alabam.
Isoardi
Oh, really?
Smith
He had more money than any of the rest of them. The guy that had the Memo Club was Clarence Moore, I think. Then there was the Hi-De-Ho club. See, all these guys I'm talking about are dead.
Isoardi
But they were pretty much just businessmen, most of them?
Smith
Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, some of them were gamblers, too, you know.
Isoardi
Oh, yeah?
Smith
Now, you take Black Dot. Black Dot was a gambler.
Isoardi
Was that Black Dot McGhee?
Smith
Yeah. He was a gambler. Yeah, he had a lot of clubs.
Isoardi
So would he run gambling games on the side or in the back?
Smith
Oh, yeah, sure he would. Yeah, Black Dot was quite a hustler. I saw Black Dot not long ago. He lost one of his eyes.
Isoardi
He's still alive?
Smith
Uh-huh. He lost one of his eyes. He looked at me real hard and looked at me. See, I used to work with him with Dan Grissom, a guy out of Jimmie Lunceford's band. We worked on Jefferson [Boulevard] and-An after-hours spot there. I can't think of the name of the street, but it was on Jefferson just before you got to Normandie [Avenue]. That was Black Dot's joint. We worked there; me and Dan worked there. He sang and I played piano.Then I worked at a place called Dynamite Jackson's. That was in the thirties, too. I even forgot about that. That was on Forty-eighth [Street] and Central, Dynamite Jackson's.Now, there was a place called the Breakfast Club. That was way back there in- It was up over the Alabam.
Isoardi
Over the Alabam?
Smith
Over the Alabam, yeah. The Breakfast Club ran for years. Boy, I played piano, and the girl that sang there, Betty Treadville, is still living.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
I worked there about fifteen years. It was a gambling joint and after-hours spot. And there was a place called the Last Roundup. That was at Forty-first [Street] and South Central.
Isoardi
So that must have been just about across from the Dunbar?
Smith
No, down the street there, before you got to the Dunbar. The Dunbar was on Forty-second Place. This is on Forty-first Street.
Isoardi
Oh, I see.
Smith
The Last Roundup. It was a joint that they had a lot of singers there and a piano player, and it was after hours, too. Yeah, and then there was the Hi-De-Ho club. Now, the Hi-De-Ho club was right across the street from the Alabam. Forty-second [Street]. Let me see. The Lincoln Theatre had been going for years and years, man. Memo Club-that was Clarence Love's place, I think.
Isoardi
Clarence who?
Smith
Clarence Love. The Big Apple, there's another club I forgot about. It was on Forty-third [Street] and Central.
Isoardi
The Big Apple.
Smith
The Big Apple.
Isoardi
And most of these were pretty much the same kind of setup?
Smith
Yeah, it was just clubs.
Isoardi
Maybe seventy-five, a hundred people?
Smith
Yeah.
Isoardi
Small stage and a bar?
Smith
Yeah, they were small clubs. See, the Alabam was the largest club. The Alabam and the Plantation were the largest clubs out there. There was a place called Leer's Cafe where we used to jam all the time, Forty-second Place, in the back. And the Elk's hall was going then, you know, Thirty-ninth [Street] and Central. But the Elk's hall had the worst acoustics in the world, boy.
Isoardi
Oh, really?
Smith
Oh, man, they were terrible. Really terrible. Yeah. Let's see. Black Dot's, Cafe Society- Cafe Society was on Twenty-Fifth [Street] and San Pedro. That's where the Trennier Twins started out. Cafe Society. Yeah, and I told you about Lionel [Hampton]. I worked with him for a short stint in '35. Then I went with Fred Mason from '34.
Isoardi
When did the after-hours thing come in? The clubs could stay open all night long for a while then, right?
Smith
'Thirty-nine is when they closed the town down.
Isoardi
Okay. And you couldn't sell alcohol, was it, after a certain time?
Smith
You had a curfew then. Two o'clock. Two o'clock curfew.
Isoardi
But some places could stay open, right, all night by not serving alcohol?
Smith
No, no, they just called them after-hours spots. They had food. They could have food, but they couldn't serve alcohol. They had to bootleg that. You see, there was a club called Noodle Smith. That was in Seattle. Noodle Smith. In Portland there was a club. In Sacramento was a beautiful club. This is all nightclubs. Charlie Derrick's, a beautiful club. Prettiest club you've ever seen, man. They closed him down. San Diego was running full blast then. San Diego had a club called the Creole Palace. George Ramsey and Mabel Ramsey ran that club. That was way back then, man.
Isoardi
Like the early thirties or something?
Smith
Oh, yeah, yeah. It had been running in the early thirties, '33, and it ran until '38- I know it ran till '38. I was there in '34.
Isoardi
And that was the best spot in San Diego?
Smith
Oh yeah. Second [Avenue] and Market Street? Yeah, that was the top spot. Yeah man, you'd get lost down there now the way they built up around it, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah, really.
Smith
Floyd Ray's band; he had a good band. I left him and joined Nat Towel's band in Omaha, Lloyd Hunter's band, then I went to McVan's in Buffalo, New York.
Isoardi
So there's a certain period of time here now that you're leaving L.A. And this is-?
Smith
Oh, I left here in '39.
Isoardi
In '39 you took off.
Smith
I was a pallbearer for Herschel Evans in Count Basie's band. I was a pallbearer for him, and I left the next week after that, which was right around my birthday, which is on the twenty-second of September. I left here on the twenty-third of September.
Isoardi
Was it the jobs? You got some offers and you decided to take them?
Smith
Oh, yeah. Nat Towel sent for me. He sent me a ticket. I went on the city of Los Angeles train. Yeah, Nat Towel sent for me, I stayed with him a while, and then I joined another band in Omaha named Lloyd Hunter. Then I left Lloyd Hunter and went to McVan's in Buffalo, New York. Then after that I wound up in New York City. I stayed in New York City a whole year. Then I came back to the coast with a group called the Floyd Hunt Quartet. I joined Floyd in Denver, and we worked all the way to the West Coast. We worked from Denver to Salt Lake City, Salt Lake City to Portland, and then Portland to Los Angeles. That was '43. In '44 I worked the Lincoln Theatre band, Bardu Ali, and I went with Johnny Otis-Alabam, Shepp's Playhouse. Then I went with a band- The best band I had been with was a band named the Buddy Banks band.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
Yeah. Seven pieces. Bad band.
Isoardi
Really? Who was Buddy Banks?
Smith
He's dead now. He was a saxophone player. He played piano for years, but he played nice saxophone, too. Yeah, Buddy Banks. He had a good band, man. They hated to see us coming, because the band was well organized, you know, it was really organized, man. I joined them in- The first time I joined Buddy was in '45. And I went with Al Killian and Billy Eckstine in '46. In '47 I was with Floyd Ray. Then I went back with Buddy in '48-'48, '49, and '50. Then in '51 I went up to Oakland with Happy Johnson. Oh, I've always worked since I've been here. I didn't worry about work. I worked. I worked myself to death. I worked nine years in Las Vegas. I opened up with the Ink Spots-I had a terrible accident in my household on Third Avenue, where I lived for about seventeen years. A car came through my bedroom at ten thirty at night, and I'm laying up there asleep, and it knocked me out in the front room. This was 1981.
Isoardi
It knocked you from the bedroom into the front room?
Smith
That's right, up under my piano. And it ended this hip- In fact, this is still injured. They drove over everything and tore the room completely out. I've still got six pinched nerves in my hip from that accident.Now, on top of that, I had an accident in Vegas in '89. I was in a Chrysler. If I wasn't in the Chrysler I'd have gotten killed. A guy hit me, was in one of those little light Fords, went through a signal. I was waiting on a go sign coming up off the freeway by the Tropicana in Vegas. I just got in town, and I was going over to my buddy's place to get some breakfast, you know. So I was sitting there waiting on the light to change. So the light said green. Well, when the light says green, I don't usually jump out there, you know. I usually look around. Now, there's three lanes. This lane here, the two lanes here, and on the other side of the freeway here, all the lanes are stopped. This lane here is stopped. The third lane I couldn't see, you know, but I figure it's all right because everybody's stopped. So I eased out. I've got this great big old heavy Chrysler. I've got this big Newport, you know. And I was doing about four or five miles an hour, and man, a Ford came through there- Well, he did go through the light doing seventy-nine miles an hour. That's what they had him clocked at. And he hit the front of my Chrysler on the left-hand side, and he tilted this Chrysler with a Ford Fairlane. Now, you know he was traveling fast.
Isoardi
No kidding!
Smith
Yeah. Well, it killed him, you know. It knocked all my grill out and everything, kind of shook me up there pretty bad, because I had my belt on and everything. Man, that tore that belt all to pieces, man, shoot. And every time I have an injury- My new car is sitting down there; I had the same thing.
Isoardi
The same spot?
Smith
The same spot.
Isoardi
Damn!
Smith
So, man, it hit me, man. I got out of the car. A guy helped me out of the car, and I was sitting on the curb, and he asked me was I hurt. I said, "I don't know." I was in a daze, man. So the cop came up there and told me to see if I could drive, to turn around and come back. So I did. I turned around, and I came back and I got in back. When I got up there, I saw the cat had the sheet over the man. So the officer said, "Well, this man, he's just deceased." I said, "The man who hit me?" He said, "Yeah, the man who hit you." And the side of that Ford looked like an accordion, man. Man, now, you know that Chrysler is heavy, man. Just all that side was just crushed in, man. And this guy, he got killed. Well, anyway, they went and told me, they said, "Can you drive?" I said, "Yeah, I can drive." So I went on. I was supposed to go to work that night at the Four Queens, you know. So I called my boss and told him, and he said, "Well, you can come to work if you want to, and if you don't you can just take it easy." Because I had a room there reserved. I didn't pay any rent in Vegas. So anyway, I went and got me a lawyer, man. I got me some bread out of that.And then I bought this car. Last April I was giving a girl a lesson over here in El Segundo. And I was leaving her house and got down there on Rosecrans [Avenue] and Budlong [Avenue].
Isoardi
Not again.
Smith
And I'm sitting at the signal waiting on a red light to change. I'm in the first car. There's two cars behind me. How this guy hit me I'll never know as long as I live. He hit me, man, from the back. He came through all that traffic and hit me in the back, knocked me clear out of the car! I'm just sitting there, and this time I don't have my belt on. I'm not lying. This time I don't have my belt on. Man, this cat knocked me unconscious, man. And the car is sitting down there in the lot now.
Isoardi
Unbelievable.
Smith
So I said, "Well, I'll be doggone, man, the same side." So my insurance company said, "Well, we'll do what we can."
Isoardi
They're not going to insure your left side anymore. [laughter] That's what's going to happen.
Smith
They just couldn't believe it. They couldn't believe it. My doctor couldn't believe it. See, I've had a doctor here for about seven or eight years, the same doctor. He couldn't believe it. I said, "I can't believe it, either." Cat hit me on the same side. I've got a little Chevy Celebrity out there, a little brown one. It was new then. Shit, they hit that baby boy in the back. The guy wanted $2,000 to fix it. I said, "Well, it won't be fixed." So I finally ran into a guy that fixed that car up into good shape for seven hundred and some dollars. So I got it fixed. And the insurance company hasn't done anything yet. And that was April, last April. So that insurance company is nothing, boy. But anyway, I can drive it and it's in good shape. So anyway, yeah, I was a-
Isoardi
So you were working the whole time, then. You're on Central; you've worked the whole time.
Smith
Oh, yeah.
Isoardi
You never really had any downtime.
Smith
No. I didn't ever worry about time off, you know. If I wanted to work.
Isoardi
It was always there.
Smith
Yeah, it was always there. I'm really lucky. It's been rougher now that- When I retired- See, I retired last year from Las Vegas. I went in there with the Ink Spots in '81 and and retired last year. So I was there a good nine years, you know. Well, see, I quit smoking, I quit drinking, and that smoke in that club started getting to me. I started feeling it, you know. So I told my wife, I said, "Well, I've got to put it down now, because I can feel it in my lungs." So that's the extent of that. But other than that, I feel okay. I go to the doctor regularly and take my medicine regular because I've had emphysema for years. So I take my medicine for that.Yeah, I had a good experience with a group in '52 called the Sepianeers. It was a singing group. They gave me seventy-five tunes-my part, piano part, and I said, "When do we rehearse?" They said, "We don't." [laughter] And they left Los Angeles and went all the way to Toronto, Canada. Now, that's almost three thousand miles.
Isoardi
[laughter] So you knew those seventy-five songs.
Smith
They gave me seventy-five songs that I had to sightread, you know. I said, "Okay." We opened up at a place called the Town Tavern on Queen Street East. Oh, a beautiful, beautiful group. And they could sing. But, man, they had me on some parts below the staff, and I was growling, man. [laughter] They said, "Man, you're really a good musician." I said, "Yeah, but, man, you guys really put the pressure on me." But that's the fruits of the business, you know. You either know your craft or you don't know it. So I think that was the last cross-country group that I was with. No, I was with another one, now. I was with Percy Mayfield, too, a blues band. We left Los Angeles and did eighty-one one-nighters. And I was with Earl Bostic; we did a lot of one-nighters. They were both nice to work with. And they're both dead. Earl Bostic was a nice guy. He died in '65.
Isoardi
When were you with him?
Smith
Earl Bostic?
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
Nineteen fifty-eight. He died in '65. Percy Mayfield just died here about two or three years ago. I was with Percy Mayfield in '53, 1953. I did eighty-one one-nighters with him down south and back. That's the only road band I've been with in a long time. Because I didn't do that much traveling with Nat Towel's band in Omaha. I stayed mostly right around the adjoining states, you know. We didn't go too far. That's about all the traveling I did on that.I went to Paris, France, in '73, '74. In '73 I was there for about two months with the Golden Gate Quartet. They came out of New York. I liked that group. And then I came on back. I like to froze to death over there, though, boy. Shoot, it was cold there. So at least I've been in quite a few countries over there.But I still like the United States, you know. See, when I was over there in Paris, hell, I was sixty years old then. It wasn't time for me to be trying to learn a language; I wanted some money. [laughter] I don't care about any French language. As long as they give me some money, you know. So I came on back home. They tried to get me to come back. I told them no, I didn't want to come back. I stayed home.But it was quite an experience, you know. Because they talk about Paris, France, Paris this, Paris that. That's the dirtiest town I've ever been in in my life. Really a dirty town, with the dogs' mess all over the street and all that stuff. See, you don't believe that until you see it, you know. Yeah, it's really messed up.

3. Tape Number: II, Side One February 23, 1992

Isoardi
Fletcher, more than anybody we've interviewed, you really have seen Central [Avenue] change over the years. Maybe you can talk a little bit about how you saw it change from the thirties to the forties, say.
Smith
Well, what I've got to say about Central Avenue is that the people that were on Central Avenue closed it up themselves by acting bad. See, we used to have a ball at the [Club] Alabam every year, a masquerade ball every year. And people used to- See, movie stars used to come over there all the time. They got to the place where they started messing with the movie stars, especially the women, and all that stuff. See, they did all that stuff themselves, you know. It wasn't the law so much that closed them down. And different clubs, you know- So the people just acted bad, that's all. I've seen it go from good to bad. They're trying to preserve the Dunbar [Hotel] and all that stuff-I mean, they need to tear that building down.
Isoardi
You don't think it should be preserved?
Smith
No. See, I've been in there. I've seen it, and it's pitiful, man, trying to save something like that. If they're going to save anything, they should have saved the Alabam, where somebody had a chance to work, you know. The Alabam was a big club. Yeah, they tore that down. See, where they made their mistake, the black union should have bought that building, see, then they'd have had somewhere to work.
Isoardi
You think they should have bought the old Alabam?
Smith
Yeah, the Alabam, they should have bought that place. Then they'd have had somewhere to work. Yeah, that's what I think. But it's one of those things, man. Good times don't roll all the time; it cuts out sometime.
Isoardi
Did the war bring about some changes on Central that you noticed?
Smith
Well, yeah, it brought about a lot of changes.
Isoardi
How did the avenue change?
Smith
Well, the avenue changed because they were taking those guys to the army. Yeah, a lot of guys went to the army off of Central Avenue. Then the clubs weren't doing too hot. They did quite a bit after the war, but not during the war, you know.
Isoardi
Oh, yeah?
Smith
Uh-huh. Yeah, that during the war, man, was rough. And then those guys, they weren't getting those gigs, those good gigs, you know. Yeah, I was looking at Luke Jones. Luke Jones had a nice band. I was with him in '39 when they closed the town down. I was working at Eighth [Street] and Figueroa [Street] upstairs, working for Papki. Papki had a lot of brothers, Italian brothers. They had warned him, though. They called him and told him they were closing him up, closing the town down, and he didn't believe it.
Isoardi
Who was "they"?
Smith
Papki. The one that we worked for. They had warned him.
Isoardi
Who was "they"? Who had warned him?
Smith
I'm talking about the cops had warned him. See, Papki had some friends on the police force, and they called him and told him that they were going to raid his place, and he didn't believe it. Man, they came up there and chopped up that place. The first time they did it, they told the musicians to get their instruments and get them out, because they were going to tear down the joint. And they did, man. They chopped up those tables. Those gambling tables, they chopped them up, man. Now, you know how much those tables cost.
Isoardi
So there was a lot of gambling going on? Was that typical of a lot of clubs? Could you gamble in most clubs?
Smith
All of them. You could gamble in all of them.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
Yeah, sure. Yeah, that Breakfast Club, my goodness! I don't know how long they gambled up there. Up over the-
Isoardi
Over the Alabam?
Smith
Yeah, up over the Alabam. I don't know how long they gambled over there, man, but that was a long time. They gambled at the Downbeat Club, they gambled there. They gambled at the Last Word [Cafe], they gambled. Everywhere they were gambling. Trying to make a dollar, man.
Isoardi
So what produced this? I mean, why did they start coming down hard? Why did the cops start coming down hard on the avenue?
Smith
Well, I think they were messing with those- They would start stealing, start stealing from people, you know, when they come on Central Avenue. Then Central Avenue began to get a bad name. I think that's what started it, really. Because the other streets didn't have a name like that, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
Go anyplace anyway, go on Avalon [Boulevard], or go on San Pedro [Street]-all those places you could get along, but Central Avenue, they just put that bad name on it. Of course, that's where the bulk of the people went, you know. Yeah, that was the busiest street in the world, man.
Isoardi
I mean, with all this gambling going on and things like that, was there any mob influence down there that you know of?
Smith
No, I don't think so. I don't think there was any mob. There was a mob out there in Hollywood, though.
Isoardi
Oh, really?
Smith
Oh yeah, out there. Different clubs out there like Streets of Paris, Suzie-Q, across the street from Billy Berg's out in there, the Circle Bar-that was all mob joints.
Isoardi
Oh, really?
Smith
Yeah.
Isoardi
You probably had to agree with what they said or you wouldn't work anywhere in Hollywood.
Smith
That's right. You could see them in the back counting their money, man.
Isoardi
No kidding.
Smith
They had a table in the back counting their money, exchanging their money, you know. So you know it was mob.
Isoardi
Yeah. But they pretty much stayed away from- So mostly Central was sort of small businessmen, I guess.
Smith
Oh, yeah, it was.
Isoardi
Hustlers, whatever.
Smith
Yeah, small-time. No big-time stuff. Teddy Lomax had more money than all of them all put together, the one that bought the Alabam. He had more money than all of them put together.
Isoardi
Was a place called Brother's going then?
Smith
Brother's was on Adams [Boulevard]. It wasn't on Central Avenue. Brother's was on Adams just before you got to Vermont [Avenue], on Adams, on the north side of the street. He had a nice place. Brother's. Yeah, he had an after-hours spot.
Isoardi
There wasn't any music there, though, was there?
Smith
No, no, there wasn't any music. He had a piano in there. Sometimes he'd let you play it. Most of the time he wouldn't, though. Brother's didn't start jumping till after one o'clock in the morning. And there was another place I didn't even mention, the chicken shack there at Thirty-third [Street] and Central. Boy, that was a jumping place, man.
Isoardi
When was that?
Smith
That was- Well, it was in the late thirties, around '39 and '40, chicken shack there at Thirty-third and Central-Jack's Basket Room, really. That was really the name of it, Jack's Basket Room.
Isoardi
Oh yeah. They used to broadcast a lot from there, didn't they?
Smith
Right. Twice a night. I worked there with Buddy Banks. We broadcast twice a night there. That man really had it made. Then he started messing with the government taxes and they put him out of business. Every musician in the world has worked Jack's Basket Room. I mean, Monday night was a regular session there, you know. Monday nights. Jack's Basket Room. Every tenor player in the world has worked there. Yes, sir. Boy, I've seen some sessions there. I'll tell you who blew them all out. What's his name? Paul Gonsalves.
Isoardi
Yeah?
Smith
Yeah, that guy could blow, boy.
Isoardi
When did you see him play at Jack's Basket Room?
Smith
Well, when it was operating. It's been closed for years. Yeah, it's been closed for years. See, I think it closed up in '42, I think it was-'42 or '43 they closed up.
Isoardi
So you heard Paul Gonsalves. He must have been pretty young, then, when you heard him play.
Smith
Yeah, but he could play, though, boy. He was young when he joined Duke [Ellington]. Yeah, he was a young man then. Paul and this other guy, Lucky Thompson. I heard Lucky Thompson, Paul Gonsalves, and Wardell Gray. That was another bad cat, boy. Wardell Gray. They were all there one night. You know that's where Barney Kessel learned how to play?
Isoardi
You're kidding. No, I didn't know that.
Smith
That's right. I worked with Barney Kessel when he couldn't do nothing but play chords. Just strum chords. He couldn't single-string at all. No, I worked with him. The first session we ever had was with Gene Norman on off-nights at the clubs. At [Nat] King Cole's off-night, we worked there. We worked Billy Berg's off-night. And then we worked Jefferson [Boulevard] and Normandie [Avenue] upstairs. We had Red Mack, Red Callender, Oscar Bradley, Barney Kessel, and Jack McVea. And then this other boy, this other white tenor player, joined us. I can't think of his name right now. But I worked with Barney Kessel when he could not single-string. He learned how to single-string down at Jack's Basket Room, with the musicians. Because they'd all turn around and look at him. Everybody was looking at him so strange, I guess Barney said, "I'd better learn how to play something." [laughter] That's the truth. Yeah, I've known Barney Kessel for years, man. He's a very nice guy. He learned how to single-string right down in Jack's Basket Room. He learned how to play the blues right down there. And he's got every record that Charlie Christian ever made.
Isoardi
I believe it.
Smith
Yes, every one of them. He played like Charles Christian. Now, there was a guy who didn't know how much he could play. Charles Christian. He made his own amplifier. When Benny Goodman heard him, he had made that amplifier that he had.
Isoardi
Seriously? He made it from scratch?
Smith
Yeah, yeah. You know, it wasn't very clear, but I mean it showed he was trying, you know. Yeah, Benny Goodman bought him a brand-new one. He wanted to buy him a guitar, and the cat said, "No, no. I play my own guitar." He wanted to buy him everything new, you know.
Isoardi
Those sessions you were playing with Gene Norman-were those jam sessions that Norman would sponsor?
Smith
Yeah, they were jam sessions. Every time the club had a night off, they would put us in there. Little six pieces.
Isoardi
Were those sessions open to anybody? Or was it just for musicians?
Smith
Oh yeah, they were open to anybody. See, in those days you had to pay six musicians. Now, anybody else could sit in if they wanted to, but you had to pay six men. So the band wouldn't get everything free, you know.
Isoardi
Right.
Smith
That's the way it operated then. Now, I don't know how they're operating now because I haven't jammed in forty years.
Isoardi
It's almost gone.
Smith
Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, sessions are gone now.
Isoardi
It's too bad. That's where you learn.
Smith
You learn a whole lot in those sessions. So, yeah, we used to work on them on all our nights off. Gene Norman, man, got rich. Man, he got behind Ella Fitzgerald and Count Basie and, man, got rich. I saw him in New York and talking about, "Do I know you?" And I said, "No." He got too big for me, you know. Yeah, some guys forget, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
At that time he was wearing tennis shoes. He didn't have a quarter.
Isoardi
He must have been pretty young, too.
Smith
Oh, yeah. Well, he had an idea, and it worked, you know. The guys then, around that time, were working those off nights and making ten dollars a man for the session. They made sixty dollars for the whole session. He wound up doing that for about a couple of years and finally got ahold of Ella Fitzgerald and Count Basie and got to be a millionaire. That guy that had the Platters did the same thing. And he's dead. See, that greed, man-being greedy don't mean nothing, man. I don't care how much money you make, there's always going to be some left, you know. And there will be some here when you're gone. So you can't make it all.I was just looking at television. They're talking about the Japanese got billions and billions, but that don't mean nothing. They spend a million and they make a billion. That ain't nothing. I don't want to get up any stress like that, you know. They give me two dollars, and then they go home. [laughter] Yeah, I don't want to get any stress like that, that big money. That will take you to your grave.

4. Tape Number: III, Side One April 4, 1992

Isoardi
Okay, Fletcher, last time we got together we pretty much covered sort of the chronology of your life from the beginnings through coming to Los Angeles and through your years on Central [Avenue]. We talked about some of the clubs that were important in the thirties and your own musical history. Maybe we could begin today by talking about the individuals that you met and worked with on the avenue as people. Who were the important people and what were they like?
Smith
Fred Mason was one-a trumpet player that I worked with quite a bit.
Isoardi
Now, who was he?
Smith
He was a trumpet player.
Isoardi
With whom?
Smith
He had his own band. He always had his own band. He had his own group at all times. Happy Johnson had his own band. He was a very nice guy to work with. He was a trombone player. Floyd Turnham usually had his own band. He was a saxophone player. And of course, Floyd Ray came out here from New York with a big band.
Isoardi
When did he come out?
Smith
Floyd Ray came out here in '36, I think. 'Thirty-six or '37, one of the two.
Isoardi
A lot of people mention his name. Was that a real well respected band?
Smith
Oh, it was a wonderful band. Floyd was just the director in the band. He played saxophone, but he didn't play any saxophone out here. He just brought his band out here. He was a little short guy. He was a very nice fellow. Luke Jones was another nice saxophone player that had his own band. These guys I'm talking about, they were always bandleaders, you know. Of course, there's thousands of guys I worked with. Sidemen-we don't have enough paper to put them on.
Isoardi
Sure. Let me ask you, these guys who had their own bands-how big were these bands generally?
Smith
Well, it was from five pieces up, you know. Let's see. Floyd Turnham had an eight-piece band, Happy Johnson had a fifteen-piece band, Fred Mason had a five-piece band, Lionel Hampton had a sixteen-piece band, Floyd Ray's- Naturally his band was large. Sixteen pieces. Luke Jones's band was a small band. Six pieces. So there were different musicians and different- Like a guy, he starts out his band, and maybe he wants seven pieces and he can't get seven, well, he'll go with six until they get seven. You know, one of those things.
Isoardi
Yeah. And you played with all these guys.
Smith
Oh yeah, I played with all of them.
Isoardi
What kind of gigs did they get? All the clubs on Central?
Smith
Well, they didn't pay no money, you know. They didn't pay no money. They didn't pay that, and then one time gigs went down to fifty cents a night.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
On Central Avenue, yeah, sure. They didn't pay no money. When you started making a dollar and a half a night, you wouldn't tell anybody where you were working, you know.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
That's right. "Yeah, I work over there," you know. You wouldn't tell nobody where you were working, because they'd come there and get the job from you, you know. It was one of those things. Like there were a lot of jobs down in San Pedro then, down there-Shanghai Red's and the 99 Club. They didn't pay no money, but there was work all the time. I was working. And then the difference was that the economy wasn't like it is now. You know, things weren't expensive like they are now. You could get a nickel's worth of this and a dime's worth of this and fifteen cents worth of this. But you can't do that now. Bulk food, you know. You can't do that now. So that's the difference. So when they say times have changed, that's what they mean: the times have changed, you know.
Isoardi
Where were these clubs in San Pedro? Were they in one area of San Pedro?
Smith
Oh no, they were on different streets down there.
Isoardi
So it was spread out.
Smith
They spread out down there. Let's see, Shanghai Red's was on Third Street. I think it was on Third Street down there by the ocean-the ocean front. There were some very popular clubs in San Pedro.
Isoardi
Who went to the clubs down there?
Smith
Well, the sailors, you know. The sailors. That was a seaport town, you know, San Pedro. Mostly sailors. But then civilians went there, too, you know. See, Los Angeles-there was plenty of work, a lot of work, but it didn't pay no money, you know. You didn't have to worry about a job then.
Isoardi
So when you worked with these guys in these bands, I mean, the work wasn't just on Central. You were working pretty much all over the L.A. area?
Smith
You worked all over, wherever the job was, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
So they said to [American Federation of Musicians Local] 767, the black local, to come to [Local] 47 so that the black musicians could work. Hell, I'd been working in Hollywood all the time. I worked anywhere there was a job. I had a union card; that's all I needed, you know. [When] I joined Lionel [Hampton], I didn't have a union card. Lionel sent to Sioux City, Iowa, here and got me a union card-which was six dollars then, in '35-and I went all up the [West] Coast with Lionel. I didn't have a problem, man. But these guys say that we're going over here to 47 so we can work. Well, hell, I'd been working in Hollywood all my life, ever since I'd been here. I mean, Santa Monica [Boulevard], Pico [Boulevard]. Pico Boulevard was a street where there was a nightclub on every other block all the way to the beach.
Isoardi
No kidding.
Smith
Yeah, Pico. Ain't no way in the world to name all that many clubs. In the thirties, you know. But it was beer joints. We would call them beer joints, you know, little small clubs. But if you want a gig, you've got a gig that night. Maybe two dollars-you'd get a two-dollar job, three dollars. If it was a three-dollar job- That's a high-class job, three dollars. For three dollars, you know- That was high class.But, see, the economy was such a drastic change, so people got along better then than they do now, because things weren't as high, you know. See, a loaf of bread-that's ridiculous. A loaf of bread for a dollar and seventy-five cents. You'd get a loaf of bread for ten cents, you know. It's a difference. And they say, "Oh, man, there ain't much difference." The hell there ain't much difference. A dollar seventy-five and a dime? Man, you've got to be kidding.
Isoardi
When you first came out here, then, Prohibition was still going on, wasn't it?
Smith
No, Prohibition ended in 1933, March 10.
Isoardi
So you arrived here just after that.
Smith
Yeah, yeah. March 10. I never will forget that. You could go down there and get free beer and all that stuff, man.
Isoardi
Were you in Vegas then? Or were you still-?
Smith
No, I was in Los Angeles. I'd just come here right after that.
Isoardi
Aha.
Smith
But you'd go down there on Central Avenue down around Twelfth Street where the grocery stores and things were- Man, they were giving away free beer and free wine, you know, in the big barrels and stuff. They were so glad that Prohibition was over. And man, they didn't have to worry about it. And man, I could go down there and get drunk, man, on that stuff. [laughter] It was free. Yeah. Free! Yeah.Now, this is what the guys nowadays don't know, because they weren't active then. See, Buddy Collette has got all this thing going on the air and this-Central Avenue days, read this and it's Central Avenue days. What does he know about Central Avenue? When Central Avenue was jumping, hell, he was a kid out there in Jordan High School, fourteen or fifteen years old. He couldn't go in no clubs. Buddy Collette didn't start playing in clubs until 1941 or something like that, because I've got a boy here-one of my best buddies now, Eddie Davis-graduated the same time he did. And he said that if he gives you any-or anything about when he graduated, you send him to me. I've got the picture hanging here on the wall when he graduated. But, you see, Buddy Collette is a good musician. I don't take anything away from him. He's a very good musician. But Eddie Davis is a good musician, too, but he doesn't play politics. See, Buddy Collette plays politics. Anything he can do in a political line, he'll do it, you know, and keep his name out there when he doesn't have to. He's that good a musician-he doesn't have to do that.
Isoardi
Yeah, he's a great musician.
Smith
William Green doesn't do it. He doesn't do it. William Green-any instrument he picks up, he can play it. But he ain't jiving.
Isoardi
Anything you blow into-
Smith
That's right.
Isoardi
-he can play beautifully.
Smith
He can play it. Because he has studied and he knows those instruments. So that's what I'm talking about, a musician. I'm not talking about one of those guys standing on the corner doing all that talking; I'm talking about a guy that produces, you know. William Green produces. I worked with William Green almost fifteen weeks in El Monte on Sundays-you know, the jam sessions.
Isoardi
Out at the legion? Legion- Was that legion field?
Smith
No, it wasn't no legion field. It was a nightclub out there that we worked on Sundays.
Isoardi
Oh, that's right, that's right. You mentioned that last time.
Smith
We worked there with a white drummer. I can't even think of the boy's name. We had four saxophones, we had trumpet-Jake Porter was on trumpet, I remember that-white boy on tenor, we had "Brother" [William] Woodman on tenor, we had William Green, and oh, Bumps was on tenor.
Isoardi
Bumps Myers?
Smith
Yeah, Bumps was there. We had four saxophones, Jake Porter, and we had a guy-a hell of a bass player. I can't even recall his name. He was white. He's dead now. I read in the obituary where he died.
Isoardi
Oh, just recently.
Smith
Yeah, yeah.
Isoardi
Oh, Monty Budwig.
Smith
Yeah, yeah.
Isoardi
That was the guy?
Smith
Yeah, yeah. A hell of a bass player, man. Well, we got down on Sundays for the jam sessions. The 49er Club, that was the name of the club.
Isoardi
Oh.
Smith
Yeah, right on the main drag. We'd go out there and do those little sessions, and those sessions paid ten dollars. That's all they paid, ten dollars. Best musicians in town.
Isoardi
Yeah, great lineup.
Smith
See, that's when they started cutting out the jam sessions. You know, if we were going to jam on a job, and the job was a six-piece job, the first thing the man had to do- He'd have to pay six musicians, and then as many musicians as wanted to could come up there and jam.
Isoardi
Oh, as long as you got the basic six covered.
Smith
Yeah, as long as you got the basic six. But then they cut that out.
Isoardi
When did they cut that out?
Smith
Oh, man, they cut out jamming years ago, man.
Isoardi
Was it the union that stopped it?
Smith
Norman Granz picked that up, you know. He picked it up.
Isoardi
Oh, with his, yeah, Jazz at the Philharmonic.
Smith
I did the first job for Norman Granz out at the 331 Club where [Nat] King Cole worked. The 331.
Isoardi
That was before you started doing jams at the Trouville and places like that?
Smith
That's right. We had Red Callender, we had Oscar Bradley on drums, we had Red Mack on trumpet, we had Barney Kessel on guitar, I was playing piano, and-who's this boy?-Jack McVea, we had him on tenor.
Isoardi
Good lineup.
Smith
And then Corky- What's his name? Corky was with- Who was he with? He was with Stan Kenton, I think. This white boy, tenor player. Well, we started him out at the 331 Club. See, Norman Granz used to work on each one of those clubs' nights off. Anytime a club had a night off, that's where he would work.
Isoardi
Oh, he'd set up a jam there.
Smith
He'd set up a jam session there, you know. That's how he got started.
Isoardi
So he'd just go around from club to club, get the night off-
Smith
I saw him in New York coming down Fifth Avenue with King Cole. King Cole spoke to me, asked me how I was doing. He turned around and said, "Don't I know you?" I said, "No, you don't know me." Shit, and all I did for that cat, man. Some of those jobs we worked down near for nothing, you know. And the job didn't pay but ten dollars, and sometimes he'd come up with six dollars, four dollars, eight dollars, and all that kind of shit. And he looked at me and said, "Don't I know you?" [laughter] You've got to be kidding, man, shit. So I said, "No, I don't know you, man."
Isoardi
When did he start with those first jams? Do you remember?
Smith
Oh-
Isoardi
It must have been about '44 maybe, something like that?
Smith
Yeah, it must have been around there. Because it was after I came back, I know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
After I came back, I come back here in- See, I came back here with the Floyd Hunt Quartet in '43. We came back from New York. We played Chicago, Denver, Salt Lake City, Portland, and then we came to the Streets of Paris on Hollywood Boulevard. That was in 1943 in the summertime; I remember that. But that's when Norman started, you know. And they had all kinds of jobs going here then, man, in '43, you know. See, the town was closed but they had so many after-hours spots that you could work, man. You know, you'd work up to twelve o'clock and then you'd be off, and the after-hours would start at maybe at one thirty or something like that, and they'd work till daylight, you know. But as long as you had food in the place. If you didn't have food, you couldn't operate. See, what it was, it was just like an all-night cafe. That's what it was. What it really was is they were bootlegging whiskey and had the bands in there, you know. Streets of Paris and Billy Berg's-all those places, man, and I worked every one of them.
Isoardi
I guess when you got out here, or maybe shortly after that, was the big band in town Les Hite's band?
Smith
Les Hite worked in Culver City out there for nine years at Frank Sebastian's Cotton Club.
Isoardi
Did you ever have any dealings with Les Hite?
Smith
I worked with Les Hite.
Isoardi
Did you?
Smith
Yeah. I worked with Les Hite before I left here. I worked with Les Hite in 1939 just before I left. I think it was two or three weeks. I went to Phoenix with him. I worked a date down in Phoenix, and I worked one in Tucson, and we did one night in Albuquerque. We had a big bus, you know. Of course, that's the only time I worked with Les, but I worked with him before I left.
Isoardi
What was he like?
Smith
Nice fellow. Very nice fellow, full of fun all the time, you know. Yeah, a very jovial fellow. Yeah.
Isoardi
Good bandleader?
Smith
Oh, yeah, he was a wonderful guy. You didn't have to worry about anything, you didn't have to buy anything. He had some woman that he was with who bought everything. She bought the music stands, she bought lights, she bought the uniforms for the guys, she bought the music, she bought everything for him. See, I ran around with Les when he came to New York, you know.
Isoardi
Oh, really?
Smith
Oh, yeah, when he came to New York. See, I was already there when he got there. And so Les- I was at the Teresa [Hotel], and I think he was around there at that other hotel, the Braddock [Hotel]. He heard I was around there, and he came around there, and we went and had dinner together and just had a ball, you know. Started talking about California. You know, California guys-when they get to New York it's such a different atmosphere, you know. See, New York guys are all, "Well, I, you know, I-" Strict jive, you know, high in the collar and all. This place is casual. It's a difference, you know. So it's hard to get used to things when you've been living out here for years. It's hard to get used to New York, you know.
Isoardi
Big change.
Smith
I know some guys that went there, like Britt Woodman, man. Britt Woodman went there-they wouldn't let him take a vacation even, man. That cat can play, boy. Yeah, he was a beautiful guy, man. The Woodman brothers. Now, he started out early in the thirties, you know. All his brothers. That was one of the first family groups to come out of Watts, the Woodman Brothers [Biggest Little Band in the World].
Isoardi
Did you hear that band play?
Smith
Oh yeah, sure. I used to hear them rehearse and everything. They lived out here on 118th [Street] and Wilmington [Avenue], yeah. And the old man [William B. Woodman Sr.]-the old man was a trombone player.
Isoardi
He was pretty good, wasn't he?
Smith
Yeah. He worked down there on-let's see, Second [Street] and Main Street at a taxi dance. They had a taxi dance down there-you know, where you just continue dancing.
Isoardi
Right.
Smith
I worked down there a couple of weeks, man. It was too much for me. You know, you don't stop playing when you start to working. A guy would take your place, and you go have something to eat, and then you come back, and then he takes another guy's place. I mean, the band is playing three and four hours, man.
Isoardi
And that's what the father used to do?
Smith
Oh yeah.
Isoardi
He played in this band?
Smith
He worked up there for years, man. A boy named Atwell Rose worked there, played a little fiddle. Yeah, old Willy worked up there a long time. I told him I couldn't read very well-you know, read music very well. And I asked Willy one night, I said, "Man, how you read this music so fast?" He said, "Just keep turning the pages. Same thing every night. Same thing. Just turn the pages and you'll finally get it." And then he turned around and looked at me and laughed, you know. He was a very nice fellow, though. But I very seldom ask people anything. I think this boy that died here recently showed me more than anybody, Red Callender, you know.
Isoardi
Oh, yeah.
Smith
Yeah, Red Callender was a hell of a musician.
Isoardi
Now, he came out here in the thirties.
Smith
He came out here in 1936 with King Cole.
Isoardi
How did you meet Red?
Smith
Well, he was standing up in front of the Dunbar [Hotel], and I was walking down the street, and I ran into him. They'd just got in town. They told me they got stranded in Frisco, and F. E. Miller brought them down here to open the Lincoln Theatre. Red was standing up in front of the Dunbar. That's where I met him. We struck up a friendship, and that's the way it was. The whole time, I've never seen Red mad about nothing. He always had that beautiful smile on his face. In fact, we had a session last year. That was the last time I saw him. I had a session May 5 out in Hollywood, and that's the last time I'd seen Red. I had Red on bass. I had some nice cats on that session. And then I heard that he went to the hospital. He went and had an operation, and they took a cyst and a bone out of his back. When he wound up he was paralyzed. His legs were paralyzed. So when they went in there again to operate, well, that cancer spread, you know. And that was it. I went in the hospital here on the seventh, and Gerald Wiggins called me on the eighth, Sunday morning, and said Red died Sunday. I said, "Boy-" And I'm laying up in the hospital, boy. I was sure sad, boy. A cat like that. It looks like all the good guys go, man. Well, let's see. Now, where are we at?
Isoardi
You said that Red came into town with Nat Cole.
Smith
Yeah, it was the "Brown-Skinned Models." It was a show called the "Brown-Skinned Models."
Isoardi
Was that Nat Cole's first appearance here? In L.A.?
Smith
Oh, yeah, yeah. He came from Chicago. See, Red came from Atlantic City, and he must have joined the group in Chicago, because King Cole's from Chicago.
Isoardi
Did you know Nat very well?
Smith
Not very well. I knew him enough to be friends with him. But he wasn't a snobbish fellow. He was a very friendly fellow, very nice, and a nice musician, you know, very neat. Yeah, he was a nice guy. See, when they opened the Lincoln Theatre on Twenty-third [Street], I had an apartment on that alley by that backstage door, and so I got to meet all the guys. I'd met Red. But when they came down there to do their rehearsing, Red came there and got me in my apartment so I could see the rehearsal and everything. But yeah, he came here in '36 with King Cole.And Johnny Miller wasn't the first bass player with him. Wesley Prince was the first bass player. Wesley Prince told him he was going to the army, but he didn't go. He went to a defense plant. So then Johnny Miller- Johnny Miller worked with me. We worked together in Lionel Hampton's band, Johnny Miller. He was a nice bass player, man. So I worked with all the top musicians around here.
Isoardi
Now, Lionel Hampton-maybe you can talk a bit about him and what he was like when he was out here in L.A.
Smith
Shoot, he was out here for ages.
Isoardi
He came here from Chicago. He wasn't established out here when you arrived, though, was he?
Smith
Oh, yeah. Shit, Les Hite brought him out here.
Isoardi
Oh, before '33?
Smith
He came out here in the thirties. He came out here before '33. Les Hite brought Lionel out here. Yeah, Lionel was a hell of a musician, boy. He'd put a hurting on you, boy. Yeah, that cat can play. That cat can play today.
Isoardi
Yeah, still going strong.
Smith
See, when I was with Earl Bostic, we came into Chicago. Lionel was closing that night, and we were up there for an afternoon something. Something was going on in the afternoon. But Bostic took me with him, you know. So Lionel told him that I was his first piano player, and we were sitting there talking, and it happened that "Bags" [Milt Jackson] was playing intermission for Lionel-you know, the vibraphone player Bags? So he got kind of smart. He made some cracks at Lionel. Man, Lionel went up there on that bandstand and wore that cat out, man. [laughter] So nobody knows how terrific that cat is until they corner him up, man. When they corner him up, man, that cat is- He's a genius, man, especially on vibes, boy. He is a genius, man. You can't tie him down. Benny Goodman tried to tie him down, but he couldn't tie him down. They used to play those different riffs and things. No, he couldn't mess with Lionel. Every now and then he's like [Art] Tatum. Tatum was a genius, man. This boy- A piano player from Canada, what's his name?
Isoardi
Oh, Oscar Peterson?
Smith
He's good. He's good. But he ain't Art Tatum. That's right. He's good, but he's not Art Tatum.
Isoardi
Did you see Tatum play and hear Tatum when he was out here?
Smith
Sure, a lot of times. I've seen Tatum play all back east in New York, Cleveland, Detroit-yeah, out here, the Hollywood Jazz- Right there at Western [Avenue] and Hollywood [Boulevard] they had a little club they called Jazz City. I was in there every night that he worked there.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
Yeah. That cat- Oscar Peterson doesn't have the technique that man had. He copied a lot of his stuff, but it still wasn't Art Tatum. He could copy a lot of the stuff because that boy started out as a classical pianist, you know. But see, Art Tatum was a genius from birth, you know. That man just played. He could be sitting there drinking beer with this hand, man, and play so much piano with this hand, man, he'd run you crazy with this hand, you know. I've seen him do it, you know. I just watched him. I said, "Man, I ain't never seen nobody do nothing like that." There are guys in New York that I ran around with. There's Lenny Scott, I ran around with him. Marlowe. These are all guys that are supposed to be near Tatum, and they're as near Tatum as I am. [laughter] Yeah, that's how near they are. So I told Gerald Wiggins to quit copying Tatum and go on and play Gerald Wiggins, because Gerald Wiggins is a good musician, man.
Isoardi
Oh, a beautiful piano player.
Smith
Yeah. I told him to quit. "Man, you're going to run yourself crazy, man, trying to tag along behind Tatum." I mean, he's got good execution, man. But when you're messing with a genius- He's got it natural, see, and you're struggling trying to get it, you know. I told Wig, I said, "Man, you let that man alone and go on and play piano like you can play." Because Gerald is one of my best friends, you know. Yeah, that's my fishing buddy. I've got to call him so we can go fishing, man. Yeah.
Isoardi
Any other personalities you remember from the thirties who were important on Central or who were characters or fixtures on Central?
Smith
On Central Avenue. Well, these weren't too many. A lot of guys were in and out of here, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
They'd come from back east and-
Isoardi
You know, offhand, what you said- I'm sorry to shift so quick, but the way you describe Central Avenue in the thirties, I mean, it sounds like there were a lot more clubs. There was a lot more music going on than even in the forties after the war.
Smith
Well, see, it shifted from the clubs to the after-hours spots. That's what happened. Because when they closed the town down, people didn't have anywhere to go. So that's when they started the after-hours spots in the different places, you know, different homes and things. And different clubs went into after-hours, but they said they had a cafe-you know, chicken dinners. But they weren't doing anything but bootlegging whiskey after hours. You see, it's pretty hard to shut a town down this size, Los Angeles.
Isoardi
Yeah, really.
Smith
Pretty hard. But I met all the important people in the thirties that came in and out. I met Duke Ellington, I met Count Basie, I met them all, you know. And I didn't have any trouble with anybody, you know. The strictest guy I ever met out here was Earl Bostic. He was the strictest guy I ever met.
Isoardi
What do you mean by strictest?
Smith
Well, he wasn't jovial like the rest of the guys were. A lot of guys were a lot of fun, you know, but he was- You know, he was a good musician, now. I can't take anything away from him. But he just wasn't that jovial like the rest of the guys I had met, you know. Especially from back east.A guy that I liked very much was Percy Mayfield. He had a blues band. I worked with him in 1953 all down south. And I worked with Benny Carter in 1954. Benny Carter is another one of those strict, strict musicians. "Play it like this, the way it goes, and don't vary from this, and don't-" You know. We had a few words. I told him I wasn't Gerald Wiggins. You know, I took Gerald Wiggins's place with him.
Isoardi
Oh, really?
Smith
Yeah. I told him I wasn't Gerald Wiggins, and I don't play like Gerald Wiggins, and if you want me to work with you, okay, and if you want me to play your tunes, put the music up there and I'll play them, and that's the end of that. And that's the name of that song, you know. So we got along all right. Every time Wig says he sees him, he asks about me. "Where's Fletcher?" Because I don't try to be anybody else. You can't be anybody else, you know. You can't be anybody but yourself. That's all you can be. And there's no need pretending because it isn't going to happen. So that's how I have figured life out. I figured that out. And I've always gotten along fine, you know. I've never had any problems.
Isoardi
What about when you came back in the mid-forties? I guess the scene had changed a little bit.
Smith
Yeah, I came back in '43. I noticed one thing when I come back-there were mostly after-hours spots, you know.
Isoardi
Right.
Smith
Yeah. The scene that changed on Central Avenue- The joints that were running-they turned into cafes, you know. But they were still after-hours spots. They turned them into cafes so they could run, and they'd bootleg that whiskey, you know. So that's what happened. That was the difference. Clubs were still there, you know, but-
Isoardi
But I guess when you came back there must have been new musicians. There must have been some new faces on the avenue.
Smith
Not too many.
Isoardi
Was there anybody? Really? Nobody struck you as-?
Smith
No, not too many. They were still here. You see, the difference in music and musicians- Musicians love that warm weather, and those guys were coming out here from New York in droves, man, getting out of that snow.
Isoardi
[laughter] Just about everybody I talk to who wasn't born here says he came out here for the weather.
Smith
That's right, they did. They did, man. Face it, that was it. They didn't care too much about California but they liked the weather. Because it's not fast. It's not the fast pace. The pace is not fast out here like it is in New York, you know. But that weather, they love that weather, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
Yes, so when I came back, I was sure glad to get back out here, man, shoot. Because, man, I practically froze to death in New York, man. Yeah. And then those towns I was in were cold, man, cold towns. I mean, my hometown is cold. Lincoln, Nebraska. Cold town. Denver is cold, you know. Salt Lake City. Portland, Oregon. All those towns are cold. But I managed to survive, you know.
Isoardi
Maybe you could talk a bit, Fletcher, about the different musical styles down on the avenue-different types of music that were played.
Smith
Oh, I don't know about style. I don't know. I guess everybody to me had their own style of playing, you know.
Isoardi
But I mean, obviously most people played jazz, and I guess in the thirties most of the music was sort of the big band sound, right?
Smith
Yeah, a lot of it was. And they had some good little bands, too. There was a band named the Buddy Banks band. I was with him about three or four years. He had a hell of a band. Six pieces and a singer. And he was tight, man. He sounded good. So it wasn't all big bands, you know.
Isoardi
Right. What about the blues? Were there blues artists that were performing a lot down on Central?
Smith
Oh, yeah. [Big] Joe Turner was down there, and Wynonie Harris. Let's see, Joe Turner, I met him there. I met Wynonie Harris. Wynonie Harris is from Omaha, Nebraska. There was another guy, a blues cat named Percy Mayfield who used to sing down there at the [Club] Alabam. And B. B. King, he used to sing down there. So they just worked when they had a gig, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
And another guy-I'm trying to recall his name. A blues cat. Bobby Blue Bland.
Isoardi
Oh, yeah. Sure.
Smith
Yeah. He was a good blues singer.
Isoardi
What about when bebop hit?
Smith
Well, Charlie Parker and Diz [Dizzy Gillespie] brought that out here. It didn't do too good out here.
Isoardi
Did you go hear them when they first played at Billy Berg's?
Smith
I didn't have to hear them. I heard them in New York while I was out there.
Isoardi
Where did you catch them in New York?
Smith
Oh, I caught them a lot of times. They played at the [Renaissance Ballroom], they played down near 118th [Street] down at Monroe's [Uptown House].
Isoardi
Did you hear them play at Monroe's?
Smith
Oh, yeah. Sure I heard them play. I said I heard them play before they came out here.
Isoardi
Yeah. What did you think when you first heard them?
Smith
I didn't think anything. They were just executing their horns, you know. As far as I'm concerned, a lot of musicians better than them live in Kansas City. In '31 I heard some guys in Kansas City I liked better than them. Joe Keyes, Hot Lips Paige, all those kind of guys, you know. Those guys were playing, man. Well, you see, when Diz and Charlie in the forties brought bop out here to Billy Berg's, Billy Berg didn't know anything about that. He couldn't understand what they were doing. So he let them work a few days, and then he fired them and got Slim Gaillard back in there. I was here then, you know, because I was working with Buddy Bengston down in Long Beach. So when we'd get off from work, we'd hear them on the radio, you know. I said, "They aren't going to last long at Billy Berg's, because they've been used to Slim Gaillard and all that kind of jive," you know. So they didn't last too long. Yeah, he fired them, man.

5. Tape Number: III, Side Two April 4, 1992

Smith
Yeah, that Slim Gaillard had Billy Berg's going, boy. He had it under control. I'll tell you another guy he sent for, Billy Berg, Scatman [Crothers]. He's the one who sent for Scatman.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
Scatman came out here with that long chain on and high-draped pants. I think I was working at Billy Berg's that week that I met Scatman, because he showed me a picture of Scatman. He was coming from Terre Haute, Indiana; that was his home. He said, "I'm sending for this guy." And he wasn't opening up at Billy Berg's; he was opening up somewhere else. But Billy sent for him, you know. I'm trying to think of the joint. I don't know whether it was the Streets of Paris or not. But anyway, he sent for him. And, man, that cat was funny, boy. He was a funny cat, boy. Now, he was a nice cat, man.
Isoardi
So what was he doing at Billy Berg's? What did Billy Berg's have him doing? What was his act?
Smith
Well, Scatman was a comedian. He was a drummer. He was really a drummer like Leo Watson was with the Spirits of Rhythm, you know, but he was a better drummer than Leo Watson. He was really a good drummer, you know. He could keep time. But he was a comedian on top of that. And when he came out here, I think Billy put him with Slim Gaillard, and they made a nice combination there for a long time.
Isoardi
What was Slim Gaillard's act? From what I understand, he was pretty popular.
Smith
Man, nobody know what Slim's- [laughter] Slim was liable to do anything, man. Take a guitar one minute and put it down, put his foot up on the piano and get the bass in his hand and hand you the guitar and- Oh, man. Slim Gaillard, man. He'll run you crazy, man, with his act. I worked with Slim a long time in Beverly Hills, man. Yeah, Slim Gaillard, man. Slim was teaching me to speak Greek, you know. He was funny. I'd say something wrong in Greek and then he'd cuss me out in Greek. [laughter] Yeah, boy, he's funny. He was a nice cat, too, boy, but he was just funny. That's his way. He never did show up on a job on time. Never. I don't care where he was working, he never did show up on time. The boss would be pulling out his hair saying, "When he comes in I'm going to kill him. I've got to pay him all this money." And the minute he hit the door, man, the boss has got his arms around him ready to hug him and kiss him. Yes, Slim Gaillard, boy, he'd get away with murder, boy. He didn't know what he was going to do, man. Now, there was another good musician that people didn't know he was a good musician, because he switched around so many different ways, you know, because he played guitar a while, he played piano a while, then he played a bass a while, and then he played the vibraphones a while. But he could play those things. Yeah, he'd start off with a sweet tune, start with a real lovely, sweet tune. Then he'd go into a jump tune. Boy, he'd drive you crazy with it.
Isoardi
The guy had some talent, then. He must have to be able to do that.
Smith
Well, yeah, yeah, he had a lot of talent. And Tiny [Brown] did, too. That bass player that he had with him had a lot of talent. He went crazy.
Isoardi
What do you mean?
Smith
He went crazy. He jumped on his mama, tried to kill her. I think they put him in an institution. I don't know whether he's still there or not, man. But he jumped on his mama, man, and threatened to cut her throat and all that stuff. See, when they made "Cement Mixer"-
Isoardi
That was a song, "Cement Mixer," pre-
Smith
Yeah, it was a big hit for Slim. See, they were making so much royalties, making so much money, and Tiny had never been used to money. Slim was an ASCAP [American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers] member and everything; money didn't mean nothing to Slim. But Tiny had never made that kind of money, man, and this guy would run him crazy, man. He went downtown and bought a Cadillac, you know, paid half of it. And he wore that red shirt till he wore it out, you know. So he just wasn't used to that guy, man, and it drove him crazy. Yeah, I talked to Tiny just before- He came up Central Avenue one day, and the next thing I heard, he was in an institution. They said that he jumped on his mama and threatened to cut her throat or something, you know, threatened to do her a lot of harm. So they took him and sent him away, man. After that, Slim was kind of disillusioned. That was his partner, you know. Slim didn't do too good after they took Tiny away, because he was crazy about Tiny, you know. And I know I saw him when I was up- I was going to Seattle one time to join the Ink Spots group, and I stopped in some little town, Tacoma. I stopped in Tacoma, and they said, "Slim is here." And I went around in a little house joint and- [tape recorder off] Yeah, that Slim Gaillard was something, boy.
Isoardi
Let me ask you a bit about the recording industry. What was it like for Central Avenue musicians recording in the thirties?
Smith
Oh, it was all right. There just wasn't any money, you know. Because, you know, they put a ban on that during the forties, during the thirties.
Isoardi
Oh, during the thirties?
Smith
Yeah, they had a ban on that. You couldn't record- We started recording at twelve o'clock at night. All recordings were at nighttime. And I know that's what happened before I left here. Yeah, I know that. So when I wasn't here, I don't know what happened. But I know I made a lot of sides with Slim Gaillard at nighttime. We started working maybe at one o'clock and worked till five thirty, six o'clock in the morning, man, making recordings. Because they had a band on the other- BMI [Broadcast Music, Inc.] and ASCAP are at each other's throat, man, about some of the money or something. I don't know what it was. So we were recording out there at 7000 Santa Monica Boulevard. And I know that was at night. All recordings then were at nighttime.
Isoardi
So that was around what? That was around 1944. Are you talking about the big record ban they had?
Smith
No.
Isoardi
This was earlier?
Smith
That was before I left here.
Isoardi
Aha. So this was in the thirties.
Smith
They started squabbling over that money before I left here in '39.
Isoardi
Who were you recording for, then, with Slim Gaillard?
Smith
Anybody you could record for. Everybody was trying to snatch you if you could play the blues, you know.
Isoardi
Really.
Smith
Uh-huh. What was his name? Shit, I can't think of this guy's name, man. There were so many of them, man. The recording companies, they'd change labels and all that stuff, and it's hard to keep up with it.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
Jules Bihari had Modern Records, and he had four or five labels. He'd put you over here on another label and all that stuff.
Isoardi
So there were a lot of small, independent labels.
Smith
Oh yeah, sure.
Isoardi
And you would get paid, but just a fee for the session and that was it.
Smith
That was it. That was it. Some guys made money. Percy Mayfield made money.
Isoardi
Well, how did he manage to do that?
Smith
Well, he was a star, you know. He wrote his own tunes, wrote his own material. And he wrote his own recording contract. He worked for Art Rupe, Specialty Records. He made some money. Percy had a big bus, he had a manager, he had a valet. He had eighty-one one-nighters when he left here, because I was with him. Yeah, Percy made some money. Then Percy was making money when the rest of them- B. B. King was down to his bottom dollar, and another guy, Bobby Blue Bland, wasn't doing anything either. And I'm trying to think of this other guy that was B. B. King's buddy. He wasn't doing anything. But Percy Mayfield jumped out there, man, and was making all kinds of bread, especially royalties, you know. But he was shooting that jive up, though, that stuff, you know.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
Yeah, but I saw one check Percy had. Percy had one check for $81,000.
Isoardi
Whew!
Smith
And that's a whole lot of money for the thirties and forties.
Isoardi
He did it right.
Smith
Yeah.
Isoardi
However he worked it, he did it right.
Smith
Yeah. So Percy was one of the first ones that I know to make- Because Little Richard didn't make anything. Little Richard started out before any of them and didn't make anything. And right behind him came James Brown. Of course, James Brown was a little smarter than him; he started making some money. You know, with the education-he had more education than the rest of them, you know.
Isoardi
Fletcher, let me ask you, maybe sort of to conclude it, in looking back, what would you say was the importance of Central Avenue?
Smith
The importance?
Isoardi
Yeah, both for you personally, but also, say, looking at the history of jazz in this country. What did Central Avenue contribute?
Smith
Central Avenue didn't contribute anything but a whole lot of clubs, you know. But getting on about it, see, I'll tell you something about Central Avenue: See, the white man owned all the clubs. The black man didn't own nothing. Ben and Pete owned the Alabam, [Teddy] Lomax owned the Dunbar. And a guy that could have bought those places didn't buy them. So there was no success for the black man on Central Avenue. You just had a whole lot of clubs, that's all. Selling whiskey, that's all. That was one of the swingingest streets in the world, man, when it was jumping. Because I've been to all those places that are supposed to be swinging, like Kansas City, Chicago, and New York, and all those places. But they didn't swing like Central Avenue, you know. No, they didn't. Uh-uh.
Isoardi
Why not? Was it just the number of clubs on Central? Or the kind of people? What was the difference?
Smith
I don't know. I don't know what it was. It was just- As you see, just like I told you, it's more casual out here, you know. See, New York is stiff. People are stiff in New York, you know. People out here swing, you know. They're casual. A man put on a sweater and a pair of pants and some house shoes and would go on out and party, you know. That's a difference, you know. That makes that man comfortable, you know. Where he couldn't do that in New York. He couldn't come in one of those places like that in New York unless he had on a shirt and tie and dressed up in a suit, you know. That was the difference. That's why I say Central Avenue was one of the swingingest streets that I've ever been on.Next to Central Avenue was Kansas City. Kansas City, the Subway, and where Count Basie was playing and all those places, you know, they jumped real nice, too. That's another one of those casual places, you know. But, man, those stiff joints, man, they don't go, man. And I don't care who's playing in there. See, I met all these guys- All these guys you name, I met them before they come here. Ben Webster. I met Herschel Evans. I met Dick Wilson. These were all hellfire tenor players. I met Coleman Hawkins. I met Benny Carter before he came here. See, all these hellfire musicians, I met them before they came here. I met guys in 1931 when I was playing with a band out in Lawrenceberg, Missouri, forty miles from Kansas City. That's where I met all them big stars, in Kansas City. You know. Walter Knight. That's where I met Hot Lips Paige. Count Basie was working at a place called the Subway. It wasn't anything but a hole in the wall. Jo Jones. I met all those guys, you know. So when they came out here, it wasn't anything new for me to run into them and talk to them because I'd already met them. Yeah, I met them back east. So a lot of people said, "Man, when did you meet that cat?" And I said, "Man, I met him back in New York." So it wasn't anything. But a cat that they never mention, one of the greatest tenor players in the world, was Don Byas. That was the greatest tenor player in the world. Coleman Hawkins said he never heard anybody play like- See, when I was in New York, Coleman Hawkins played the Paramount Theatre downtown featuring Don Byas. This is Coleman Hawkins. Now, he's supposed to be the greatest tenor player in the world, Coleman Hawkins, but he was featuring Don Byas. That's right. So you can imagine what kind of tenor player he was, you know.
Isoardi
A beautiful player.
Smith
Oh, man, that cat could play, man. He died just one year before I went to Paris, France, '73. He got to drinking too much, man, and it killed him. Ben Webster died over there, too. Ernest Shepard died over there. Oscar Pettiford died over there. All those cats. I don't know what they do. There's something that those guys do, man, because when you see them, they look clean and everything, but I don't know, behind closed doors they're doing something wrong, man. Because some of those guys are not old, you know. Yeah, some of those guys are young fellows. But maybe that's the way they want to go, you know.
Isoardi
Well, do you have any other thoughts, Fletcher? Anything else you want to bring up or say about Central Avenue? Something we might not have touched on?
Smith
No, there isn't anything about Central Avenue. Only it was a jumping street at the time. At the time, from '33 to '39, it was a jumping street. Clubs were flourishing. There was plenty of work. It didn't pay any money, but there were plenty of jobs. And that's the way it was. When I had a chance to leave here, I was gone, you know. Because me-I'm a person who likes to venture out and see what's happening on the other side of the street, you know.When I first left here- You see, when I left here in '39 to go to Omaha to join Nat Towel, they didn't realize that I had been back east in the thirties. In '31, I'd been all over the east. I'd been in New York, Chicago, everywhere, you know. And I had met different guys. There's a guy up there in Oakland now that I write quite often named Ike Bell, a trumpet player. He's from Kansas City. And he was with Lionel [Hampton] at the same time I was, and he's a very beautiful guy. We correspond quite a bit. But them guys from them years-very few of them are here. They're gone, you know. Yes. See, [I'm] seventy-nine [years old]. Ike is older than me. Ike is eighty-two years old. So you see, you take guys that are living eighty-two, eighty-four, eighty-five, and up like that-they've been around. You know, they've had a good life. Most of them have had a good life.So I don't worry about it. It came and it was gone. Now, if you didn't do anything with it while it was here, that's your fault, you know. [laughter] That's right.
Isoardi
That's it.
Smith
That's right. You didn't do anything while it was here, that's your fault. Yeah, because it was sure here, man. It was jumping, man. All the way out to 107th Street and down to Fifth Street it was jumping, boy. I mean, every one of those clubs was jumping. But that's all it was doing, just jumping, just selling whiskey and selling food, you know, buying up chicken dinners and drinking whiskey and going back home. That's all it was, see. So a guy said, "Well, what's different about Central Avenue?" I said, "Nothing. Nothing different." It's just a daily thing, you know. People go to the club and have a good time and go on back home. That was it.I left Los Angeles in '81. I had broken this hand in '75, and I was convalescing in Los Angeles. And finally one of the Ink Spots groups come along and hired me in '81 to go to [Las] Vegas. I said, "I don't want to go to no Vegas. You don't do anything there but drink and gamble, you know." I went there in '81 and stayed until '89, man. I stayed there nine years at one place, the Four Queens. They just left here last week to go to Australia.
Isoardi
Really?
Smith
I would have gone with them if they paid any money, but they didn't pay any money. Five hundred dollars. What you going to do with $500 in Australia? A damn loaf of bread there will cost you $500. [laughter] The going price overseas now is starting off with $1,200. Your checks will be $1,200 starting off. Yeah, $500-I couldn't make it. Yeah.
Isoardi
Well, Fletcher-
Smith
Well, everything is lovely.
Isoardi
That's a good note to end on.
Smith
Yeah, yeah, everything is lovely.
Isoardi
All right. Thank you very much.
Smith
Yes, I'm glad you came by and got a few notes so when you hear those guys talking that jive on the air you'll know better. [laughter] Because you got it from the horse's mouth.
Isoardi
[laughter] Yeah. All right.
Smith
I was here and a grown man. I wasn't going to school. Yes. That's right. And the way I got here, I hoboed here, so you know I'm here.
Isoardi
Yeah.
Smith
Yes, sir. Those guys, I hear them on the radio talking about this and that. "Central Avenue revisited." Now, what kind of jive is that, man? "Revisited." Ain't nothing on Central Avenue but vacant buildings, you know. That's all that's on that. So what? What are you going to do, look at a vacant building? What's that going to tell you? You can look at that all over Los Angeles-vacant buildings. [laughter] Vacant buildings all boarded up and all that jive-that doesn't mean anything. No, that don't mean a thing. Yeah, Steve, that's about the extent of it that I know about. I didn't come here until '33, and there were things going on before then, you know, things going on in the thirties that I don't know anything about. But when I came here there was plenty to do, plenty to do. Yeah.
Isoardi
Okay. Thank you, Fletcher.
Smith
Okay.

Appendix A Index



Fletcher Smith . Date: August, 2003
This page is copyrighted