Interview of Margaret Douroux

1.1. Session 1 ( February 13, 2007)

UCLA Oral History Program Margaret Douroux Session 1, 02-13-2007 Douroux[1].Margaret.1.02.13.07

PATTERSON

Are you on? OK. So here we are. It's, um, February 13th --

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

-- 2007 with --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- Margaret DOUROUX. And, uh, we wanna, in this project, start right from the beginning.

DOUROUX

You do. (laughter)

PATTERSON

(laughter) Which stars, of course, with y-- you know, with your, um, your parentage, you know --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- your -- your family, and uh, looking back to your -- maybe your grandmother and your grandfather.

DOUROUX

Yeah. I think I could stay there a minute.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

So, um, where were they from?

DOUROUX

My grandparents, uh... I guess we give them a landmark of -- of Louisiana --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- but it was very far in the -- in the country area. I think the name of the little country was Vacherie or something, that --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- we're not real familiar with. And, uh, my mother's -- I'm speaking of my mother's parents -- were very uneducated. Ah. They -- my grandmother [Margaret] grew up without a mother or a father.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Her older sister raised her.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

My grandfather, on the other end, was, um, kind of fortunate in that his father was credited with, uh, the ownership of some property in that area.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Uh. They were extreme opposites. This is very significant. My grandfather was very fair. Beautiful man. Tall. Gorgeous hair. Uh, my grandfather -- my grandmother was big and husky and very, very dark. Very dark. And she spoke with a dialect. She -- she did not speak real fluent English. Uh. But for some reason, they married. (laughter)

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, um, the significance of that is that my grandfather, uh, was very worldly. He liked gambling, uh, he did a lot of dancing, and he did all kinds of card parties. And my grandmother stayed at home. She was a prayer warrior.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And she birthed the saying that says, "If you can't pray, you can't stay." Because my gram-- my grandfather was such a, uh, uh, worldly man.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

But they bore two children of their own, but raised five --

PATTERSON

Mmm!

DOUROUX

-- of somebody else's. Her sister, who raised her, passed. She took in all of her children.

PATTERSON

Wow. Mmm.

DOUROUX

And even --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- on the most meager earnings -- I remember my grandfather as a porter on the plat-- on the train.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. A Pullman porter? Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Yeah. He was a Pullman porter, here in California, yeah. Uh, but I kinda remember that he was a porter after he was here in the -- in the state of California. I really don't remember what he did or what she did before they moved to L.A.-- I think she was a homemaker, because she had all these children. She told us of stories of not having enough, um, money to, uh, feed them lunch. She would cook lunch in the morning after they went to school: red beans, rice, french bread, and she'd take it to 'em, but she was certain that all of them went to school.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Um. She made sure that somehow they had piano lessons. My mother was a great pianist.

PATTERSON

Wow. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, they had almost no income.

PATTERSON

Was there a piano in the home? Your grandma's home?

DOUROUX

Evidently she --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- uh, sh-- I have to ask my -- I meant to ask my mother that -- it's too late now, but --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- I don't know how my mom practiced, but she --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- was a good musician. Excellent.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

She [my grandmother] saw that they all had an opportunity to go to college. My mother went to three years at Xavier University.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, by this time, they had moved into the New Orleans area.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, um, that's where my mom met my dad. Uh, I think they went to the same church. While my mother being a musician that played piano, my dad was an excellent singer.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Um. And he -- I think he left there to travel with Mahalia Jackson, and by the time he was on the road, my mother and my grandparents, they moved here. Or either my mother moved here with him, my grandparents followed after.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, but, (clears throat) I remember my grandfather being a Pullman porter, so he was in and out of the city all the time.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Remember, he's very handsome --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- and the ladies are chasing him. (laughter)

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

He was really handsome. And, uh, my grandmother's this heavy-set, real typical heavy, strong, black woman.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

She worked at, um, the Maywood Hospital as a maid, in Huntington Park. And I remember going back and forth for different reasons. One reason, I was an asthmatic, and um, my grandmother worked there. I was very much attached to her, and my mom didn't know if I was, uh, going to the doctor because I was sick or if I wanted to be with my grandmother.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

But she often told me about her experiences there. She was a -- she was a maid. She explained that all of the goods in the hospital were accessible to her, and she noticed some of the maids would take the sheets home -- because these people were being paid 50 cents a day.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

You know? Her desire was to help my mother finish school and to help them to get on their feet as a newly wed couple. But, uh, she said she brought the sheets home and God made her take 'em back. (laughter)

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

You know, she was just the opposite --

PATTERSON

She thought about it --

DOUROUX

-- of my grandfather. She said, "No," uh, "if he gave me this job, he can keep me and give me what I need without me stealing it.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And she was held in very high esteem by all the doctors there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Now if you really talked with her, you -- you sensed her innate intelligence.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Sh-- I mean, she -- she gleaned from the community all of the information that made her special. People rallied to her --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- for, uh, wisdom.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Isn't that good?

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

For -- fo-- that's a typical --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- strength -- that's the typical strength that a black woman had. Wisdom.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

She knew how to make her 75 cents a day --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- feed a family of people.

PATTERSON

Yes. Yes.

DOUROUX

Never did we go over to my grandmother's house when she didn't have enough food to feed anybody who came through.

PATTERSON

When did she come to Los Angeles with your grandfather?

DOUROUX

It must have been --

PATTERSON

What was the year?

DOUROUX

It must have -- my mom, um -- my sister was born in 1940, and I do believe she came right after that time.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So it was probably early 1940s --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- in the '40s.

PATTERSON

And where did she live when she came?

DOUROUX

We -- we all landed -- and I was telling' my husband that. The whole side of East L.A. was black. At black schools, some of the best black teachers you ever saw would come to school to teach us in suits and heels. We -- we looked up to them --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- as the strong image of our community. They had contact with my mom and my dad. They would -- my mom would know that we didn't behave at school --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- you know. So we all ended up in that strong community where everybody knew each other. Black churches were strong, and, uh, we walked to school. You know, we -- we -- we -- on the way home, we could stop at a black grocery store.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And my gram-- my dad could take your shoes to a black shoeshine parlor.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, um.... Uh, there was a black cleaners on the other corner.

PATTERSON

Do you remember the address of or -- or what the streets were that you lived on?

DOUROUX

Uh... 48th Street?

PATTERSON

You lived on 48th?

DOUROUX

48th Street, uh-huh.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And my grandmother lived on -- I think she lived on fo-- fo-- one of us lived on 40th and the other lived on 48th.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. So you were in walking distance to your grandma.

DOUROUX

Walking distance, oh yeah.

PATTERSON

Yeah. (laughter)

DOUROUX

Yeah. Mmm.

PATTERSON

We--

DOUROUX

And at the same time, my dad's mother [Pauline] came, and she was a part of our household.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And she was, again, a strong, uh, black Christian woman.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Did a lot of praying. We -- we noted -- I -- I tell stories about her all the time. Because she would be up before anybody.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Why does she get up at 6:00 and 7:00 in the morning? We never understood that, when we wanted to sleep in. She was in the kitchen bakin' biscuits.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And one of the things about her that I talk about all the time when I'm giving lectures about black -- uh, the black heritage. My grandmother -- again, this is the second grandmother, on my dad's side -- did not have an education. Her -- her strength, her, uh, her real, strength was her contribution was housekeeping.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, what she would do was she would go from maybe as far as West Los Angeles to clean homes.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Then she'd bring the white shirts that belonged to people who hired her, they would hire her to wash and iron shirts.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

So my grandma on my dad's side would -- this is -- this is really a powerful image for me. She would get up at 7:00 in the morning. Sh-- for some reason, she insisted -- and -- and I can remember when my mom got her first washing machine, but she didn't have one. So she washed -- at first, she washed the sheets in a tub.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

She had a -- she had a scrub board. And you won't know what that is. But she would wash --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- the sheets -- uh, and the shirts, shirts on the scrub board.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Sometimes she would make her own soap.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And she would make it with lye.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh --

PATTERSON

She would do all this at -- at home, in the house, with us

DOUROUX

Yes, she would do it at home.

PATTERSON

-- yeah.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm. She was hired to wash these e-- executive shirts.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

And, uh, (clears throat) the thing that -- that -- the whole thing is such a picture in my mind. She would make her starch. The younger generation would spray starch. My grandmother bought the boxes of Argo -- and you wouldn't even remember that --

PATTERSON

Mm-mmm.

DOUROUX

-- and she would mix it and -- (clears throat) and make -- it -- it came out as a clear gel --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- grayish gel. But it couldn't have any lumps in it --

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

-- so she would have to stand and stir the gel --

PATTERSON

Oh, wow.

DOUROUX

-- and then, after the shirts were washed and rinsed properly, she would pour the starch onto the white shirts. Then she'd take the shirts -- no dryer -- and we had a line in the backyard. There was a who-- this is so powerful fo-- whole line full of -- of, uh, white stiff shirts. The next evening, she would take the shirts in, sprinkle them with water, put 'em in a ball -- for some reason, I never figured this out, she'd put 'em in the refrigerator --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- and they stayed there overnight. The next morning, she'd get up. She would iron the shirts, but we didn't have -- she didn't have an electric iron. For some reason, she had to heat the iron on the stove.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

And, uh, she ironed all of these shirts and earned some kind of living ironing shirts for these people --

PATTERSON

Wow.

DOUROUX

-- and cleaning houses. N-- she would take the bus -- both grandmothers rode the bus back and forth, and y-- the -- the -- the, uh, earnings were so meager.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

But it was like, that's what they contributed to the household.

PATTERSON

And this -- and this whole masterly process of taking care of these clothes --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- in such detail and --

DOUROUX

She was a genius at ironing.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

The shirts were just -- when she took 'em off the line, the shirts could stand up by themselves --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- because they were stiff.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know? And, uh --

PATTERSON

Wow.

DOUROUX

-- that's what she did.

PATTERSON

Where was she from? Where was her home?

DOUROUX

Both -- uh -- my heritage (cough) -- even to my husband -- all of them were from -- from Louisiana.

PATTERSON

Louisiana. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm. And they all had the same impoverished financially --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- but rich --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- um, experience in living as a family unit.

PATTERSON

And caring for the family.

DOUROUX

And caring for each other.

PATTERSON

Keeping (inaudible), yes.

DOUROUX

Everybody had a place at the dinner table. I knew where I sat. My sisters knew where they sat. We all had a place.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

We all said the blessing. Uh. We all ate what was there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know, we didn't have several choices --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- like, "I will eat MacDonald's tonight, or I will eat," -- no, we ate dinner a-- at the table. And the weekends became very, very important to us, because those were the days where somebody was cooking on Saturday for Sunday's meal, and then we'd have extended family to come in on Sunday. And whatever we did, we sat at the table -- all of us were at the table, and we ate all together after church on Sunday.

PATTERSON

Mmm. Was that a time for you to discuss together your --

DOUROUX

Oh, we talked about --

PATTERSON

-- the things that were going on, and --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. We talked about -- at that point, I can remember that there was a lot of conversation am-- among adults.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

DOUROUX

My father was trying to -- to build a church. My grandparents were buying property at that time. My grandmother on my mother side I want to name thems. My mother's was named Margaret. I'm named after her. My dad's mother's name was Pauline. And my mother's mother, Margaret, how she did it, I don't know. But she bought property all over Los Angeles. She died wealthy.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Isn't that amazing?

PATTERSON

That's hard work --

DOUROUX

She died --

PATTERSON

-- and being mindful --

DOUROUX

75 cents an hour.

PATTERSON

Yes. Just a --

DOUROUX

She had property everywhere.

PATTERSON

That's... wonderful.

DOUROUX

She could buy and sell all of us.

PATTERSON

Wow. And -- and her husband, your granddad's name was...

DOUROUX

Alfred.

PATTERSON

Alfred.

DOUROUX

His name was Alfred. He was Alfred. And, uh, he never -- he never bothered my grandmother's religion or Christianity. In fact, he was a Deacon at our church. But, uh, he had a different upbringing than my grandmother. By my grandmother not having a mother or a father, I think she gravitated to prayer.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Because she didn't have any other resource --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- to depend upon.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Whereas my grandfather's -- I -- I think his father had land, so --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- he was a little more wealthy.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, my grandmother just kinda let him be --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- you know? Just --

PATTERSON

Let him do what he -- he --

DOUROUX

-- just let him be --

PATTERSON

-- felt like he wanted to do.

DOUROUX

Just let him be. And sh-- that's -- that's, uh, um, a real lesson, because when she says, "If you can't pray, you can't stay," she passed that on to younger generations who... who were not at all going through what she went through, you know? But she knew to tell them that, uh, the power of being able to stay in a marriage, i-- it comes from God. Because no marriage is ever perfect. And if you -- you know, people evaluate marriage from a different standpoint. She says, "If you're in -- what -- what you're going through, I'm not going through. And what you're going through may be difficult for you. Certainly what I'm going through may be difficult for me." But she said that God is able to give you the stamina to, uh, live in a household with a person who's completely opposite than you.

PATTERSON

Heh, mmm.

DOUROUX

And she had experienced that.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Women -- my grandfather was one of the best dancers, I guess, of his time.

PATTERSON

Mmm!

DOUROUX

So women would call and -- and ask, "Margaret, is Duv," -- they called him D-U-V, I don't why Duv, "is Duv going to the party tonight?

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

She'd say, "I don't know. I don't know."

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

"Can you tell him?" "I'll tell him to come on out here so you can talk to him." (laughter)

PATTERSON

Oh, she didn't -- she wasn't jealous of any of that. (laughter)

DOUROUX

She wasn't jealous at all. I don't know how she did it. All right?

PATTERSON

Did he ever dance professionally or (inaudible)?

DOUROUX

No, he was just a jitterbug. He was just --

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

-- he was just a fun, outgoing man.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Um. I remember he took us on a train trip. Uh, and that was the highlight of our life. You know, he must have been doing the, portering while they were living in Vacherie, because he came to California, got us when we were little kids, took us on the train to my grandmother. I remember that, now.

PATTERSON

Mmm, mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So he was doing portering while they were still there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And we were born. So then she moved here afterward. I guess after we were born. After at least the first three of us.

PATTERSON

And Pauline, her husband --

DOUROUX

I never knew him. Um. If I'm not mistaken, he died early in their marriage life.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Uh. She had a daughter that died early. I think she was -- her daughter was burned to death. So was -- it was very traumatic.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, she had two sons left. My dad and my uncle. Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Mmm. Wa-- was she from the New Orleans area in Louisiana?

DOUROUX

I think she was originally from New Orleans.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I don't remember a city other than New Orleans. 'Cause we called the area my grandmother came f-- Margaret came from, uh, Vacherie.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

My mother took us there. My grandfather took us there. It was a horrible experience to go to the bathroom outside. (laughter)

PATTERSON

(laughter) Ah, the outhouses. (laughter)

DOUROUX

It was horrible for us!

PATTERSON

Oh! (laughter)

DOUROUX

It was horrible. (laughter) But then we got to see animals and this was a unique experience fo-- we were California born.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

We were born in Los Angeles. But we got to see the pigs.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

My grandfather always had pigeons. He always had chickens. He always -- we always killed a chicken on Sunday for dinner.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

He had rabbits. Uh, they grew vegetables. So, you know, that was a -- a plus for us.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

We all had that rich experience of --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- seeing what our ancestors or our grandparents, how they lived.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

And it's -- it's so burning in my spirit, because I do a lot of ministry, uh, to young people. And the void for me that I view in their lives is that they don't know where they came from. In other words, they don't know -- they don't know their historical journey.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

They don't know the journey. If they knew how much, what a significant progress, uh, they have because of my grandmother.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

Uh, uh, because of them. I think they would have more appreciation.

PATTERSON

Appreciation.

DOUROUX

Is that the right word? I don't know.

PATTERSON

I that was the word that came to my mind before --

DOUROUX

Yeah, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- you said it, appreciation.

DOUROUX

Uh, because --

PATTERSON

Yes, mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- I think of my grandparents all the time.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

And all that they invested --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- um, in my l-- in my, undergraduate years of -- I went to Southern University. That was another lifesaver for me, 'cause had I not gone to a -- a, uh, black college, I never would of found myself. I graduated from L.A. High School, which c-- which was completely a disaster for me.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Uh. Very few --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- black people.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Uh. And al-- almost no recognition, no participation, because of a lack of self-image. Mmm.

PATTERSON

When you were a child, though, you went to an all-black elementary school [Ascot Elementary], right?

DOUROUX

Yeah I did, and I went to --

PATTERSON

Where?

DOUROUX

-- an all black junior high-- that's -- that was the problem. Because our Junior High School [Carver Jr. High], Elementary School, first year of High School [Jefferson High School] -- ninth grade -- my mom moved way over to the west side, and that was that song, "Goin' to the East Side," what was that?

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Remember that sitcom, uh --

PATTERSON

Oh, yeah. The -- the -- the --

DOUROUX

Movin' on up!

PATTERSON

-- the Jeffersons!

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

For our era --

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

-- going to the west side was movin' on up.

PATTERSON

But you -- because you had come from this all-black --

DOUROUX

All --

PATTERSON

-- kind of self-contained --

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

-- um --

DOUROUX

Exactly. Community --

PATTERSON

-- comfortable community.

DOUROUX

(inaudible), Albert McNeil

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- [Don Lee White] that m-- mentored us in music and --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- all of the teachers were black.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

That was my preface for that. It just made us secure.

PATTERSON

What elementary school did you go to?

DOUROUX

Um, Ascot. Ascot Elementary School.

PATTERSON

Ascot.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh. And we went to Carver Junior High --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- and when we got to the ninth year, Carver was renovating, so they sent the eight -- yeah, the ninth-graders, I believe, over to Jefferson High.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

So we had a year at Jeff.

PATTERSON

Oh, OK.

DOUROUX

And we had a wonderful musical teacher whose name was Larson, Mr. Larson, taught music at Jefferson High. Albert McNeil taught us at Carver.

PATTERSON

Right.

DOUROUX

But, uh, Mr. Larson was a -- a midget of man. White.

PATTERSON

(giggles)

DOUROUX

Taught us choir. We had the best choir in the country.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And they -- and you know --

PATTERSON

Wow.

DOUROUX

-- it was all black. We --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- you know, we fed into each other's gifts.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Somebody could sing, I could play --

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

-- Rodena Preston and Billy Preston were there.

PATTERSON

Ohh.

DOUROUX

(coughs) Janelle Hawkins, who also turned out to be a real good musician. (coughs) Uh. Just, ooh, a lotta stars came outta Jeff.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

A lotta athletes came outta Jeff.

PATTERSON

Did you start your -- when did you start to learn to play the piano?

DOUROUX

Well, it's --

PATTERSON

Y--

DOUROUX

-- like this. (chuckles)

PATTERSON

Did your mother -- no, your mother played.

DOUROUX

My mother played. (clears throat) So quite naturally, we were gonna play. However, I don't think we started officially taking' lessons 'til we got on the west side.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And my mother used to try to teach us, and she gave us more spankin's than anything else. (chuckles)

PATTERSON

(chuckles)

DOUROUX

If -- (cough) if we didn't practice, you know, we had not and my dad said, "Get those kids a teacher!" So we started takin' piano. And, uh, all of us took. (clears throat) My older sister's a good singer. My brother's a good singer. Uh, but I -- I -- I gravitated to the piano.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And I started playing for Sunday School. By this time, my dad was organizing a church. And my mother was a wonderful musician, so she developed all the choirs.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

But I played for Sunday School -- excuse me. (coughs) And Baptist Training Union. And, uh, that's -- and -- and then my mother started teaching me little songs to play for the children's choir.

PATTERSON

And that was after you moved to the west side.

DOUROUX

To the -- to the w-- to the --

PATTERSON

Now, when you were a --

DOUROUX

I'm tryin' to remember.

PATTERSON

Because when you were on 48th, you hadn't learned to play piano yet, but your mother played.

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

Did you have a piano in the home?

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. We had a piano.

PATTERSON

And yo-- were you --

DOUROUX

We had a piano.

PATTERSON

-- going to a church where there was music? You were exposed --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- to music, then?

DOUROUX

We -- we --

PATTERSON

What did -- where -- where -- what is the first church you remember going to when you lived on 48th?

DOUROUX

Um. Around us, I think my mother belonged to Israel Baptist Church. But right across the street from us -- and I can't think of the name of the -- I did a, um, a recording session last night with Andre Crouch. Do you know who he is?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

(coughs) His father or his uncle, Pastor very near us, and the music there was ["pshew"] --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- unbelievable. So we --

PATTERSON

That was a Church of God and Christ?

DOUROUX

It was a Church of God and Christ.

PATTERSON

Was it on 33rd or --

DOUROUX

Um....

PATTERSON

I'm trying to remember, 'cause it seems to me Albert Mc-- Albert McNeil --

DOUROUX

He mentioned it to --

PATTERSON

-- ment-- mentioned --

DOUROUX

-- uh....

PATTERSON

-- uh....

DOUROUX

I can't remember the name. My brother would know. But --

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

-- but in that area, there was Victory Baptist Church, where Reverend Peters was. Another church, Opportunity, Reverend Smallwood --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- and my church, Mount Moriah, was the name of my church. But they became, um... a trio, and they sang all over the world, those three pastors.

PATTERSON

Wow.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh. They sang all over the world.

PATTERSON

So they came to --

DOUROUX

They called 'em the Voices of Thunder. I think that's documented, too, somewhere.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, but (clears throat) m-- my mom's forte was organizing choirs and teaching them.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh, so.

PATTERSON

So she had a choir when you were a little girl --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- in one of -- I-- was it at Israel that she had her choir?

DOUROUX

Uh, she -- yeah. Actually, she accompanied choirs at Israel. I don't think she organized choirs until my dad started pastoring.

PATTERSON

I see. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh. But she was a musician there --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- at Independent, one of the churches that come to mind. I think my dad was a soloist in that area. Maybe that's where Albert McNeil played.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. So your mom's name was Olga.

DOUROUX

Olga, uh-huh.

PATTERSON

And -- and your dad was Earl.

DOUROUX

Earl.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mmm.

DOUROUX

Yeah, that's right. His name was Earl. But my grandmother -- my grandmother Pauline -- ooh, she was an awesome singer.

PATTERSON

Was she?

DOUROUX

Oh, and my dad too. They were awesome.

PATTERSON

Wow.

DOUROUX

And, um --

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

-- sh-- she sang all over the city and traveled -- my dad traveled all around the country with Mahalia Jackson.

PATTERSON

What was his motivation for singing? What -- what started him out on this mission?

DOUROUX

If I'm not mistaken, he -- he evidently new Mahalia in Louisiana.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

An-- and she invited him. So he -- he was a regular church singer in New Orleans.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, my mom used to accompany him at their church and concerts, but he was a regular church singer.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And he became known as a singer. And he was -- I -- I don't know the form of this word. He did ora-- oratorical --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- presentations.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Known as a wonderful public speaker. Never did he know that he would be a preacher.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So between the singing and the speaking, he was noted as a, uh, a talent that couldn't be ignored.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And m-- and Mahalia took him on the road with her.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

But he did a lot of movement. He was -- sang for the Billy Graham Crusade. He, uh, traveled with, uh, Youth for Christ. He did a lot. Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So when you were a little girl and you were growing up in this home of very talented, powerful people --

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

-- what did -- how did you first begin to, um, feel the stirrings of wanting to create music?

DOUROUX

A long time away. I think God mentored me a long time. Because it was like, um, my perception of the people that were mentoring me were so far ahead of me that --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- I would never get there --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- you know? Um (clears throat) I can remember at my dad's first church that he built from the ground, we had a, uh, a pianist. (cough) Her name was -- her name was Gwendolyn Lightner. She was l-- known late in her life as an accompanist for Mahalia Jackson. And, uh, she was the pianist at m-- at my dad's first church. This woman, she -- oh. (cough) She played the piano to the point where -- i-- you know, I was just dumbfounded. I just sat there. W-- well, in my mind, I -- I never thought that I would play anywhere around her, you know, because she was so -- so great in my eyes. I --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- and I remember in that same little church, Gwen was absent on one Sunday, and my dad sings after his -- he used to sing after his message, and he started singing. And I just sat there and played for him. So a-- his ba-- (coughs) excuse me. His back would've been turned to me, so he didn't know that I was playing for him. And after church, I said, "I played for you, I play--" he said, "You did not!"

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

And so, actually, um, I guess she -- she was such a icon for me, uh, but I never thought that I'd be able to -- to access anywhere around her.

PATTERSON

But you had been learning and watching and listening --

DOUROUX

Right, I had.

PATTERSON

-- and it became natural for you to --

DOUROUX

Exactly, and my mom was there. Actually, I didn't know what God was instilling in me. You know, it was a mystery. You don't -- you think it's the hard way around. You're just do-- you're just doing --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- what comes natural to you.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

But -- but really, God is, uh, putting you in places, uh, that will nurture what he has in store for you.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And that's what happened to me.

PATTERSON

What was the name of the church?

DOUROUX

Mount Moriah.

PATTERSON

It was Mount Moriah, then.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And he built this church. And also, there was a gentleman there, uh, R.L. Hatter (sp?), I think he passed away last year. But he did, uh, what we call the Senior Choir, and they did traditional spirituals. So we were fed on, "Go down Moses, way down in Egypt Land," "I am a poor pilgrim of sorrow," -- we were nurtured on that.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

There was no ambiguity about who we were --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- because the music said who we were. My dad -- my grandparents said who we were. And so that made the transition really hard.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

To West L.A.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

To L.A. High School.

PATTERSON

It was like the -- a dispersal or a breaking down --

DOUROUX

That's what I'm talking about.

PATTERSON

-- of the community that you --

DOUROUX

That's what happened to us.

PATTERSON

-- was safe for you.

DOUROUX

That's what happened to us.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

And, um....

PATTERSON

So, you're -- you're going -- you're going to, um, Ascot Elementary --

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

-- and then to Carver --

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

-- and you're still in sort of this safe, n-- n-- n--

DOUROUX

That's right.

PATTERSON

-- nested, warm --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- place in your life with your grandparents --

DOUROUX

Oh, yes.

PATTERSON

-- around you.

DOUROUX

Aunts and uncles. We ate together on Sunday. It was just a --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- you just -- you know, in retrospect, y-- those were days that you'll never live again.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

You know? And it's -- it's hard to reproduce them. We -- we do keep alive the gatherings on Thanksgiving and Christmas, but I mean, my daughter still sees my home as her home, which is a good feeling, 'cause those grand babies, they think they live here.

PATTERSON

(chuckles)

DOUROUX

And I think that's part of the, uh, uh, a-- attitude that I brought from my --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- my upbringing --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- my upbringing.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

And what was some of the -- eh, th-- the people in your environment. The neighbors, the children that you played with --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- would you say that this was pervasive, that most of them had these kinds of hom-- or w--

DOUROUX

Oh, yes.

PATTERSON

It -- it was just the way it was?

DOUROUX

Everybody, right.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Across the street, Alicia had her family. That was our girlfriend, Alicia. I think they had eleven kids in that household.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And her mother cooked for everybody. Daddy worked down the street, Louis Walker. We all were doin' the same things.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm, and very attached to the church.

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

And the music of the church and...

DOUROUX

The music of the church.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

We all were doing the same things.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Um. In fact, you know, we had Pastor's wives were -- were with my mom and -- (coughs) and -- and a lot -- a lot of mentoring went on --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- in those communities. Even though we were not aware that it was happening --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- it certainly was happening.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

My brother still references, uh, the influence that these churches had on him --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- as a -- my brother's a pastor now.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So, I mean, we were not lacking in influence at all.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Now, at church, you had the -- the community of the church and the family and the feeling.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

When you were at school, it was still an all-black school, so it was still a continuum of that feeling. But you weren't aware of -- of being a musician yet.

DOUROUX

Oh, no.

PATTERSON

What did you dream about being, as a little girl? What did you think you were gonna do? What did you love -- the subjects you loved or --

DOUROUX

Well I -- I think I always loved music.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Oh. I think (clears throat) God just instilled that in me, and I gravitated to it, but, um, to put it in my mind, uh, to become the -- a -- a musician or a writer wasn't there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I think my mother influenced most of us to think music --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- because we had a little trio, uh, Norma, Margaret, & Earl.

PATTERSON

Oh.

DOUROUX

We And my daddy often took us with him. We often sang on concerts. Uh. We were at the Billy Graham Crusade at the Youth For Christ -- he [my dad] took us with him and -- and at national conventions --

PATTERSON

How old were you all then?

DOUROUX

Very little. We have pictures of it.

PATTERSON

Ohh!

DOUROUX

I'll have to try and find 'em.

PATTERSON

Please do.

DOUROUX

(inaudible)

PATTERSON

(chuckles)

DOUROUX

And we sang. W-- we have one with my -- my brother's coat buttoned wrong. That was a --

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

-- that was -- that was quite his logo. (laughter)

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

A -- a coat buttoned wrong. Um. Uh. But we -- my mom -- I -- I g-- I guess (clears throat) that had to be a part of my mental, uh --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- concept of myself --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- because we were always in it, every day.

PATTERSON

So you were learning harmony --

DOUROUX

Oh, yes.

PATTERSON

-- and to sing harmony and -- and the literature, the sch-- the -- the songs.

DOUROUX

Most definitely.

PATTERSON

W-- what were some of the names of the songs you would sing as thi-- the -- the trio, you children?

DOUROUX

Um. (clears throat) The one that sticks out in my mind is one that -- "Just let the billows roll."

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And the reason I remember that song is 'cause my brother, who was supposed to be saying, "Just let the billows roll," said, "Just let the billy goat roll."

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

On stage. (laughter) So tho-- that would stick out, you know. I'm trying to think -- "Is it well, is it well with my soul," -- uh, a real old song. But my mom taught us what was contemporary of that day.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So you were in the Bap-- Baptist tradition --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- and -- but you were around (clears throat) churches of other denominations?

DOUROUX

Oh, yes.

PATTERSON

And h-- and so you were hearing th-- that music as well?

DOUROUX

Oh, yes.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

On the radio, uh, Andre Crouch's family -- oh, it was such a great church. I'm-a get you that name, too, 'cause it's -- it's -- i-- it's real pr-- it's a real prominent, uh, um, experience for that era.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And St. Paul was a prominent experience musically, 'cause they were on the radio.

PATTERSON

Yeah, St. Paul -- what denomination was that?

DOUROUX

That was Baptist.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm. But some of the great composers and writers, Cora Martin and Albert Goodson and, uh, Gwen Lightner, all -- a lot of them came out of that church.

PATTERSON

Out of the Church --

DOUROUX

Out of St. Paul Baptist Church. --

PATTERSON

-- under Crouch's father?

DOUROUX

No, out of St. Paul.

PATTERSON

Oh, OK.

DOUROUX

That was another entity.

PATTERSON

I see.

DOUROUX

There were several influential churches --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- at that time.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

They became that way because they were on the radio. They were on radio e--

PATTERSON

Ohh.

DOUROUX

So we -- we would go from church to church -- we called it church hoppin'. We'd go to this church for that broadcast and run to the next church for that broadcast --

PATTERSON

Live broadcasting.

DOUROUX

Live [broadcast]. And -- and you know what? (clears throat) One of the rich things that happened in my early memory was that because my dad was such a well-known artist in gospel music, um, (clears throat) he met -- let me see. I guess you would call them the elite of gospel.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And they were in our house. They came over to eat after they came out of our church. Mahalia was at our church. Every time she came to Los Angeles --

PATTERSON

At Mount Moriah?

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

She was in our church.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Um. I'm tryin' to think of, uh, some others, the Martin Singers, Sally Martin and --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- Cora (sp?) Martin and, uh, Joe May (sp?). These are all historical people.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

They're listed as historical --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- legendary people. They were in our environment all the time.

PATTERSON

And how did -- how did -- now, you were just a little girl, so --

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

-- i-- how -- how -- you weren't really, maybe as knowledgeable as of course your parents were --

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

-- of how prominent these people were. How did you observe -- how did you pick up that they were so important? Was -- did people gravitate to them and come around when they were around in your home, or --

DOUROUX

No, no.

PATTERSON

-- they treated 'em just like anybody else?

DOUROUX

Just like -- I don't even think my mom and dad considered them, uh, as being, um, you know, the elite, because they all flowed in the same --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- environment. So when they came over, we called them familiar names and somebody corrected us, um, corrected me because in our little groups, we called her Mahalie, and her name was Mahalia.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh, yeah.

DOUROUX

But for some reason, they called her Mahalie, and that's what we called her.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And my dad called her that. And, um, we had another icon in our church of gospel music, Thurston [G.] Frazier, and I really believe he was my mentor.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, he -- he was the counterpart of -- remember that -- that, uh, spiritual choir I told you we had where we sung, "Go Down Moses," and --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- he was the c-- counterpart of that, because we did all the latest gospel songs.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Doris Ackers was writing then, "God is Still On the Throne," and, um, "You Can't Beat God Giving," and Albert Goodson was writing, "We've Come This Far by Faith." These people were right there. But we just -- they were just a part of our community.

PATTERSON

So weren't a-- aware of how prominent they were --

DOUROUX

No.

PATTERSON

-- until much later.

DOUROUX

My mom and them -- you know, they didn't really teach us, uh, I -- I don't -- I don't remember them setting them apart.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

You know? They were just --

PATTERSON

We are all equal.

DOUROUX

We were a family--

PATTERSON

We're all here together.

DOUROUX

When we got to the house --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- waitin' for the chicken to be put on the table, we were playin' at the piano--

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- and singing our songs. I'm showin' them and they showed -- I remember I did a song at church and Mahalia was there s-- and when we left, she said, "Girl, come on over here and show me that song," you know?

PATTERSON

(laughter) Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And that was when I had just started writing.

PATTERSON

Mmm. And this is still on 48th [Street]?

DOUROUX

No, this is on Figueroa [Street].

PATTERSON

Now, you had moved from 48th to Figueroa?

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm. My dad built the church on McKinley [Avenue] --

PATTERSON

OK.

DOUROUX

-- and we stayed there, but the next move was to Figueroa.

PATTERSON

So you stayed on the property where the church was. You lived....

DOUROUX

We -- no. We -- we lived in a separate housing. Our housing was e-- on McKinley, our church was on McKinley, and our house was about three blocks away.

PATTERSON

Oh, OK. So you moved from 48th -- do you remember when you moved and went to McKinley?

DOUROUX

I don't remember. But, you know, I have a book I'm-a give you --

PATTERSON

OK.

DOUROUX

-- to document that.

PATTERSON

OK.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

OK.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

And so you were there, right near church.

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

And I'm sure that was great for your dad --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- 'cause he was there so much and --

DOUROUX

Back and forth, right. Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- building it, and --

DOUROUX

And we went to school right down the street.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So everything was there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. And then you moved to Figueroa.

DOUROUX

Right, we --

PATTERSON

Now, how was it that you moved to Figueroa?

DOUROUX

We outgrew that little church.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

My -- like I said, my daddy was -- he was just a powerful speaker.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

and we had this wonderful music. So even today, if you get the element of wonderful music and a powerful speaker, you gonna... draw the masses.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

How many pe-- how many people could sit in that ch-- the first church.

DOUROUX

Oh, I -- eh. I, um --

PATTERSON

Yeah, it was much smaller than the -- than the next --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. Much smaller.

PATTERSON

-- but it was still Mount Moriah?

DOUROUX

It was still -- oh, it never changed.

PATTERSON

It was the second Mount Moriah.

DOUROUX

Never changed the name.

PATTERSON

Oh, but just changed location.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm, just location.

PATTERSON

So how was it that he was able to build the new church. What -- wh-- wh-- wh-- wh-- what was that process?

DOUROUX

The church -- we second -- we found ourselves in second was already built.

PATTERSON

OK.

DOUROUX

And it was very, very, uh, uh, convenient and it was -- it was accommodating.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

A large sanctuary. A large, um, choir stand. Plenty instructional room.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

So -- and it -- and -- and it was in a very good area. It was right there on Figueroa, down the street from the Coliseum [Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum at University of Southern California].

PATTERSON

Oh, OK. What was the cross street? Do you remember?

DOUROUX

Vernon [Avenue].

PATTERSON

Vernon and Figueroa.

DOUROUX

And Figueroa.

PATTERSON

Ah.

DOUROUX

Uh, and the other street -- I think it was Santa Barbara. Where -- what is -- Martin? What's the street where the Coliseum is now?

PATTERSON

Ex-- uh --

DOUROUX

Exposition [Boulevard]?

PATTERSON

Exposition.

DOUROUX

But it's on the oth-- the other -- other side of it.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So now your father's able to stretch out a little bit --

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

-- and, uh, welcome more to his congregation.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm, exactly.

PATTERSON

And how -- how did life change for you as a little girl. How old were you at the time, when you guys moved, do you remember?

DOUROUX

(coughs) Let me see. We were in high school --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- I believe, when he moved there, I'm thinking because we were going to L.A. High, and, um, it was just a struggle for us.

PATTERSON

So you didn't actually l-- live on th-- at the Figueroa location, near there. You were living -- where were you living at the time?

DOUROUX

Um. We -- when we moved to the west side. --

PATTERSON

Do you remember what street you were livin' on?

DOUROUX

Uh, Oxford [Avenue].

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And it was just, um, one block east of Western [Avenue]--

PATTERSON

Near Western.

DOUROUX

Yes! One block -- yeah.

PATTERSON

Yeah, I know -- I know Oxford.

DOUROUX

You remember, there used to be Sugar Hill.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

All the black stars lived there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Um. Hattie McDaniels. I remember that house.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

So she was near Oxf-- what is it, near Adams?

DOUROUX

Right. Adams. Exactly.

PATTERSON

Right. All those big, beautiful homes.

DOUROUX

That's where we moved.

PATTERSON

A-ha.

DOUROUX

A-ha.

PATTERSON

Did you have -- so you had a bigger home?

DOUROUX

Bigger home and really very convenient and very lavishly furnished. My mother loved chandeliers and carpet.--

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- velvet drapery, and she loved the beauty.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And so we got the new home, and we got the new church.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I'm -- in my mind, I can't, uh, put a date on it, but they were close.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

They were close.

PATTERSON

So you were in high school. Now, your siblings, were they under you?

DOUROUX

I have one older sister, I have a sister who's eleven months older than I am.

PATTERSON

Oh, what's her name?

DOUROUX

Norma.

PATTERSON

Norma.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And then my brother --

PATTERSON

Earl?

DOUROUX

-- Earl.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

Then I have sisters. We c-- we put ourselves in groups, and my sisters at the bottom hated, 'cause we called them Deborah, Durena and Mandy. (chuckles)

PATTERSON

(chuckles)

DOUROUX

Debra's the oldest of that group, Durena is next, and Mandy's the baby. So we have Norma, Margaret, Earl; Debra, Doreen, and Mandie. (laughter)

PATTERSON

Uh, Norma, Margaret, Earl --

DOUROUX

Earl.

PATTERSON

-- Debra, Durena --

DOUROUX

Durena and Mandy.

PATTERSON

-- Mandy. OK.

DOUROUX

And, uh --

PATTERSON

And the -- but the trio was you and Earl --

DOUROUX

And Norma.

PATTERSON

-- and Norma.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And they're good singers.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

Both of 'em are. Really I never considered myself as a singer. My momma always gave me the alto part --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- you know? But I think she knew I would play, you know?

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

She taught me a lot of things that --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- you know, I perceive now as being, uh, um, the root.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

She taught me, uh, to play a Christmas song on the program.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know? And... play for BTU or somethin' like that. So --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- she knew what she was doing.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

Bec-- and then suddenly or naturally, you found yourself playing behind your father that day.

DOUROUX

That's it, naturally.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh. Mmm.

DOUROUX

The first song I wrote was such a surprise. Um. I don't know how it came to be. But a -- we were in the -- the church on Figueroa. That's the middle church, because my daddy finally built... a wonderful building, still standing, on Figueroa across the street.

PATTERSON

A-ha.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Still right near Exposition?

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Same location.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, it would be diagonally across.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Now, getting back to your grandmother --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- she's coming along the way and watching her family flourish --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- and grow.

DOUROUX

And -- and being an encourager --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- a financer.

PATTERSON

Mmm. Because meanwhile, she's busy --

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

-- buyin' property and being industrious in her own right.

DOUROUX

Telling you.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

She was.

PATTERSON

Did she move from where she was originally, from her home?

DOUROUX

Uh. she moved from 48th Street to, um, Oxford [meant Harvard Boulevard], also on the west side.

PATTERSON

Oh, so she was near you --

DOUROUX

Uh-huh.

PATTERSON

-- when you all moved.

DOUROUX

We gravitated to each other. I mean --

PATTERSON

Yes. She -- uh-huh. Did she have her own space?

DOUROUX

-- when one did something, the other one did something.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

We all were close --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- in proximity all the time.

PATTERSON

So you didn't have to lose that part.

DOUROUX

We didn't lose that part.

PATTERSON

And Pauline moved with you?

DOUROUX

Right. M-- my grandmother Pauline was in, uh, our home sometimes, quite a bit of the time, but also in the home of my uncle -- her older son.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So she was back and forth. Uh --

PATTERSON

And what was his name, your uncle?

DOUROUX

Fernandez. His name as Fer-- Ahrian Fernandez.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I think it was my grandmother's second -- or first husband.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Uh.

PATTERSON

But he was in L.A., too. So so much of the extended family had moved from Louisiana to Los Angeles.

DOUROUX

All of us.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Everybody moved here.

PATTERSON

Everybody just moved.

DOUROUX

Everybody

PATTERSON

Just be close.

DOUROUX

When one went, everybody went.

PATTERSON

They said, "We gotta go." (laughter)

DOUROUX

Everybody went. That's really s-- it was really a phenomenal thing.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, because that meant that all of their children were born in California.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So all of us have Louisiana roots, but all of -- all of the children were born here.

PATTERSON

Did they all belong to the Baptist, um --

DOUROUX

Um. Yes.

PATTERSON

-- community, or were there --

DOUROUX

Um.

PATTERSON

-- other denominations in your family?

DOUROUX

My mother's family all -- and my grandma Pauline's family (coughs) all belonged to the Baptists.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

But my grandfather's family were all Catholic.

PATTERSON

Mmm. Margaret's husband.

DOUROUX

Yes, exactly.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Remember, I told you they had --

PATTERSON

Alfred.

DOUROUX

-- complete different breeding, upbringing.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

They were completely different.

PATTERSON

So you -- would you say they were like the -- the Creole kind of --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- you know.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh. (laughter)

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Like my husband, yeah.

PATTERSON

(inaudible). How did he interact with the rest of you? Did -- was he --

DOUROUX

Fine. He was --

PATTERSON

Everybody was o--

DOUROUX

-- our heart.

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

We couldn't wait to see our grandpa. He was fun. (clears throat) What we got from him was completely different --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- from what we got from my grandmother.

PATTERSON

Uh, yes.

DOUROUX

He would play with us. He -- he'd make, um, a ring out of a, ham round, a bone.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

He would carve things for us or he'd bring us galoshes from Mexico.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

You know, so --

PATTERSON

The worldly side.

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh. It was great to have that balance, wasn't it?

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

Just learn from both.

DOUROUX

He smoked a cigar. He --

PATTERSON

(chuckles)

DOUROUX

-- he didn't mind havin' a beer, uh, or -- or brandy or whiskey, whatever it was he drank.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And my grandma said, "Go in the back with that!" (laughter)

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

But --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- we loved him.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

He would give us a horsey-back ride or --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- bounce us on his knee. We loved my grandfather.

PATTERSON

He was -- uh. Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

Mmm.

PATTERSON

But he remained in the Catholic tradition and h--

DOUROUX

No, he came over to Baptist. He came with my grandmother --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- as a Baptist.

PATTERSON

Mmm, OK.

DOUROUX

I don't think he ever did whole-heartedly --

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

-- but his family was Catholic, and my grandmother's, um, outskirts of her family were Catholic.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

I think that Catholics were predominant in Louisiana.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

My husband's family --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- are all Catholic. They still are.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

He's probably the only Baptist.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

'Cause I think they -- their influence was Catholic.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mmm.

PATTERSON

Did you ever attend any other denomination? The Church of -- of -- maybe AME or Methodist or the Catholic --

DOUROUX

I did. I -- you know, I've been in every church denomination.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Um. I actually organized, uh, a gospel choir at St. Bridget's. They wanted a gospel choir-- it's a Catholic church that wanted gospel.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And they called me in as a clinician.

PATTERSON

That was here in Los Angeles?

DOUROUX

In Los Angeles.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And that choir still exists today.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

How was it working in a different domination, for you?

DOUROUX

Um, you know what? Lemme tell you. Wh-- who we are as black people... who we are is always present.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So, uh, even though they say a mass and they -- they pray a different way, the root of the moan, the groan, the --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- is still there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- I mean, they were eager to experience a gospel song --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- because they knew that it was a part of our legacy.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Now, the -- the AME, I understand, has more of a -- a formal --

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

-- liturgical musical program.

DOUROUX

Exactly. But they're coming out of it, too.

PATTERSON

Mmm. How -- h-- how would you describe, in your experience, the musical program of, say, an AME service and a Baptist service?

DOUROUX

Well, the AME church has more of an air of education about them.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Um. A-- and I don't wanna say this clean across the board, but you think of AME as being an upper-echelon of black America.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

So they were ea-- they -- they -- whereas a black gospel church would sit there and -- and -- (syncopated) "I love the Lord, he heard my cry," they would take a hymn book, (more sedately) "I love the Lord, he heard my cry," because they were reading it --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- and they were -- and they were actually more on an intelligent level.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. So it was more mental rather than inspirational.

DOUROUX

Right, exactly.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

We -- on the other hand, my grandma would start a hymn on the -- on the back row of the church. The last row. And it would just filter through the church. No hymn book. The harmonies would be wonderfully rich. The men knew they were to sing bass, and the altos found their part, you didn't have to teach it.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

Uh. In the AME church, in most churches -- and I'm saying most, because, uh -- where was I going the last time I saw you? Anyway.--

PATTERSON

You were going to f-- Florida, I think, wasn't it?

DOUROUX

I had a recent experience at an AME church -- AME church. A young man who came out of the Baptist church.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And he has completely contemporized that church. I said, "Tyrone," -- he has a Baptismal pool, he has a Hammond organ, B3 speakers -- all of those things are related to the black Baptist church.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And they sing up-tempo gospel music. However, if you go to, um, an AME yo-- a traditional AME church, they're very hymn-oriented. They're very, um, liturgical in their scripture reading. Um.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So. It -- it -- it is a difference.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

W-- were you exposed to that when you were a little girl as well?

DOUROUX

No, no, no.

PATTERSON

It was --

DOUROUX

Just as an adult.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Just as an adult. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I've done several workshops --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- in AME churches. And in fact, m-- you know, one of the bishop, uh, bishops that I met tried to entice me (chuckles) to become an AME. I said, "No, I don't think so!"

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

And my daddy was alive, then, too. (laughter)

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

Uh, but, uh (clears throat) it -- I -- I -- I -- I think the blackness of our soul --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- slips through all the time. I don't care --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- what denomination you're in. Sooner or later you're gonna feel the pulse of a -- of a black song --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- an -- an inspirational thought in -- in the congregation that'll make you say, "Amen!"

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

Yeah. This more spon-- spontaneous incident of --

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

-- e-- e-- the ex-- the rapture of the natural aesthetic.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

Mm-huh.

DOUROUX

I think it's gonna come through somewhere.

PATTERSON

Yeah, yeah.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

So, here you are comin' over to the west side --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- and now you have a multi-ethnic environment.

DOUROUX

Killed me.

PATTERSON

(laughter) How do you mean?

DOUROUX

It killed me.

PATTERSON

How do you mean?

DOUROUX

I'd lost who I was. Uh, who -- who I am-- I would never be who I am today, as I said, if I didn't have that s-- Southern University experience. I remember applying... um, for the Keyboard Club or something like that.

PATTERSON

At L.A. High?

DOUROUX

Yes. And it was such... um, almost humiliating --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- experience, because the kids who sat there judging you had no in-- no concept of who I am as a musician.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And I remember one of my professors -- this was in college when I accompanied a soloist. In the black church, we can accompany so that the soloist may be in one place and we're either behind them -- it's -- it's really an art --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- where you -- you can play, uh, a song, and the -- the soloist can sing it in any way she wants to, and the musician -- and he graded me down for that. Because see, they don't understand.... They're looking at you accompany with this kind of, uh, gift, but they -- they know it is not academic. They can't grade it.

PATTERSON

So you're having a natural conversation with the singer --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- based on what the singer -- there's a call and response.

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

Exactly. So --

PATTERSON

So it -- it's based on h-- y-- you each are telling each other what to do next.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

And talking. Conversation Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

I can lead a singer to the end, if -- if she's taking too long --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- I -- I know how to --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- take her out of a song, you know? So. But... but it's -- it's a black characteristic, I think.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Because even -- even in the, uh, AME church, they would be prone to play first, second, third verse, and then a chorus or two choruses. We may play anything we want first. (laughter)

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. But you would know what each other were doing --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- because you were used to interacting. Again, the idea of a dialogue rather than --

DOUROUX

Oh, my, yes.

PATTERSON

Yeah, mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Last night at the studio, when Andre Crouch was in the studio, they were working on a particular song. Before they finished that song, they broke out into... a jam -- I guess they called it a jam session that was completely different from where they started!

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

And it was phenomenal! And thank God that it's on tape somewhere.

PATTERSON

Mmm!

DOUROUX

They were recording it.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

He'll never do that again.

PATTERSON

Yeah. The improvisational quality, that is such a --

DOUROUX

It was --

PATTERSON

-- a -- a --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- and African-derived aesthetic. Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And that's what he-- that's what hurt me in the Keyboard Club, you know?

PATTERSON

Yeah, yeah.

DOUROUX

Because they judged me from their perspective of music.

PATTERSON

Mmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I was nowhere there.

PATTERSON

So here you are, a teenager. OK, great. OK, we'll chase this.

DOUROUX

OK.

PATTERSON

This is fascinating. This is great. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

What school did you go -- did you go to school here?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. I went to L.A. High [Los Angeles High School].

DOUROUX

You did?

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

What year?

PATTERSON

When it was brick.

DOUROUX

What year?

PATTERSON

I graduated in '68.

DOUROUX

So -- I graduated in '59.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And i-- and it wasn't even predominantly white. I think it was predominantly Oriental. A lot of, uh --

PATTERSON

Yeah, the Asian --

DOUROUX

Yes, Asian.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh.

PATTERSON

It became more multi-ethnic now. Now, when I was there... there were few black people --

DOUROUX

Mm-mmm.

PATTERSON

-- that there were -- you know.

Douroux

Just a very few -- and it was because (clears throat) um, very few crossed the line to the west side yet.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mmm.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, um, my husband and I were discussing that the other day. the railroad tracks -- Alameda [Street]--

TECHNICIAN

OK, we're rolling.

DOUROUX

OK.

PATTERSON

OK.

DOUROUX

On Alameda [Street], uh, the ri-- the -- the east side consisted of, um, South Central across Central Avenue, east of Central Avenue.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I know on Central Avenue they had the Bill Robinson [Theater], the 5/4 Ballroom, um, uh, Kress's... that was a ten cent store.

PATTERSON

Oh.

DOUROUX

K-R-E-S-S, somethin'. Um. All the shopping we did was on Central Avenue. And it was five minutes from Carver High School.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know, so. And then the Sentinel newspaper was in that area. Sentinel.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know that newspaper?

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh. It was in that area. An, um. I -- my -- my husband and I were talking about the change... w-- when we -- when black people started to migrate, e-- everybody started to migrate. So when we got onto the east side-- the west side of Central Ave., it took a while before we went as far as L. High -- L.A. High School.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So it was -- I think I had one black teacher in that whole -- in the whole three years I was there.

PATTERSON

So there were mostly Caucasian --

DOUROUX

Caucasian. And I think --

PATTERSON

And so-- a few Asian?

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Well, I -- I'm not sure if there were Asian teachers. I think they were Caucasian.

PATTERSON

Hmm, the teachers.

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

What about the student body?

DOUROUX

Student body were [agent] -- mostly Asians.

PATTERSON

Oh.

DOUROUX

White, very few blacks.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Very few blacks.

PATTERSON

So there was a culture shock in a couple [a] ways. (chuckles)

DOUROUX

Oh, my. There were -- I'm tellin' you.

PATTERSON

Just the ethnicity --

DOUROUX

Right. Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- and then the way of the teaching method --

DOUROUX

(inaudible)

PATTERSON

-- and then to carry music with you one way, and --

DOUROUX

And the --

PATTERSON

-- and find it be completely different and --

DOUROUX

Be evaluated --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- uh -- be evaluated a different way. It's completely different.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Did you talk to your parents about this?

DOUROUX

Um.

PATTERSON

When you were adjusting and --

DOUROUX

You know what? I.... All of us resented and we expressed it a lot to my mother. But... sh-- sh-- her desire for us was to be broader in our experiences than she was.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And so she knew that we were, um, n-- n-- we weren't happy. But she knew it was a better school and that the experiences we would get would take us a long way in Los Angeles.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

So, yeah. I cried a lot, yeah. I was -- and I don't think -- I don't even know if my sister, my br-- or my brother e-- had the same attitude that I had about it. But I just didn't fit in.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I -- I co-- I preview, I, um, think about, um, my high school experiences very little.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

PATTERSON

Yeah, because it didn't feel good.

DOUROUX

Mm-mmm. And then right after that --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- I went to East L.A. Junior College. I could not handle -- by this time, my mental state -- and -- and this is in retrospect -- was very, very, um, low.

PATTERSON

Do you think coming out of -- it was -- the c-- it was -- having experience that culture shock, did that affect your -- your, um, musical expression? Did it -- did it make you -- did it affect your personality in such a way --

DOUROUX

It affected my personality.

PATTERSON

Di-- or when you went back to church --

DOUROUX

Mm-mmm.

PATTERSON

-- you came back to yourself, and you were happy --

DOUROUX

E-- exactly.

PATTERSON

-- in that environment. But --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- "I don't feel like goin' to school." (laughter)

DOUROUX

Ah -- that -- that was very difficult for me. And I didn't --

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

-- do poorly in school. I was a --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- average student.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

But I -- I remember one of the real hurts that I got -- and this is also in retrospect -- was that my counselor encouraged me to do business. Took shorthand. Plenty of it. Typing. Because she didn't see -- her -- her words were, you know, "To get in college, I don't think you will, uh, be able to do this, so take shorthand and typing." And that's what she programmed me for.

PATTERSON

So she programmed you not to be able to go to college --

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

-- so you better be a secretary.

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And that's what I took in high school.

PATTERSON

So had you thought about college at all before that?

DOUROUX

Only from my mother's perspective --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

-- you know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh. She wanted us to go to college. But we weren't being prepared for it.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I ended up goin' to East L.A. for the first year, and I remember one night sitting on my bed, crying all night. I guess on the verge of being broken.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

I just sat there and cried. And finally I got my daddy up, and he came in the room and talked to me all throughout the rest of the night, and we prayed and... um, he went through some of the hurts with me.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. What -- how do you describe that hurt? What did it feel like? Was this fe-- did you feel like your environment was rejecting who you truly were? Mm-hmm. And for a young -- a young woman, it's such a fragile time anyway. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

It was really fragile.

PATTERSON

Yeah. Yes. Yes. And your father was there for you. Mm-hmm. Did your mother or your grandmother ever know what you were suffering with?

DOUROUX

Yes, that weekend my mom and dad were going on a church tour.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. So they went there. We-- did anything in particular happen that -- either in -- at L.A. High or at East L.A.. Was it the racism?

DOUROUX

At my age, at that time, it was unexplained.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

I just knew --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- that my spirit was low --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- uh.... I felt so alone at school.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Yeah. I have that -- when I -- I moved into the -- in the area when I was in the third grade, and the -- and I had come from a black school, and I moved into a school that was all Asian, and I remember having a similar experience of standing out-- outside the volleyball court wishin' they would invite me to play.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

And -- and no one would invite me to play.

DOUROUX

No -- nothing -- nothing --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- were we included in. Nothing.

PATTERSON

Yeah. I remember the feeling.

DOUROUX

I remember wanting to say the, um, graduation prayer. And I think maybe it was only two of us that applied for that.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

But it wasn't me. You know, I didn't get that.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So my high school experience was... ah, just very down

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- and I was sickly. I had asthma.

PATTERSON

Oh, did you? Yeah.

DOUROUX

So a lot of self-image things came through there.

PATTERSON

Sure. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I did not find myself until that week, when I did that night of crying, my dad -- my mom packed up my suitcase, and they were going on a -- a car trip, just some church meetings, and they took me with them.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And we stopped at some of the colleges on the way. And my mother made my dad take me to Southern University. And they left me there. And that's where I began to figure out who I am.

PATTERSON

Now where was that now?

DOUROUX

In Louisiana. Baton Rouge.

PATTERSON

Louisiana and Baton Rouge.

DOUROUX

That was my mother. She went three years to that school, and she said, "Unless you are able to identify who you are, you will never be able to be all that God wants you to be." So we stopped there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I got into the music program. And that -- that was the beginning --

PATTERSON

(laughter) Like, "OK, now we're talking."

DOUROUX

Now we're at home.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

You saw black students in nursing, in law, in music, we had -- we had, um -- well, even now, on the Bayou Classics, those great bands, uh, Drum Majors and all of the emphasis of black teachers --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- tellin' you to be somebody, making you practice --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- black dormitory leaders. All of those influences --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- came again --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- to my --

PATTERSON

So now there was a continuity --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- between what was at home --

DOUROUX

Uh-huh.

PATTERSON

-- and what you were doing outside of your home and your education --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- and so now....

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm. And people started askin' me, "Could you come play for this church? Could you do this Sunday?" Or people wanted me to play for 'em as a soloist. So, you know --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- I started to regroup --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- my, um, my intuitive spirit --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- you know, knowing who am I, you know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And what am I to do? And... if it hadn't been for that experience, I would have lost it.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. So your parents understood that you needed --

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

-- to do this.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So -- so now you're in Louisiana.

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

And it -- and it was -- it was a tremendous, uh, rebirth. In fact, it was during the time that Martin Luther King and Jesse Jackson and all of them were, uh, on the march.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Now, did you start at Southern at -- um, wh-- in what year, do you remember?

DOUROUX

Must have been '60.

PATTERSON

In '60.

DOUROUX

'Cause I graduated in '59.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I had that horrible year. Maybe it was '61.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Somewhere --

PATTERSON

After East L.A. College.

DOUROUX

Yeah, uh-huh.

PATTERSON

And, w-- w-- just to back up a little bit. At East L.A., was it mostly white, or was it mixed, uh, uh, La--

DOUROUX

No, it was, um....

PATTERSON

Was it Latino som--

DOUROUX

Latino.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

That area.

PATTERSON

And white, mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

And then you went on the road trip, and you entered Southern.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

And did you -- so, were your -- your -- your parents, your family wasn't there with you.

DOUROUX

No they weren't. I stayed on campus, which was a great experience. Everything that happened to me at Southern was the -- the antithesis --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- of L.A. High.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Is that -- that means the opposite.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

And, uh --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- it just gave me a whole new lease on life.

PATTERSON

Did you start composing -- when did you start, actually, composing songs? I know you mentioned it a little earlier.

DOUROUX

Wel-- wel-- yeah, um.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

M-- because the school... was a center for the, uh, Martin Luther King marches, they closed those schools down in my third year.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And because I was down there by myself, my dad insisted that I come home. On the basis that they were puttin' people in jail, people were gettin' beat up, and he was afraid for me to be there without a family.

DOUROUX

The Civil Rights Movement.

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm, all the protests.

DOUROUX

Exactly. But when I came home, uh... I rode the train -- yeah, I did, 'cause that's where I met my husband, on the train.

PATTERSON

Oh.

DOUROUX

And, um... by this time, my momma had bought a new home, and my dad was building a new church. But that minister of music, Thurston G. Frazier was there, and I think -- I think the influence of my, um, envir-- musical environment was so much instilled in me, I started writing. Just outta the clear blue sky.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And my dad gave me a choir that was known for failure (chuckles) --

PATTERSON

(laughter)

DOUROUX

-- they were young adults. They were havin' babies. One month they were pregnant, somebody was out havin' a baby, they were havin' new jobs, they were gettin' adjusted, they were workin' at night, there were family problems between newly married people. But that choir... introduced the music that I wrote.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

They weren't good, so I didn't mind (laughter) experimenting with them.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And finally, they became, um, the passageway to the congregation for the music I wrote.

PATTERSON

Wow. So you came --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- back from Louisiana with music in you.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

Music to express songs to write.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

And you had met your husband, so you had -- your heart was full, and....

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. You're back with your family.

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

Now, the new church across the street, on --

DOUROUX

Was being built.

PATTERSON

Was being built, so you were still at the -- the other church.

DOUROUX

The other church on Figueroa.

PATTERSON

With the youth choir.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

Now, what made your dad say, "Go ahead and -- and take this choir and do somethin' with it." (laughter)

DOUROUX

Well, he was just -- you know, I thu-- I think he trained us without us knowing... that we were being trained? Um. Because... I-- w-- why did he want me to do a young adult choir like that?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Um. And it blossomed. It blossomed.

PATTERSON

Did you -- di-- were you a little nervous when you started out, or did you -- were you excited? How did you feel?

DOUROUX

I -- I don't think I was ever n-- nervous in church ministry.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I th-- I was comfortable there.

PATTERSON

Yeah, yeah.

DOUROUX

You know? I was -- I was, um... uncertain in regards to the music I was writing.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, you know, I didn't know what I was doing, I -- it was just something in my spirit.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, really, I wasn't around, um, writers. Thurston was a conductor. There were people around that wrote... but I didn't know how to do a copyright. I didn't know how to put the music on paper.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I.... Somehow or another, I guess, my mother had instilled in us how to teach parts --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- uh, but, uh, it was just a new experience.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. So you were teaching, just, sort of, through or-- or-- orally --

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

-- and -- and singing the parts to them, and --

DOUROUX

And I could play, and singin' the parts.

PATTERSON

-- playin' the keyboard.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

And Thurston was directing the -- the adult choir --

DOUROUX

The adult choir.

PATTERSON

-- there.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm. Ooh, my.

PATTERSON

And, uh, what kind of a relationship did you have to him? Did you --

DOUROUX

Oh, I loved him.

PATTERSON

-- did you all talk about writing, and --

DOUROUX

Oh, I lov-- o--

PATTERSON

-- you said he -- he mentored you.

DOUROUX

When I wrote the first song, "Give Me a Clean Heart," I taught it to... uh, my choir. Thurston heard it and flipped. He took the song all over the country.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Finally, it was recorded, by the James Cleveland Workshop of America.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Multi-numbers of people were there --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- heard it, sung it, and they just could not get over the fact that it came from our church.

PATTERSON

Well, all of you must have been so proud.

DOUROUX

And Th-- right. My daddy was, yeah.

PATTERSON

(laughter) Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And that song is in all the hymn books.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

The AMEs sing it. The Catholics sing it.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Church of God and Christ sing it. Everybody sing it.

PATTERSON

How old were you when you wrote it?

DOUROUX

I was married, so I was tw-- in my early 20s.

PATTERSON

Your early 20s?

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And I wrote, uh, constantly after that.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

It just came through.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

I hummed and melodies and words that came to me. It was a, uh, a natural occurrence.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I wasn't one to sit down and --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- take manuscript and --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- try to write it out. Make words --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- rhyme and --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I wrote a song -- I told you I wrote "Trees" out here --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- uh, and it just flowed.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Another song I wrote, I wr-- I wrote it on the freeway, and I taught it when I got to church.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

"If It Had Not Been for the Lord on My Side." Wrote it here, taught it when I got there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Because it just flowed over me.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

And th-- and this way of creating and being powerful --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- was a natural way, and --

DOUROUX

It was -- mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- and I think, uh, well, what do you think, in u-- in our black community, maybe that opportunity isn't always there, to be empowered in an instinctual way.

DOUROUX

It isn't. It isn't. It isn't.

PATTERSON

And -- and instead of the structured --

DOUROUX

It isn't. Is it?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

An-- part of my vision -- and I know we'll cover this -- is to build a Gospel House in -- in -- in Los Angeles. And if -- if -- if I had, um, listened to some of my, uh, friends across the country, it may have been in New York. One of my good friends says, "Girl, I'll get you that building. I'll get you any building you want. Just build it here. But L.A. is where the void is for black emphasis.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

You go to, uh, D.C., you have Hampton. You have Morgan State. You have Howard University. And all of these black students... are influencing their communities.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

You see blacks when you go into D.C. and Howard [University] is there, when they see schools, college, change of, uh, classes. Crossing the street. Just the -- just the vision of all of these black people. In Atlanta -- Spellman, uh, all of those colleges in one place. Young kids see black kids going to college. You don't see that in L.A.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

It's very hard to see a black -- uh, uh, to feel a black, uh, educational impa-- im-- influence --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- in Inglewood, you know?

PATTERSON

Yes. Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

You --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Where do we see people goin' to college?

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

So I graduated, [from California State University, Los Angeles] and my graduate work was at S.C., I'll come back to that. I'm --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- runnin' out, but --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- the actual influence of State College and S.C. if I wasn't who I was, would have been the exact experience of L.A. High School.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. So, yeah.

DOUROUX

You know? You know?

PATTERSON

Because you -- but you had grabbed back to your identity, your root --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- so you were able to carry that forward into your other environments.

DOUROUX

And that's --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- that was the school where my grandmother walked me to -- (laughter). She walked with her hands behind her back. Real strong image. And she walked in that and said, "This child wanna go to school here. Where -- where -- what's she supposed to do?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

Well, she's cert--

DOUROUX

And I had graduated from, um -- I had a Bachelor's degree.

PATTERSON

Now where'd you -- where did you get the Bac-- now, you left at the third year at Southern --

DOUROUX

I got it from Cal. State L.A.

PATTERSON

So when you got here, you went back to school, and you got involved in the --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- in the church --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- your dad's church again.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So -- but by now, you had a sense of self.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

So you were happier at Cal. State L.A.?

DOUROUX

I'd -- I'd -- I actually, didn't.... I wasn't there full-time, so I -- I still didn't have a lot of connection, you know.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

It was still hard. But I didn't need --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- them like I n-- needed before, you know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I was a person.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I knew who I was. I knew -- by that time, I was married. Had my own family.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So I was OK.

PATTERSON

So, what else were you involved in? Of course, the church took up m-- much of your time --

DOUROUX

Most of my time.

PATTERSON

-- and -- and you had classes, and you had your family.

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

Where were you living, when you got back and --

DOUROUX

Um, my --

PATTERSON

-- was married?

DOUROUX

When I got married -- we bought a home during the first year of our marriage, and we were living on Raymond [Avenue], off of Washington [Boulevard].

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

That Western Washing-- my grandmother lived over that area, and, uh, my mother was living on Mt. Vernon Drive. But it was still....

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. The family was nearby.

DOUROUX

You know, it was -- the family was close, yeah.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Very close. We didn't have any problem. Five minutes away from my grandmother, you know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So, um, that's where my husband and I bought a home, in that area. Uh-huh.

PATTERSON

What was your social life like?

DOUROUX

Um.

PATTERSON

How would you describe your -- your friends and --

DOUROUX

Um.

PATTERSON

-- the people that were close to you, other than your family.

DOUROUX

Actually, we had... best groups of friends in church.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, you know, I had m-- my best girlfriend was there. Before I married, my boyfriend was there.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

We did everything in church. We went on hayrides.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

We had, uh... park experiences, went on picnics, to the beach, uh, we had parties over each other's houses.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Most of our influences was still centered around church.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Now that you had children, how do you -- how would you compare when your little ones, their experience. Did they -- were they able to fall right into the tradition, or did the -- did the -- in the city --

DOUROUX

My daughters --

PATTERSON

-- was different?

DOUROUX

-- ooh. My daughter, I -- I had a most difficult time with my daughter -- when I moved out to here.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Because she had to go to Agoura High [School].

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

But she actually went to kindergarten here, so I thought it would be fine, first grade, first grade. I thought she would be OK. But she still longed for that experience in -- in the black communities, and I had a hard time breaking the yoke o-- of that black influence there. Because by then, where we grew up were gangs. And my daughter was growing up.

PATTERSON

OK, now this was on, uh --

DOUROUX

Uh, if you -- if you went to the projects or if you went --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- uh, even as far across Central, the whole -- the whole community has changed. 'Cause it's, uh, L-- Latino, and further over would be, um, uh, uh, the, uh, gang areas. I can't even think of them.

PATTERSON

Now, she was born in the late '60s, or...?

DOUROUX

Yeah, six-- early '60s. She was born in early --

PATTERSON

Was born in early....

DOUROUX

She was born in.... No, she was born in sev-- I -- I was married ten years when I had her. So she was born in '71.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So that whole area over there changed.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

But, she would go to church, and still, some of her friends were still living in the black community. So that's who she wanted to socialize with. But that meant leaving here, going into L.A. by herself, and being connected with the families in that area. And our church environment was very, very close. She still had a lot of friends there. But they lived in L.A.

PATTERSON

Right.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm. I remember one... one evening, she wanted to go on Crenshaw, because all of her friends were there. And she had been buggin' me about this, and buggin' me about letting her go on Crenshaw.

PATTERSON

How old was she?

DOUROUX

She was -- must have been in her teens.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, so I let her -- I said, "OK, we have a-- we have to take this girl to the airport. Let's go down Crenshaw. Maybe we'll show her the areas." When we got there, there were helicopters --

PATTERSON

(laughter) Yeah.

DOUROUX

-- (laughter) flyin' over all of the fast food places. They had a whole line of boys with their hands up against the wall. They were pattin' 'em down. Over here, they had boys lined up on the ground. (laughter)

PATTERSON

Boys in the hood, huh? (laughter)

DOUROUX

My mother, my daughter said, "Ma, nobody -- this would happen to nobody but my mother! She prayed this on me!" 'Cause she had wanted to be there so much, you know, they actually started closing Crenshaw Street down.

PATTERSON

Now, what year was this? When you were driving through.

DOUROUX

Um. I don't know. It must have been, uh.... She -- she was about -- she was in her teens. So....

PATTERSON

It was in the '80s?

DOUROUX

Yeah, probably so.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mmm, when you start changing.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

They had those car clubs.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

And that's what she was gravitating to.

PATTERSON

Yeah, yeah.

DOUROUX

Those car clubs on Crenshaw and --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- they had so many policemen out there, we had to U-turn.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

We couldn't even get through it.

PATTERSON

When you moved to the west side, the neighborhood was already beginning to break up and change.

DOUROUX

It --

PATTERSON

Now, that -- what year was it that you moved to, um, uh... eh, the Sugar Hill area?

DOUROUX

Uh... when we were in high school.

PATTERSON

So it was --

DOUROUX

So it must have been, uh, the ea-- the late --

PATTERSON

The late '50s.

DOUROUX

-- '50s.

PATTERSON

And it started to change around in there.

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

And then through the next decade --

DOUROUX

It just --

PATTERSON

-- we have the Civil Rights Movement, and everything just changed.

DOUROUX

Everything changed.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Everything changed.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So when your baby was born in the early '70s, she was born into the -- eh -- you were still in the Sugar Hill area --

DOUROUX

Right.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

No -- I -- I actually moved. (coughs) I moved -- I bought a home, again, off of LaBrea.

PATTERSON

Oh.

DOUROUX

Baldwin Hills. Baldwin --

PATTERSON

Oh, OK.

DOUROUX

It was called Baldwin Vista.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And that's where she was born.

PATTERSON

Oh, OK. And what was the lay of that land, I mean, ethnically?

DOUROUX

Basically black, but upper-class --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- they would call themselves, because the property was so expensive.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

And you know, they had, uh, um, Don Felipe and all of that.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm, Don Tomaso.

DOUROUX

Yeah, all of that.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Well, we were across, they were on one side of LaBrea. My mother lived in Baldwin Hills, uh, off of Vernon [Avenue]. It was an extension [of Baldwin Hills].

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- that came out Mt. Vernon drive.

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

And then it went to the Don Felipe --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- then crossed LaBrea and it was my area.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. I know where you mean.

DOUROUX

Yeah, Baldwin Hills Theater was there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So in that area.

PATTERSON

Yeah, yeah.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So your daughter was born there --

DOUROUX

She was born there.

PATTERSON

-- and most of her environment was black, then --

DOUROUX

Right, mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- and so that's what she was used to before you moved out here.

DOUROUX

That's what she was used to.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And she has -- she has a very, very close connection with her first cousin, and she -- she was still in L.A.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

So they had a real -- either sh-- Ahrianne was here or Mardy was there, 'cause they -- they wanted to be together. But they migrated to some very se-- serious environments.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Their boyfriends started coming out of gangs, you know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

A-- and it -- it was like this is what was offered, this -- this -- this was the -- the caliber of boys that were over there, now.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

So that's -- that's who she gravitated to.

PATTERSON

Now, before you moved into Baldwin Hills, did you -- the church was still in Figueroa --

DOUROUX

Right, mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- you had built a new church.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Did the ch-- congregation -- did the -- did the church environment change any?

DOUROUX

No, it didn't.

PATTERSON

So that was sort of an encapsulated and protected environment?

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. Always. Always.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, right now, our church is predominantly black, but we're in a predominantly, In a Latino community, I guess.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

It's changed everything from, uh, where we were born.... I'm trying to see how far we go.

PATTERSON

On 48th [Street]? Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Yeah, up 48th all the way to where my church is to the Inglewood area.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- is probably predominantly Latino now.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Our church meeting in December addressed that, because where we were pulling from a black community, now we're pulling from a Latino community, and many of them are not English speaking.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So -- but the congregation itself has remained black.

DOUROUX

Yes, uh-huh.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Did your -- when y-- when you moved to the west side and then to Baldwin Hills, and you had your baby --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- y-- your daughter Ma-- Me--

DOUROUX

Mardy.

PATTERSON

-- Mardy.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Did Mardy go to the church --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- with you?

DOUROUX

She loved it. Oh --

PATTERSON

And she g-- so her early years were in the black church --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- and so she had that --

DOUROUX

She did.

PATTERSON

-- as a root.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

And, um....

DOUROUX

She gravitated. My daughter is so protective of her -- her heritage.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

My mother passed away in, um, July this year.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And of course, she had so much and all of our houses are furnished. You know, it's so little need for what my mother had.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

My daughter's havin' a fit. (laughter)

PATTERSON

Oh!

DOUROUX

She took as much as she could. "That's what Gram's furniture! We can't get rid of this!" She's really linked.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

And, uh, she said, "And if somethin' happens to you or my dad, this house, God, is gonna be a favorite of mine, because I grew up in this house."

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I said, "Mardy," --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. She has a sense of heritage --

DOUROUX

But she's like that oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- and tradition and family.

DOUROUX

She is really

PATTERSON

Her history.

DOUROUX

Oh my, yes.

PATTERSON

Yeah. So she's able to pass it along.

DOUROUX

She really -- she's really linked.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

OK, I guess --

DOUROUX

And she chastises me all the time. Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Well, I guess we -- we should stop. We've -- we've done a beautiful two hours, almost.

DOUROUX

Oh, did we do two? That was great.

PATTERSON

Oh well, maybe a hour and a half.

DOUROUX

Oh, great. Great.

PATTERSON

Well, thank you, Margaret.

DOUROUX

You're welcome.

PATTERSON

Wow.

DOUROUX

I --

1.2. Session 2 ( April 17, 2007)

UCLA Oral History Program Margaret DOUROUX Session 2, 04-17-2007 DOUROUX[1].Margaret.2.04.17.2007.mp3

PATTERSON

-- lives.

DOUROUX

I know, it's so sad. And you know what? In my spirit, I believe we created the whole thing to be like this.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

With all the violence on television every day, all day, everywhere. It's --

PATTERSON

Violence creates violence, doesn't it?

DOUROUX

Yeah, it just seems like a natural consequence.

PATTERSON

You know, I thought about it one day. I said, you know, most of the... most of the m-- most popular shows are based around --

DOUROUX

Murder.

PATTERSON

-- murder. Murder.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

OK. So this is April...

DOUROUX

S--

PATTERSON

-- 17th, 2007.

DOUROUX

It's the --

PATTERSON

Is it the 17th?

DOUROUX

Oh, the s-- is it? OK.

PATTERSON

The 17th, 2007. We're with Margaret Douroux --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- again. Happy to be here.

DOUROUX

Glad to have you.

PATTERSON

Mmm. Um, I think w-- what we were discussing when we were here before was, um, your having come back and gotten settled in the west side, you and your family --

DOUROUX

Oh, yes.

PATTERSON

-- and -- and --

DOUROUX

With my mom -- on -- when I was living at home. Or do you mean... uh.

PATTERSON

No, you -- you had, um.... You had completed your education, you were back in Los Angeles --

DOUROUX

ok.

PATTERSON

-- and you and your family were living n-- near -- somewhere near Adams, I think it was?

DOUROUX

Oh, ok. I -- all right. Um, lemme -- lemme fix it.

PATTERSON

ok.

DOUROUX

I'm tryin' to rem-- remember if I was with my mother and father. Or was I with my husband then?

PATTERSON

I think you were with your husband then.

DOUROUX

OK, OK, yes.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

We lived in a small apartment on Adams.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, later bought a home on, uh, Raymond [Avenue] near, um --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- Vernon -- Vermont [Avenue]. Vermont [Avenue] and Normandie [Avenue].

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

And you were back at church.

DOUROUX

Yes, back at church --

PATTERSON

And you were --

DOUROUX

-- and back at school again.

PATTERSON

And -- and you -- so, now, lemme get oriented. In 1970, you wrote the song, "Give Me a Clean Heart."

DOUROUX

Right, somewhere around there. Yeah.

PATTERSON

Were you on Adams, in the apartment, at that time?

DOUROUX

Uh, no, I was on Raymond.

PATTERSON

OK.

DOUROUX

Raymond. That was the little house we bought on Raymond Avenue. That was -- I guess that was probably the first song I could identify as, uh, the onset of composing. I had done some frivolous things, but I -- I could never, uh, identify them. They weren't identified by the public as having been, you know, a composition.

PATTERSON

Mmm, mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

But this particular song, uh, Thurston G. Frazier, who was a giant in my life, uh, heard it, and he just m-- mentored me --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- in regards to teaching it and, uh, getting it copyrighted and --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- all of the things that I needed to do with it.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And he identified -- when he identified it as a composition, I knew it was a composition. (laughter)

PATTERSON

Right, right.

DOUROUX

Mmm.

PATTERSON

Was that -- now, wh-- where did going to Cal. State L.A. fit in? And where -- had you already gone?

DOUROUX

When I came -- when I came from, um, Southern University -- and I'm not good at dates, but --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- you know, we had that, uh, M-- Martin Luther King [Jr.] sit-in in the south --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- when I was down there. Uh. They were trying to, uh, um, s-- integrate the counters and the -- the bathrooms, and they were marching. They were sitting in at only-white counters.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, um, consequently, it called a lotta students out of school, because Baton Rouge and New Orleans -- the south was the landmark place for those marches. Well, when they started to, uh, infiltrate the college campuses, the school was intimidated, because it was like, um... they didn't know what to expect.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Riots or whatever. So they started closing campuses.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And finally, my daddy -- by me living in Los Angeles, you know, I didn't have a haven. So he made me come home.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, so I was in my third year. And I did one year at Pepperdine [University], and then I went to Cal[ifornia] State [University] L.A..

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. And you were doing --

DOUROUX

Mmm.

PATTERSON

-- this while, um, you were living on Adams with your husband. Or you we-- did you come back and stay with your fo-- your folks?

DOUROUX

Well, that's how Cal. State -- let's see. I -- I married my husband while I was at Cal. State --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- and, uh, we lived on Adams.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And after Adams, I moved to Raymond.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

But -- but the reason I, uh, went to Cal. State was because they closed the school at Southern.

PATTERSON

Oh, I see.

DOUROUX

Uh-huh.

PATTERSON

So you completed your four years at Cal. State.

DOUROUX

At Cal. State, mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

And -- and what made you th-- now, you still hadn't decided to go into music as a career yet, huh?

DOUROUX

Well, when I went to Southern, it was a very peculiar situation -- I may have referenced this before. But I was so unnerved, um, by school -- the school, L.A. schools I had attended, and, uh, not knowing who I was. S-- when I went to Southern University, that seemed to be a landmark place for me. I identified myself --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- and I understood the music, I studied music. People respected my music. The churches in the community knew I was there, and they would call on me to play. So by the time I got home, I felt like a whole person.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh... um.... When I -- when I got to Cal. State, I started to feel that uneasiness again, you know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Because at Southern, the community understood gospel music. There was a place for me. I played gospel music.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Uh. Cal. State was just the opposite. They did not --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- recognize gospel music. It was very, very, uh, academic.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I had to work hard at that.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, um, it was just not a good place for me.

PATTERSON

What was your major, when you -- when you went there?

DOUROUX

Music and -- for some -- some reason, I got a -- (cell phone rings) um. Uh.

PATTERSON

I'm so sorry. I have to turn this off.

DOUROUX

And it's all in that little purse and you still can hear it? (chuckles) I couldn't hear it.

PATTERSON

I'm so sorry.

DOUROUX

I can seldom hear my...

PATTERSON

It rarely rings, so I forget to turn it off.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So, you were at, uh -- you were in a classical music environment.

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I had to do a senior recital in classical music. It was very difficult for me, but --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Um. It was required, and I did perform, you know. Um. And I can't say that I regret that --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- because academically, it prepared me --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- to walk through doors --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- that I would not be able to walk through. And right now, because I have that preparation, I have -- I have the right to talk to young people about education.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I can, um, actually, um, I believe -- we -- we have so many gifted kids around us who are just naturally gifted who don't think they should --

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

-- they have to get an education.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

And I try to explain to 'em, "When you walk into a studio, uh, and they want you to play a chart, and they have n-- chord structures on the top and no notes, or you don't hear it on the tape, you've gotta sit there and play it. You need to be able to read and be able to walk through any door that's opened," --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- "for you." So, yes, Cal. State prepared me for a classical education.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Did you decide right then to -- to go straight into, um, your graduate work at, uh, USC [University of Southern California], or --

DOUROUX

Um. When I graduated, even though I had a major in education and -- music education -- and -- and English, I didn't have a credential. To teach.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, I -- L.A. requires a credential.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I wanted to teach --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- so I did go back to get the credential. Coincidentally, a-- getting the credential, I got a s-- a Master's.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And coincidentally to that, uh, I wanted to be a psychologist. So actually, I got several, uh, uh, credentials in educational psych.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I could do several things in that ar-- arena.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And I hadn't touched music again.

PATTERSON

And you hadn't? So you --

DOUROUX

I was just doing it in church.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So while you were at USC, it was -- it was as though you were pursuing another side of your life --

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

-- that meant something to you, being able to get into the field of education.

DOUROUX

Education, mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Yeah. So it's a mission.

DOUROUX

And psych.

PATTERSON

It was -- became a mission for you.

DOUROUX

And it was very important, uh, because my student teaching -- my clinical work was in south central L.A., where a lot of our kids were being, uh, identified as EMR. A lot of 'em. Educable Mentally Retarded.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Our -- our, uh, what's -- I can't remember the acronym for it, but it meant hyperactive or -- or out of control.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Hyper-something. I can't --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- remember what the acronym -- but.... We were required to give them a pre- and post-test, and our -- and our kids were getting, uh, fifth graders were scoring on a first and second grade level. And all of that just dumbfounded me. Because at one time, in the black communities, parents would not allow their children to -- to not know their name, their address. Their alphabet. When I went to school, I know I got plenty whippings. (chuckles) Because I didn't know my alphabet or I'd -- I hadn't done what I was supposed to do. But this was a whole new generation of kids, now, who are coming to school without breakfast, without the right clothes. Without any of the things that they needed to, uh, benefit from an education. You had to take care of all those needs!

PATTERSON

Yeah. Yeah.

DOUROUX

And so, the head psychiatrist was, um, a move towards really getting a visual of what was going on.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And basically, it was community negligence.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

We didn't have the things that we used to have. Uh. We used to have a community of black people who took care of black people. Her momma could tell me what to do, you know.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

My mother could tell them what to do. We all went to church. Our community was self-contained. We had a grocery store. We had -- you know? So we all felt a part of the community. But now we're looking at a whole different generation of kids, and maybe... we were identifying a whole drug generation at that time.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Newly found drug addicts, you know, experiencing drugs.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Because these kids were having babies who were, um, on welfare, um, and... their homes were very well technically equipped with the big televisions and boom boxes. It was just a whole change in black culture.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, for the children to actually get to school was a major, major victory. If we followed these kids home, we would wonder, "How did they get here?"

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Were -- was the community more integrated, or was it just a black --

DOUROUX

Predominantly black.

PATTERSON

It was still the self-contained black community --

DOUROUX

Self-contained.

PATTERSON

-- but the behaviors were different and --

DOUROUX

Yes, a whole new generation.

PATTERSON

-- the allegiances were (inaudible) -- mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I mean, you taught children who were completely cared for by themselves.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

They would get up -- this is when free breakfasts came into, uh, play. You know, they would get up and they'd get to school -- they would even miss the breakfast. They'd come to school in the rain without a sweater --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- or -- and if you go home with them, your whole perception of this child would change... because they are doing things for themselves that teenagers didn't have to do.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Get themselves up for school. Get some kind of clothes on. I taught first grade, second grade. Comb their hair, to the best of their ability. And we were supposed to discipline them when they got to school late.

PATTERSON

Mmm. So you took a teaching position.

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. I taught --

PATTERSON

What school were you at?

DOUROUX

Hooper Avenue.

PATTERSON

ok. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

On the east side. And I -- I guess I taught, uh, maybe a year -- no, maybe two, three years before -- maybe three years before I became a psychologist.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I taught about -- 'cause I did have tenure before I left school, so it must have been three or four years in this classroom.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So you're going to school and working as a teacher.

DOUROUX

Right, exactly.

PATTERSON

At the same time, working in the church --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- and caring for your own family.

DOUROUX

Yes. I was --

PATTERSON

You were busy!

DOUROUX

I was! I always seemed to be like that. Right now, my schedule is unbelievable. It's just --

PATTERSON

And still, it sounds as though you were still seeing more than the children in the classroom, but you were also seeing that connection between them and their homes --

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

-- and their home life. What they were up against. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Yeah. It was grievous.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Because I was born in that same community.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

I grew up in that same school environment. Uh, I -- I -- I went to Ascot Elementary School, and Ascot is around the corner from Hooper, where I was teaching. So when I started to work in that a-- area, I was delighted. Because I knew that's where I came from, and I knew the community. But it had changed tremendously. Uh. There was a whole new, eh, um, influence --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- in that community that we just didn't have.

PATTERSON

How -- how did you find the mothers? The women of the community? Because the -- that -- those are usually the first line in caretakers of the children.

DOUROUX

Very few. I can remember some parents -- very few parents -- who came to school to see me, or who was interested. In -- in that particular era, we were required to go to their home.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

So -- so I did visit. But there were a few parents who came to see me, and I can -- you know, in my mind, identify those kids as being successful. In fact, I've seen, uh, one parent -- she's, "Oh, my boy was in your room!" You know, and, "He's this," and "He's that!" And I see a few of the kids around whose parents had an interest, but the -- the most of them had not even a grandmother that was of any maturity. It seemed like the kids were babies, the mothers were 18, 19, and 20. The grandmothers may have been 35 or 40.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So, their -- their -- their maturity, the, uh, the caliber of lifestyle they were living, was completely different --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- than I had experienced in that same community.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. What do you feel like... wh-- what do you feel like the distance was between the women and their children? What was it that they weren't able to give their kids? It -- was it love? Was it that they weren't educated enough to understand what the children needed?

DOUROUX

I think that they... prioritized differently than our parents did.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Um. As I s-- mentioned before, in some instances, um, I think drugs were being introduced in a major way in that community. And... I -- I don't -- I d-- I think that the women... were approaching that era that said, "My daddy's," -- what is it? "My daddy's..."

PATTERSON

My baby's daddy?

DOUROUX

"My baby's daddy." You know, they weren't really --

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

-- building a family.

PATTERSON

Yeah. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

And, uh, they were having babies, but most of them were not -- many of them were not married.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And they were struggling. So they were on -- either on welfare or they were, uh, uh, being promiscuous or --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- you know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh. The priority was, "How do I eat every day," --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- "and still have this and that and the other?"

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And -- and in many cases, I felt like the kids were, uh, burdensome for them.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And -- and that was the attitude. That's how they treated them, you know.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, you would hear them say, "Get the so-and-so outta here, out of my face," or -- it was a whole -- a whole different lifestyle that w--

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- that we approached. And -- and I think even 'til this day, there're still communities -- I did some evangelistic work over in the projects way over -- can't even think of where they were now. But that same attitude was there. The children were bothersome.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mmm.

DOUROUX

They were in the way.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh, they suffered neglect because their parents were doing something else.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

So then you'd find that their skills and talents were s--

DOUROUX

Oh, my.

PATTERSON

-- were, uh --

DOUROUX

Mmm.

PATTERSON

-- un-attended to, and --

DOUROUX

And -- and -- and what finally happened was with the school integration, um, well, let me preface this. Because the school where we were was taught by black teachers, they -- they still -- the teachers still had an image of, uh, being a teacher. You know, they came dressed a certain way.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

They had a lot of dignity. And -- and they -- they demanded that these kids listen. "Go wash your hands. Did you brush your teeth this morning?"

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

They dealt with those kinds of things.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

But w-- with the onset of integration, um, there was a move towards not only moving the kids to another environment but also bringing another environment in the school. The culture that came from a UCLA where you were was, uh, uh, "Come on, I'm-a be your friend." it wasn't a -- a d-- uh, um, uh, educational kind of requirement to come to school and learn this and learn this. But they saw a whole new young adult coming in wanting to be, mmm, compadres with the children. When really, again, they weren't getting the adult and the child role.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

They were getting friendship or -- and our kids don't respond -- didn't respond to that.

PATTERSON

They needed more guidance.

DOUROUX

They needed guidance.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So tho-- they -- they overran -- (chuckles) they beat those teachers down. You know. They could not discipline those kids.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Because they needed an image of authority.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Someone who cared them in. Our black teachers came with ties and shirts and they looked like a -- a -- a man in leadership, that --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- they -- they were strong and disciplined, and the women -- they were still wearing suits to school.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know? And they looked all dressed and with authority.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

Well, you bring a UCLA student -- and I'm using UCLA 'cause you guys are here (laughter) -- they -- you -- you know -- any student from another culture doing their student teaching.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

They come in slides --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- or they'd come dressed down. Then they see a whole 'nother image that they could play with.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

You see what I'm sayin'? And they did that's not what they needed.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

DOUROUX

So, a lot of the emphasis that we had been building into the school because of the neglected home was again interrupted by student teachers who had a different motive.

PATTERSON

Uh-huh.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Wow.

DOUROUX

Isn't that somethin'?

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

Yes, it's always the unf-- cultural unfamiliarity.

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

Not really understanding what the needs were of the student body.

DOUROUX

That's what I mean.

PATTERSON

And integration, I guess, just sort of happened to everybody --

DOUROUX

It just happened.

PATTERSON

-- and nobody knew --

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

-- what the implications would be.

DOUROUX

Nobody studied it. Nobody took the time. And even while it was going on, our teachers --

PATTERSON

Wow.

DOUROUX

-- at -- at Hooper we're sayin', "Why -- you know, why are they requiring this, you know, what is this about?" And it required more post paper work and more pre-- paperwork. Accountability, uh, and, uh, it -- it just got to be very, very, uh, con-- counteractive.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Is that the word? You know, when it was workin' against itself.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

What do you think -- I mean, this is -- I know -- I'm -- I'm asking you to speculate, but what do you think the importance of integration was in view of what children needed? What could we have done differently, do you think? I mean, integration was inevitable --

DOUROUX

Right, uh-huh.

PATTERSON

-- we wan-- we didn't want to be segregated.

DOUROUX

Right, we didn't.

PATTERSON

But integration w-- also brought in a whole slew of problems.

DOUROUX

Sure did.

PATTERSON

What could we have done? Did we just take -- w-- did it -- did it too fast, or we needed --

DOUROUX

I think that was part of the problem. When they said, "Integration," they just did somethin'.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

It -- It.... Uh, so much of what they did in that -- in that season failed.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Because they just did somethin'. "Well, we'll take the kids out of this school and we'll bus 'em over here." But then, again, the people over here were not familiar with the culture over here.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And so, when the kids moved over here, they -- they felt like I did, you know? It was outta place. I don't fit. You know, nobody knows who I am. I can't -- I don't -- I can't identify myself here. They just did somethin'.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I think that, um, that that move for integration was done so fast -- I -- I guess, to them, to p-- to us, it was -- it was a series of decades. But the procedure to bring people into a s-- a school with a conflicting culture was too fast.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Way too fast.

PATTERSON

Do you think some of that could be, uh, addressed in the curriculum of the school? Do we -- do we get enough cultural education? Do we learn enough about people that are different from us at the -- the primary and secondary school level?

DOUROUX

At that time, we didn't.

PATTERSON

Yeah.

DOUROUX

Because first of all, you remember -- maybe you don't, but -- none of the, uh, lit-- the, uh, history books or -- I taught second grades. But -- but -- but the reading material was still non-black-oriented. We were still reading s-- s-- throw the stick to Dick and -- and Jane and all that stuff.

PATTERSON

Right, right.

DOUROUX

We were still reading that.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh.... It just didn't -- if they had started... integrating cultural things in before they moved with people, it may have been a better source of change.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

PATTERSON

You know?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, because that was lacking in our community.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

These little kids... had nothing. They had nothing. I remember going to a little girl's house. She would come eve-- every morning late. And it broke my heart so many times, because it would be cold, and she didn't have clothes. And she would miss breakfast. And I walked her home one day. When I got home, she lived in the back of, uh, some apartments. And, uh, when I went to the door, I was tryin' to see her mother, and they had about three or four men sitting there. Bundles and bundles and bundles of clothes, where this child got her clothes from every day, just scattered all over the house. And, um, in the front yard was a, uh, baby carriage with a, um, hydro -- what do you -- a baby that was sick?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And this little girl was takin' care of this baby, gettin' her clothes out of that bundle, and stayin' outside 'til her momma was finished whatever she was doin'. That's the kinda community that they had around her.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

So she had nothing.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

How can, you know, I bring her to school and discipline her about homework or about getting to school late or about --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- anything. She needed somebody.

PATTERSON

She had no structure to --

DOUROUX

No.

PATTERSON

-- even relate to what you were talking about.

DOUROUX

Nothing.

PATTERSON

Yeah, yeah.

DOUROUX

Nothing. And so she -- it would be different if she was in the minority, but she was in the majority. Very few kids came through, uh, that were -- were educable --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- from the standpoint of our new curriculum.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

Your own children. How -- how were they doing in school? How did you find their experience? Of course, they had a -- a foundation, at home. Um. What schools were --

DOUROUX

My daughter --

PATTERSON

Yes.

DOUROUX

My daughter did.... We moved here when she was in first grade. Very difficult. Very difficult.

PATTERSON

Here in Agoura?

DOUROUX

Yeah. Ooh! She was the only black child. The only thing that I felt ok about is -- is that she was in a black family that had, uh, a real strong black link. We -- we went to church in L.A. My mom and dad, all of my sisters and brothers, and we fellowshipped every week with them. So she -- she wasn't lacking in that area.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

But that school environment, um, threw her.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Threw her.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Now, what about the -- the student body that you were involved in at USC, at that level of education? What was -- wh-- how did you find the cultural mixing and -- and understanding?

DOUROUX

I was very isolated in school. The only time I found any link at all was when I went to Southern. SC was, um... it was d-- you kn-- actually, at SC, I would dare say that I was the only black in all of the classes I took. If there was one or two, maybe.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

But basically, the only black -- no black teachers. I did not have a black instructor at Ca-- Cal State L.A. nor SC.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. And yet it's -- i-- there's -- the surrounding community --

DOUROUX

Was black.

PATTERSON

-- there, uh, is -- is black.

DOUROUX

Mm-hmm.

PATTERSON

So here this university --

DOUROUX

Sits right in the heart -- my church was down the street from it.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And then, nothin' -- nobody. I had not one black teacher.

PATTERSON

Did the church environment change at all during those years? Now, we're talking about the late '60s, early '70s, mid-'70s. How did -- did the church change through the years? Or was the church a -- a safe place, or --

DOUROUX

The church was a haven for us.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

Uh, we did everything at church.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

I mean, you know, we went to picnics. We had hayrides. We did drama at church. So we did have that part of our lives... covered.

PATTERSON

Now, was -- was -- so, but the -- the general black community, were they going to church less, did you find?

DOUROUX

Um, no.

PATTERSON

Or the ones that were, the -- the -- the young people were not well-cared for, w-- did they -- had -- had they --

DOUROUX

Oh, on -- on -- s--

PATTERSON

-- lost their link to --

DOUROUX

-- in -- in, um, east Los Angeles, I do believe that they went to church less. Culturally, the, um, w-- the -- the economic thing --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- kept them struggling. Um.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh.... They -- they -- they just dropped the things that were important... so that.. they -- they could either get it from a man, or a man could, um, link up with somebody else to get it, or sell dope, or -- so they dropped things that were really of sus-- substance --

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

-- and they started to pick up things that were just, um, death. But... right across Crenshaw, are -- I mean, right across -- what would be considered the west side at that time?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

The more, um... economically sound black person was still going to church. And that became like a -- what do you call it when the -- it's the right thing to do --

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

-- to go to church, you know, there.

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

DOUROUX

"I'm Methodist. I went to church this weekend." And -- and picking up all of the cultural, uh, things that they had lacked all these years, they couldn't have.

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

My grandmother used to say, "The worst thing that could've happened to black America is that they built a television." (laughter)

PATTERSON

Ah!

DOUROUX

So -- so black people started seeing what they were missing.

PATTERSON

Hmm.

DOUROUX

You know?

PATTERSON

Mmm.

DOUROUX

And, uh. Then -- then -- my grandmother was uneducated... but she had a good sense of life, and she had a deep sense of -- of godliness. So... she -- we were born on the East Side. She bought property over there. But soon, she saved enough to buy on the West Side, and that's when we all moved over here. She emphasized education, and she emphasized Christianity, and she always said, "As important as an education is, I made it without an education, but I couldn't have made it without God." And she taught us to pray and ask for guidance and listen to hear God speak. We were very conscious of that. And we were very conscious of education. I could see a difference between my mother and my grandma. Because my mother, even though my grandmother was able to buy property and -- my mother had a sense of need for that. She felt like, "I have to have this suit; I have to have these clothes; I have to --" My grandmother could take it or leave it, but she did it, because she knew that the structure of life was going to increasingly demand this. But to go shopping just for GP, no. She saved; she invested her money in things that were worthwhile. But the generation where my mother was, they had to have a house with plenty of carpet, chandeliers -- a whole different economic view came, because they felt they were in a different economic culture. So she wanted stuff.

PATTERSON

So now they're mixing with the general culture, and Anglo-American cultures that have more entitlement and more things, more material. So now, the black community's comparing itself with that, and becoming dissatisfied with --

DOUROUX

This is what they have, and this is the measurement I have to reach. Whereas my grandmother, she had a different motive. Her motive was different. She wanted our family to be caught up and evolving in education and to save your money, and Christianity, she had a whole different motive.

PATTERSON

Another set of values.

DOUROUX

The whole set of value is different.

PATTERSON

And I think in a balanced life, you carry all of that with you, including economic; it sort of got out of balance.

DOUROUX

Yes, as time went on. I think my mother's generation was comparing themselves to the general population, and they started reaching for a lot of economic stuff. Since my mother passed, I just see so much futile efforts -- because what do we do with it? Where does it go? Who wants all that stuff in this house? My daughter has her own house; I keep thinking about that. All the clothes we buy.

PATTERSON

Seeking happiness and somehow not getting it.

DOUROUX

Not getting it. It's not in this stuff. Clothes that you just -- closet after closet after closet, shoes. my daughter can't even wear my clothes, so if I closed my eyes today, what would all this stuff mean?

PATTERSON

But you carried that value system with you, in spite of that your mom got a little away from it, and even your daughter somehow has her distance from it. But you managed to keep it. I know you're -- the closeness that you mentioned with your grandmother, you were able to hold that and keep that.

DOUROUX

Yes. She was such a -- she imparted so much, yet I long for more. She had such wisdom. And even right now, I try to pour some of that into my grandchildren, because materially, they don't need anything, but the wisdom that my grandmother had. I give them -- they just learn the word "merit" and "demerit." So they get merits for putting away their things, for knowing where they are, and picking up things off the floor that shouldn't be there. Just making them conscious of all that they had, and how to take care of them. Basically, the generation of young people they're growing up with, especially black America, they have excessive stuff. They have three computers for my grandchildren back there, with three printers. They had birthdays, their grandpa -- they weren't brand-new computers, but he upgraded them, and made them -- all of them have computers and their own printer, and my oldest one has a cell phone. They have so much, they don't even relate to South Central, who has so little. They can't even fathom a child not having a television, or not having the color shoes to go with their pants or whatever.

PATTERSON

Do you feel like you're connection to the arts, to music, has been a vehicle for you to carry your values? Do you feel like music connects to --

DOUROUX

Values, to my values? Yes. Because of the kinds of music that I teach. In regards to music, and I think music is a vehicle that opens the door for me. So when I get in front of a group of young people, I'm teaching music, but I'm dealing with the minds that have strayed from -- for instance, choirs all over America, one of their major conflicts -- this is so disgusting to me -- is whether or not they take off earrings, or whether or not they wear a robe. Or if the church says to wear robes, there's bound to be at least three people who have a new outfit on. So they carry all this stuff from where they live to church. And in my presentation, I'm painting a picture of pure worship, where you come into the sanctuary with a motive, and that motive is to worship. If that requires you to put on a robe, you put it on and you worship. There should not be enough time in worship to debate a robe. There should not be enough time -- when you go to choir rehearsal, someone sitting next to you maybe have had a bad day. Husband has not supplied the needs for the children, or whatever the circumstances, we don't have enough time to debate a robe. When somebody next to you is hurting, we don't have enough time to feature you as a soloist, regardless -- it is not my obligation to discover you. If you have a gift, God is responsible for opening a door. All you need to do is be faithful over that gift, use it where the door's open. And it's not always open at 10:30 worship when the pastor is in, when you have a microphone in your hand. It may be at the convalescent home. So feature your gift where God has opened the door. And all of those little idiosyncrasies that you carry, in regards to who you are, have to decrease. We can't build you up in worship. And the reason that's important is because we strive so hard in our home life to have more than the people next door. Or to be the featured house or the featured dress or -- in comparison to anybody else. So most of my ministry is trying to understand that the music is really written for the glory and to worship God, and it really needs someone who has humbled themselves enough to present it.

PATTERSON

So there's, again, a disconnect somewhere between the words that are being sung, even if they're in the middle of performing, somehow they're not absorbing.

DOUROUX

Exactly. That's the most difficult thing. I'm trying to think of some lyrics. It takes forever for most congregations to even begin to digest a song. The first song I wrote, "Give Me A Clean Heart," I basically was inspired to write that because I was in a church environment. I did hear people who were negative, who wouldn't mind talking and criticizing my father, who was a pastor, in my presence. People -- in church settings, you have to struggle if you are in the ministry itself, you have to struggle to keep clarity, and not to build up resentment, and not to have the wrong thoughts about people. Keep your mind free of all of the things that are going on around you. It takes forever for a congregation to really -- I mean, I do songs deliberately over and over again if I think the words are important enough for them to understand. And I have stopped performing for a church where -- if we sing something, we don't sing it once; we sing it a lot of times. So by the end of that song, they're singing some part of it with me. I don't want to just sit -- I wrote a song, "God Knows Just What He's Doing," and it says, "You may not understand God's perfect will, God's perfect plan. You may not understand the power in God's hands." And the reason I do that, I sung -- I wrote that song, is because we went through all of this country's catastrophes. We had hillside fires right across from me; we had the beach; we had the big floods.

PATTERSON

The tsunami.

DOUROUX

Yeah, we had the big earthquake -- well, the floods in New Orleans, and all of this is a part of God's world, and we don't understand it. But before I let that go, the whole church was singing it, because we don't understand it. I want them to pay attention to the things that are going on, and pay attention to what is happening in the world that we don't have any control over, which indicates that there is God, because we don't know how to do a flood. God has to have control in there.

PATTERSON

So at some point -- I mean, here you're maturing in your wisdom of life and your perspective of life, and your education mission and your musical mission, came to be married.

DOUROUX

They came together, exactly. I could not be who I am musically, if I did not have an education. Many doors will open. The Methodist people are very education-minded. They're people from certain -- the CME, United Methodist -- certain levels of them are very, very, very conscious of education. And they've opened doors for me to come in as a lecturer. And I just told you, Dominquez is actually celebrating a living legacy, and I'm included in that. But it's because I have both. I have both.

PATTERSON

And a lot of the students -- a lot of the youth in the Gospel -- in the Baptist --

DOUROUX

-- are so musical.

PATTERSON

-- are very musical, but they rely on their natural talent more than -- the education.

DOUROUX

-- the education. And I pushed them right out there to education. They have to be aware that they need to be able to walk -- we're doing a big album production -- CD production, I think they'd call it now -- and the kids that walk in the studio, they are so gifted. They make you want to sit back and just watch them. And in this particular situation, they had to sit down and read the chord structure and be able to play what's on there. And it's just time out for those people who are not able to do it all. Andre Crouch was at that session. He is unnaturally gifted; can't read a note. But what he does, he puts the music out there; he'll play it and sing it, and these kids will come and document it, put it on paper, and make it live.

PATTERSON

So he's surrounded by those that have the education. So once you started to realize your mission as a professional, did you ever venture out into the secular world of music?

DOUROUX

Never. I never have been there. We've had an era where there were -- and I think the House of Blues is an aspect of that, because we had an era where Gospel groups were singing in nightclubs, and I had a very good girlfriends who sang behind Frankie Lane, somebody like that, some star. So it was like they had arrived when they were able to sing in Vegas or sing behind a star or sing in a nightclub. I never put myself there; I never even thought about doing that kind of entertaining. But it's been an avenue that is explored often. House of Blues -- I don't know if they're still doing it, but they used to have entertainment in that facility, all Gospel.

PATTERSON

Do you think it's another form of integrating a message by taking it into the secular world?

DOUROUX

It's going into the secular world anyway, because of television, because of the media. There's not one awards show that doesn't feature, like, Yolanda Adams or Kirk Franklin or the Wynans, those people who are doing music on the level of a secular show. So it's going there. I still think the root has to be the church, because it comes -- it has to carry a biblical perspective. It is not Gospel if it does not have Biblical perspective. Hip hop Gospel was trying to reach a hip hop generation, and so Kirk Franklin takes the motif of a Gospel song like "Why I Sing." My grandmother used to sing that, "I sing because I'm happy; I sing because I'm free." And he made it so that a contemporary generation could experience the same message, but a contemporary beat and rhythm. In fact, as far as I can tell, and I did this with Dr. DjeDje's class on a couple of occasions, the message seems to come around often. My grandmother, before she was -- well, even in slavery, we used to sing songs -- somebody called me from UCLA this week to ask me, why would a slave want -- why would black America, or why would blacks want to write a song regarding Ezekiel Saw the Wheel. And actually, they wrote, "Ezekiel Saw de Wheel," D-E, because it was slave-oriented. Most of the music slaves in early black America sang had messages of movement, anything that was going to move them out of slavery. That's where they focused. Swing down, sweet chariot, come and let me ride. My home is over Jordan. [Get right church and] let's go home. They talked about trains, and -- "Over my head I hear music in the air; there must be a God somewhere." Things that made them feel like there was another place. And basically, that's where black American songs started. They actually sang what they lived, and even today each generation, the chronology will show that we sang where we worked. When we started to read the music, we started getting hymnbooks and singing the words, because we were now reading. The music still took on a black motif, because reading a hymn that they heard white congregations singing just did not soothe the soul of a black person, when they needed a different depth. So they may take a hymn written in straight counting and line it out so that it becomes a long, four-part unwritten score, and they would sing according to their feeling of the same lyric. And every generation did that. When we started reading, we did the hymns. You can look at Mahalia Jackson and Thomas Dorsey, some of the early Gospel musicians, they sang songs that were really where they were living. Progress, move on up a little higher. "Precious Lord, take my hand; lead me on." All of these songs were really feeling the culture. They couldn't write something they weren't living; that's what I'm saying.

PATTERSON

It's interesting, because even hip-hop composers defend -- and rappers defend their songs, their lyrics, by saying, "This is where we live. This is what we see." How is it different?

DOUROUX

The difference in that is that are creating a culture; it belongs to them, the language that they speak does not represent black America; it represents rappers. I don't think black America receives that language as something that you say every day. We don't talk like that every day. I've never heard my brother or the men in my church call women "hoes." I don't hear it in my environment; I don't hear it as I travel. I think it is something that they created for themselves, but I don't think that it will ever be a language that black America will accept as a representation of who they are.

PATTERSON

Do you think that there is a faction in the youth culture that keeps this going? Hip hop sells so broadly.

DOUROUX

I know, they sell broadly. Well, I think they have a major influence, and it's because of the media that they do. If you look further into their history, you'll find a lot of -- let me see -- you'll find a lot of influence from that culture I was telling you about, from the projects. That's the culture that they're bringing to black America. And because it is ornate, they've got the jewelry, they have the cars, young people are digesting it as something that they want. But I saw a show -- you know the name of -- is it P-Diddy [Sean Puffy Combs] or somebody? Is that the right name?

PATTERSON

Mm-hmm. Sean Puffy Combs.

DOUROUX

Yeah. He did -- and I don't really usually look at this, but he took about seven or eight, maybe ten -- I don't know the number -- to a lovely living situation, and he was trying to do a project with them. They brought so much of the negative part of culture, black culture, to that living -- he could not do the project. And he is considered a rapper, but he sent them home; that project did not succeed. And I think it's a hard push against black America, because what they are showing as our culture really isn't. That reality show of this gentleman who wears the big clock, you know who he is? He wears a big clock and he has all these ladies. You know in our right mind, we would not chase a man. (laughter) You know what I mean? Is that real?

PATTERSON

Do you think it's somehow theatrical, or --

FEMALE

Change tapes.

PATTERSON

Oh, OK. Yeah. It's interesting, it's a timely discussion because of --

DOUROUX

What was the girl's name that went down so far with the drugs? She married the --

PATTERSON

Whitney Houston?

DOUROUX

Yeah, Whitney. I just don't understand why they want to feature a reality show of -- I just had a different perspective of her. I knew she got in trouble with drugs, but the level of lifestyle that they lived is just beyond me, why they want to show that. When you think of all of those big-time record companies -- what is it, Jam --

PATTERSON

Def Jam?

DOUROUX

All of those guys went to jail. Millionaires in that environment, they had their hand on everything. They're in prison; a whole other race of people has control of all that they did, because business-wise, they weren't on the level that another culture race was, and they were able to manipulate everything they had. As far as the language is concerned, I don't believe you can draw lines of demarcation once you put it out there. No one would appreciate the language that was spewed on television last week. No one, none of us do. But my problem is, how do you stop the language from crossing lines, once you put it out there? What control do you have over it? What is it that you can do to say, "You can use it and you can listen to it, but you can't use this language."

PATTERSON

Is this ---- do you still see this as part of the culture that you recognized when you were back at Hooper Avenue that was beginning to seed itself into the community? Is it a continuum --?

DOUROUX

It was a big gap, and you know what? I think that's what Puff Daddy or whatever his name is saw. Those kids said, "I'm ready to go back home. I want to go back to Compton; I want to go back," because there is a gap between cultures, black culture. They saw that refinement meant that you respect each other's space; you speak a certain way, you can't go in a restaurant yelling and screaming. That may have caused some real, real anxiety to have to change -- like Hooper, changed all of that at one time. You come out of one culture; you put it into another one that expects a whole different reaction. And you're uncomfortable, so you say, "I want to go back." That's the only segment I saw, where he was saying -- he met with each of them, and he says, "We didn't do what we planned to do. You had a conflict; you didn't know how to handle it; you were fussing and fighting with this person. I tried to get you guys to meet a deadline; you never met it." Stuff that you would automatically think would happen in that project, they were not aware of, because it was lacking there.

PATTERSON

So that -- thinking of the word "ghetto," you know, being so isolated and separate.

DOUROUX

Isolated, yeah. They missed -- and that's what happened to those big records companies. They were producing raps and into each other's language, but they failed to develop the character and the intelligence to keep what they made. That was what was lacking. They just knew a part, a small segment of what they needed to keep what they were doing. And black America is often guilty of that. When we first started doing Gospel music, there were these -- at least one record company I know of, and several publishing companies, that usurped everything we did; they own it. Because we didn't know enough to keep it.

PATTERSON

There's some of the hip-hop executives now that are young men that came from hip-hop music. And so they came to control their own wealth.

DOUROUX

That's a great thing.

PATTERSON

And we're seeing that more.

DOUROUX

And I think those hard lessons had to stir some reality, a reality check. Gospel America was certainly beat down with people owning the project. Remember in Dreamgirls, part of what they depicted on a small level is that there were always pay-offs. You pay this one to do that; you pay this one to do that. But in the long run, and I'm not sure if there was really a good competitor to Motown, but Motown owned -- and that was a black company -- they owned the music. And in black Gospel, the record company could get rich, and your family not reap any of it, because we missed that link.

PATTERSON

When you were writing, going forward with your writing career, after you'd had this wonderful song that did so well, and you began to write more; you realized you were a composer. So how did you handle your composing career, in terms of business?

DOUROUX

So difficult. It was so difficult. My grandmother -- you know, she had no education, but such wisdom. She just found somebody in the book -- I remember walking down the street with her to this man's house, she couldn't drive. We took the bus or whatever we did, and she said, "Put this girl's music on paper." So that was done. But the most difficult thing I had to do was to learn how to copyright. Nobody around me knew about copyright.

PATTERSON

They didn't teach that at Cal State, or you didn't have any from --

DOUROUX

No. And at that time, I guess you would have to take a particular class to take that. I don't know if it was being taught.

PATTERSON

Yeah. That's in professional tools, but sometimes they're not taught.

DOUROUX

Right, exactly.

PATTERSON

So your grandmother helped you actually get your --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. Everything. So I finally learned how to copyright; she helped me to put it on paper, get it put on paper, then I learned how to copyright. Then a major company got interested in my music, and they wanted to be the publishers for it. But it is -- only God helped me through this, I'm telling you, because they offered money -- and you know, money is always an incentive -- but they would own everything I wrote, and that they would control it; if they didn't like what I wrote, I would have to write it again, and keep writing until they got a certain number of compositions that they liked. And this was the ultimate company.

PATTERSON

You don't want to mention the name, or you want to mention the name?

DOUROUX

No, I better not. It was ultimate. Andre Crouch and Sandra Crouch were in another company, and they gave over to their company, and that company went out of business, and just recently, somebody's trying to help them get their stuff back, because the ultimate goal of these companies was to own the rights to all the music that we produced.

PATTERSON

Was this -- without saying the name of the company, but it was a record company that had a Gospel division?

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

And so it was white-owned?

DOUROUX

It was always separate; the Gospel was separate from the more visceral or strong genres. And they even had a division between black Gospel and white Gospel.

PATTERSON

And who -- did they have any black executives that were in power?

DOUROUX

They had black producers, because the producers were responsible for capturing the essence of the music. So it had to be somebody who knew what it was.

PATTERSON

And so you obviously made the decision not to go that route.

DOUROUX

And it was so hard!

PATTERSON

(laughter) Money is an incentive.

DOUROUX

Yes. But since that time, I've met several of the people who did, and they're in horrible shape.

PATTERSON

It's really in the long run that money isn't really there.

DOUROUX

The money was so insignificant, in retrospect. Just nothing compared to what should have been.

PATTERSON

So how did you structure your career, going forward as a composer? What did you do?

DOUROUX

I didn't. My grandmother helped me to pray to gain quietness. That first song I wrote, and I mentioned Thurston [G.] Frazier, who was my mentor, just pushed me into it. Basically, I was comfortable accompanying; he directed the songs and he made them live for me, and I just sat there and played. And I remember one weekend he called me, "I'm out of town, baby. You go up there and direct those musicians." I said, "Thurston, are you kidding?" "No, you go direct the songs." That was my first movement towards interpreting my own music.

PATTERSON

Now was this in a recording studio setting or in a church setting?

DOUROUX

Church setting.

PATTERSON

So you -- that was your outlet.

DOUROUX

That was my outlet. I could play it; I was writing it, and now, he was forcing me to teach it.

PATTERSON

So you copy wrote your songs, and performed them in the church.

DOUROUX

Exactly.

PATTERSON

OK, so you have 100% ownership, on paper and in the performance space.

DOUROUX

Exactly, I do. And you know, what it was like, and I teach like this, in my estimation, at that time God really busted me, because -- I mean, I had -- I don't know how many credentials; I could teach anywhere, I could be a parole person, I could -- I just had a lot of stuff. And I was at the end of the payroll scale. I had all of these units, and they pay according to how much you got. And then you know what happened? Doors just started closing. The school system was changing; I had moved out here. And it was just such a ruckus in my life to keep trying to go back over there and keep up with what was going on?

PATTERSON

What was your motivation to come out to Agoura?

DOUROUX

My husband was working out here, and he was working down in Santa Barbara [California] building the university [University of California, Santa Barbara], and my daddy passed, my father passed, and I was in an upheaval in my life; I was just miserable. In fact, I don't know how God kept me in this marriage, because I was just really, really tormented. My daddy was my heart, and it was just a hard move for me. And I just thought we would be separated, but he started working in Santa Barbara, and he would ask me to come, and just -- it was a good outing, it was a wonderful hotel. My daughter was born; it was a good weekend extravaganza. A lot of chaos around me, because my dad's church was -- he was the founder of it, and these people had just turned completely against our family, which was really scary. All these people -- then I was feeling frustrated, my marriage, and I was trying to go to school, and my baby was about three or two or something. We drove through here, we started seeing property further that way towards Santa Barbara, and just started looking around, I don't know why. We had a lovely home then; we were off of La Brea on Veronica, by Baldwin Hills. Wonderful home. And one day we just stopped, and --

PATTERSON

What year was it that you moved out here?

DOUROUX

We've been out here 30 years, so that was 30 years ago.

PATTERSON

And so your husband was working in Santa Barbara, and so this was sort of a midway point.

DOUROUX

That's right. We were just looking at houses from there all the way here. Don't know why. And we stopped here and got interested and found this house.

PATTERSON

So really, your daughter was raised out here.

DOUROUX

Yes. She went to first grade out here.

PATTERSON

But she was still able -- because you're just close enough to Los Angeles to maintain --

DOUROUX

Right, to do both.

PATTERSON

-- a connection.

DOUROUX

She had a hard time out here, and she felt like her adjustment should have been -- her life should have been in LA. And I had a hard time. She loved the ghetto; she had boyfriends in the ghetto. She went to jails to see them. I had a hard time with her.

PATTERSON

I guess maybe she was hungry like --

DOUROUX

Yes, that connection.

PATTERSON

Your foundation was -- when did you start that, your foundation?

DOUROUX

About 1983.

PATTERSON

What was the motivation to get that started? Here is yet another expansion of your sense of mission?

DOUROUX

Well, did you notice, when my discussion about black music -- I began to see, and I discussed it with you, how secular music was interested in what we were doing. During that time, and I don't know if you noticed it, but Jim and Tammy Bakker -- PTL, [The PTL Club] did you know them at all? Very prominent in the television industry. They had the biggest television industry. He built a -- for lack of a better word, it's almost like an amusement park; something like maybe Michael Jackson would have had. He had a concert hall; he had hotels; he had his own TV station and everything. Some reason, I don't know how it happened, she started singing one of my songs, and then later on, she invited me to come to sing there. And in the midst of that, I introduced a song -- its title was "If It Had Not Been For the Lord on My Side" -- we would perform that song that night on that show. And it was such a massive ordeal. One of the things that again slapped me in the face -- at the beginning of that production, there were about three or four talented groups or talents that were supposed to perform that night. They had a sound check. They sound-checked everybody, and we were still sitting there. So she came over to us, one of the ladies over, "Well, we don't have time to sound-check you. You guys just go on." So you know me, not knowing, I didn't care; I didn't know what that kind of business would require. We sang that night, and Jim went nuts. That whole -- still aloof, we just doing what we do. We left that station -- one of their drivers -- it was a monumental place. One of the drivers put us in the limo or whatever, we went and started driving through these winding roads of buildings; it was just too extravagant, it was just so wonderful. He caught up with us and brought us back to the studio because Jim wanted that song. And his wife, who was known for not being a singer -- they laughed at her, I don't know how you missed Tammy; she was known for eyelines --

PATTERSON

Eyelashes.

DOUROUX

Eyelashes and all that, and jewelry and all that.

PATTERSON

(inaudible) .

DOUROUX

Yeah, really big. And for me to be in that environment -- again, money took a real big call on that, because he said, "I'm going to give you $10,000 right now if you let Tammy sing that song." But soon, it got to be their song.

PATTERSON

But you had copy written it.

DOUROUX

I had copy written it, but they wanted the song, and he gave me more money for it, and it got caught up in there. That's what made me understand that copyrights are what they want, and when I came out of that in that spin -- I have the song back, because their whole thing fell apart, so I still have the song. But that was the turning point for me. I knew then that the secular world would want to own all of the music that came out of black America. There was another -- oh, I can't remember her name, but she and her sisters did a big television show, and they would sing black Gospel. At this time, the Grand Ole Opry was coming into being. They were promoting country and western people, and they built the Grand Ole Opry. At that time, black music was being [stepchild] into a whole different area, other people were owning it. Other people were producing it. And I felt like we needed to have our own museum or our own Hall of Fame. When we were ready to do a concert, the procedure was to find a venue, hire laborers that were -- they had to be in a union in order to record our music. And the thing about it is, they didn't know how. They didn't know the innuendos of Gospel music. We're loud, so they had to know how to use the microphones. We did know how to hold a microphone. Just so many things about black Gospel that were only attributes of black Gospel. I remember one night we hired the Scottish Rite, a beautiful auditorium on Wilshire. It was during the season of some major pennant. These guys were literally looking at the television and keeping up with whatever was going on while we were trying to perform onstage. That's the lighting people, and -- there was nothing we could do about it.

PATTERSON

Now this is the Gospel choir from the church?

DOUROUX

I had built my own choir.

PATTERSON

Oh, and what did you call the choir?

DOUROUX

Heritage, or something that resembled -- up and down names, but basically Heritage.

PATTERSON

So you were moving around and performing your songs in various settings.

DOUROUX

Right. We had nothing. The Gospel -- the National Baptist Convention of America came to Los Angeles to have a convention. They rented the Shrine Auditorium, and I think it was something like $20-30,000 a day. Couldn't we have an auditorium paying that kind of money? All day long, having to pay their sound system people? They had to have breaks at a certain time; they had to have lighting; they had to have guards, patrolmen; everybody had to be unioned, and we paid for that.

PATTERSON

So there was a gap between the culture of what produced and supported the venues, and what the art was that was being performed there.

DOUROUX

And in that same era, we have -- we still have a Gospel music workshop, that's what it's called -- Gospel music workshop of America. And we were boasting of about 20-30,000 people. Our choir -- one choir was 25,000 people. And every year, we went to a different place, and rented hotel space and a concert hall. And the same union people. To me, that's not -- and listen, it is an unbearable thought to have to go and find an auditorium and pay $22,000 for a concert hall. To me, it just don't make sense. Why don't we have a concert hall? Why don't we have a radio station? Why don't we have our own people who know Gospel. Right now, Gospel Music Workshop celebrating their 30th-year anniversary, still have to rent a concert hall.

PATTERSON

Why do you think that is? Is it the gap between whatever the educational preparation to go onto these other fields, to create professional structures?

DOUROUX

You know what I think it is? A lot of it is what I just described with the secular world. We are so musical; we get consumed with producing this. But then we're missing a whole level of production. And that's -- and in some cases, not only are we mixed in the producing of it, we want to produce it, we're struggling within ourselves, who's the boss? Who's getting this? How much is she getting? When am I going to get paid?

PATTERSON

So here again, it goes back to the values, what is really the priority when it comes to performing this music. Is there -- are we doing it for a sense of mission, or are we doing it for recognition and material wealth?

DOUROUX

And recognition and material is always a consideration in black America, who's still struggling to identify with another culture.

PATTERSON

So the foundation that you initiated was in response to those issues.

DOUROUX

Those issues. And it is so hard. Nobody wants to do this. I'm just hanging on. We have enough churches in Los Angeles. If they're boasting of 100,000 in one convention, and all the church -- and we've got five conventions. Because of that same mentality, conventions split, because of the image who's leading it.

PATTERSON

Less so -- the unity of purpose is lacking then? What was the mission of the foundation as you saw it initially? What would you say its --

DOUROUX

Our mission is to nurture and preserve the art of Gospel music through the building of a Gospel house.

PATTERSON

And the Gospel house would embrace more than just the music.

DOUROUX

Right. We felt we have -- UCLA has helped us to organize the memorabilia that we have, because we have so many old songs. It's like we've contributed an entire art form to America that they don't even recognize.

PATTERSON

When you say "they" --

DOUROUX

America.

PATTERSON

The mainstream.

DOUROUX

The mainstream America. They don't acknowledge the fact that Gospel music has contributed an art form. Nobody can imitate Gospel music or black church music. We sing a meter that can't be written, because every time we sing it, it's different. And east coast will sing the meter differently than west, and it can't be copied. It's strictly something that God invested in black America without the benefit of pen. Can't be written down.

PATTERSON

And yet it as its foundation and characteristics that are -- that create tradition.

DOUROUX

Exactly. My music -- my mother taught em this, the first piece I put on paper. She was just concerned -- it wasn't the first, but anyway, it was the first time I wrote a song in a key that most musicians can't play. My mother said, "No, you won't write like this. The people in the country can't play this. Put it in a key that everybody can play. So we had to learn to write music so that people who had less of an education could play it. Anyway because it doesn't make sense to put all the feeling that I have for a song in music, because the person who hears the music is going to play it the way they feel because we embellish; we play it the way we feel it. Five musicians will play one song differently, or five church choirs will sing it differently. So it's a very innate gift that God has invested in us.

PATTERSON

Would Gospel House then systematize it somehow to be able to teach the art form in its truest sense? Or what would Gospel House do with this?

DOUROUX

It would actually present it so that mainstream America could know what exists, because it will forever change. The Kirk Franklins will forever make it relevant to their generation. But, there is a historical line that can be demonstrated and illustrated, and applied to culture. For instance, the Martin Luther King movement used black music as an undercurrent of what he was doing. They did -- that "We Shall Overcome" is a traditional spiritual. Every generation has done it in a different version, but it came from the black church.

PATTERSON

So then you see the mission of Gospel House as providing a genre of music that can be applied to society generally?

DOUROUX

It will. It does already. Every generation. You can actually tell what was going on. Remember the onset of Pac Man, that generation? There's a whole generation of kids who play with little movements that they feel or felt because they were from a new technology. The technical aspect of music came about. Instruments were no longer a spinnit or a grand piano. They were movable; they were synthesized. They had a whole different -- the music sounded different because they were using these synthesized instruments. There was an era where we didn't use instruments, and the songs came from patting your foot, clapping your hand, moving your body. And every time there was a change in our community, black community responded to America through technology we changed. We used to have to go to a studio to do a recording. Now, they have home studios, we used to have to go to a studio to do this. Now they've made all kinds of little instruments that are portable. You can do a recording at your house.

PATTERSON

How would Gospel House preserve and foster this culture differently than, say, an academic institution?

DOUROUX

Well, basically those of us who are fostering or working on this project are in Gospel music. Academically, it would be different, because academics would look for structure, and -- for the academics of music. And Gospel musicians don't look for that.

PATTERSON

Now, there is ethno-musicology.

DOUROUX

I love it. Still, we treat -- and I've done a lot of work for them -- I teach that, its own structure, but it does read the community. It does say what we are doing, historically, it does. But I can't write a piece of music down on paper, and have it to compare to what I play, which takes a different look when you do classical music. When you take a classical piece, you want to look at it and say, "OK, you have a chromatic scale here." Just learn that this is a chromatic. Right here, you have a cadence, and right here you're moving into a different key. We may do that, but it's not on paper. And when you listen to it, academically you may say, "Oh, you did this," or, "Oh, you did that," but it's not a guarantee that we know we did it. In other words, it's not something that we set out to do, but it's part of instinctive interpretation of a song that every Gospel musician will interpret what they feel it is needed to do at that moment. So if I write it on paper, anybody can sit down and look at what I've written, but they may not get it back in performance, which is quite different from the academic sheet music or classical music. You want to get back in classical music what's on that paper. Your teacher has got to say, "Do it like this. This is what's here; this is what the composer wants you to do." Gospel music is not like that.

PATTERSON

Ethnomusicology does have this view of the oral traditions, which I suppose it makes it easier for you to have done the work you have done with UCLA, with the ethnomusicology department.

DOUROUX

It does; I couldn't do it anywhere else.

PATTERSON

And so Gospel House, do you see that Gospel House can have a liaison with this kind of mission of, say, an ethnomusicology department, as opposed to the traditional musicology or music departments?

DOUROUX

Yes, I do.

PATTERSON

And begin to support each other that way. I know you were speaking of some of the other functions that a performance needs. For instance, sound, lights, actually managing of venues, the ownership of venues, those kinds of things. So do you see Gospel House as being sort of a bridge between the study of Gospel and the preservation of the history, and then also those other kinds of professions that need to support Gospel?

DOUROUX

Yes, and I think they're doing that. Because I did something with the school last year, and we were included in a total line of musicians, because we had a saxophone jazz player there, Albert McNeil, who is quite adept in spirituals. Guess I was Gospel; somebody else who was a singer in classical -- so, yes, we are infiltrating the entire music genre; we're just not out there by ourselves anymore. And you have a Gospel choir and UCLA; Santa Barbara has a Gospel choir. I was a teacher at LMU [Loyola Marymount University] for years, over the Gospel choir. Biola has a Gospel choir. So yes, we are infiltrating. And it's still sort of -- Dominquez -- it's still crazy though, because my Gospel choir was not under the music department at LMU; it was under theology. And so it causes you to think or wonder what they consider Gospel music to be, that they would not put it under the music department.

PATTERSON

It could be against his idea of culture being part of education. We talked about it in terms of the primary and secondary schools, culture being part of the more -- the academic world in the university level. I think maybe we're still finding our way, how to incorporate true culture, authentic culture, into an academic setting and systematizing it.

DOUROUX

What I'm seeing, even in the primary schools, is that there's almost a shield, or some kind of fear or some kind of intimidation, because they don't know what to expect. For a music department in LMU to completely shield themselves from Gospel -- I never met the person. I wouldn't know who she was or who he was; we couldn't use their facility. They bought me a piano. Isn't that sad?

PATTERSON

But these things are changing; I see -- certainly Professor DjeDje at UCLA is really making sure that these cultural, important cultural streams are being --

DOUROUX

-- are being integrated, right.

PATTERSON

-- integrated in an academic setting. You've mentioned that you were having a hard time with Gospel House.

DOUROUX

Oh, real hard.

PATTERSON

What are some of the problems and challenges you're running up against?

DOUROUX

Financial support. We wrote several grants to the cultural arts in DC, and even though we'd get close, there is a line that bothers them on the separation of church and state. I've had several grantwriters to help me, try to help me cross that line. But process of elimination, we would be the last people that they would want to give grants to, because of the text of Gospel music.

PATTERSON

Even if you frame these requests as culture, rather than theology --

DOUROUX

Yes. Our actual -- we actually had -- we had to be a state non-profit organization. And we are registered under cultural arts. When we send our grant to the cultural arts, grants in DC, we had one person close enough to figure out what the problem is. We would get almost there, but they would eliminate on that basis.

PATTERSON

So you've been going through this for awhile now?

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. And the churches have their own agendas, and -- I wish I was a man. I really think a man could have done this already. But how do you approach church pastors, who are men -- and I have done this all over the country -- in fact, I've worked for so many conventions. I've got plaques and certificates and everything you can imagine. But the approach form woman to man is always an eggshell thing.

PATTERSON

And yet it's part of a tradition.

DOUROUX

That's right.

PATTERSON

So you do see that -- or is it your position that these traditional characteristics would benefit by growth and change, incorporating -- because you call it sexism in the church?

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. Well, let me just paraphrase part of the beliefs of traditional Baptists, is that -- and my husband is one of them -- it's been a long haul for women to be accepted as preachers in Baptist churches. And I understand that the East Coast is moving at a far greater speed than the West Coast, because women preachers in my daddy's era, in this era, have not been accepted. And I'm not sure that the Methodists used a lot of Methodist bishops in the feminine group; I think that they've been men. And you know Catholics have not allowed Catholic priests to be women. So that has been a line of demarcation in Christianity across the board.

PATTERSON

Do you see this as something that should and will change?

DOUROUX

I think it will change. But it will belong to another generation.

PATTERSON

And yet it's handicapping you in your work.

DOUROUX

Oh, yes, it is; it really is. As much as work as I do in churches, not one convention that I went to was available to help at all.

PATTERSON

With Gospel House.

DOUROUX

That's right. Not at all.

PATTERSON

Do you have any partnerships with males? I mean, using them to kind of help -- (laughter) facilitate some of these barriers?

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah. My brother has been there, the go-between, the intercessor between the churches and me. He would write them and ask for moneys from them, and he gets angry because they don't send it, and they always want me to do something. And he would say, "Don't do it! They're going to call you, but don't do it."

PATTERSON

Your brother Earl.

DOUROUX

Yeah. I've asked them over and over for this, and over and over for that. So he does. And I have a lot of fine men on my board, and then I have a board-at-large that are big supporters. But just to come together and say we're going to do it, and it can be done; we need to do it.

PATTERSON

Have you approached private donors outside of the church?

DOUROUX

Yes. We've done a lot of grantwriting. The Getty Center; the -- they just built a new concert hall downtown with the convention center, where they have the music halls; we thought that would be a good venture. We've done a lot of writing, a lot of appealing.

PATTERSON

So what are your plans?

DOUROUX

Well, you know, I'm at this point where I make -- this year was especially hard for me. I told you we just came out of a month of concerts, and we've been doing it for several, several, several years. And I told God, "I can't do another year of this." And for some reason, God allowed it to happen.

PATTERSON

This is your Heritage Choir?

DOUROUX

Yeah. Well, we actually do four nights of different styles of music where we invite four different kinds of Gospel music in. Those who do quartet singing, we have a night for them. Spirituals, we have a night for them. We had a youth night, and -- four different kinds of music represented by different people on the four Monday nights.

PATTERSON

And where was this held?

DOUROUX

At Greater New Bethel, my brother ministry .

PATTERSON

OK. So that's been your venue --

DOUROUX

Yes.

PATTERSON

-- for many years now.

DOUROUX

Right. I've done some concerts at Mount Moriah, because my daddy was the founder of the church. But basically, we hold most of it in the Inglewood area, if we need a hotel, or we stay in that area, we use that church as our venue.

PATTERSON

How do you live here and interact with your neighborhood friends, or --?

DOUROUX

Well, again, our church is probably the center of everything we do socially in this area at all. Everything we do. In fact, my daughter lives in Simi Valley. We found one black church in Simi Valley, and she is just thrilled with it. Because everything we do socially or church-oriented is in LA. It's getting to be more sparse, since my grandparents are gone, and my parents are gone. But basically, our whole black family-oriented activities were in LA.

PATTERSON

When you have your -- oh, OK. I was just going to ask you about the youth with Gospel House, if there are any of those that you're working with that you feel like would be part of this next generation --

DOUROUX

Oh, yeah.

PATTERSON

-- that are going to make changes, and maybe --

DOUROUX

We have several that are so gifted and so supportive, and we're determined to mentor them. And they do a lot with Heritage and the Gospel House, performing and helping us to pass brochures. They do a lot.

PATTERSON

Are you looking for a permanent piece of real estate for Gospel House here in Los Angeles?

DOUROUX

Yes, we are. Here in Los Angeles.

PATTERSON

Have you had your eye on anything?

DOUROUX

We thought we were going to be able to do something around the Forum, because we have a person at the Forum, [Bishop] Kenneth Ulmer. And there was a lot there, but it got into conflict with Wal Mart.

PATTERSON

Oh, are we hearing a lot about Wal Mart. There's something about that corporation, it's --

DOUROUX

Yeah, they've gotten in trouble. And so we're holding our peace; it's between the racetrack and the Forum. The circus is held there a lot, on that vacant lot. And that would be perfect for us.

PATTERSON

That's what you want, (inaudible) .

DOUROUX

Yeah.

PATTERSON

OK. Stop for -- thank you, Margaret. I know how busy you are. I got you email; I was like, "Oh, yay, she answered me back!" I was so happy to hear from you. (laughter)

DOUROUX

Well, actually, when you dropped off -- when you called me about that jury duty, it seems like things just started piling up on my plate.

PATTERSON

Oh, yeah. I knew you were busy; I knew you were. But thank you for seeing us today, thank you.

DOUROUX

Oh, I'm so glad that I won't -- you know, when you told me there were only two sessions, I said I could do that --

PATTERSON

You were happy -- you were like, "only two, good."

DOUROUX

Yeah. I could do two sessions. (laughter)

PATTERSON

One down. (laughter)

DOUROUX

Yeah. It's got me -- how much did you have to have?

PATTERSON

We were trying to get between six to ten. What do we have? We're about four, so maybe just one more time when you're able to.

DOUROUX

Oh, great.

PATTERSON

Please be patient with us.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE

You have so much to talk about.

DOUROUX

It's a lot. Well, I've been doing this a long time.

PATTERSON

And you know, you can let me know some of the things you feel are important to talk about that I may not know to ask you about; I want you to --

DOUROUX

Actually, from my perspective, it's good to get innovative questions, because sometimes I'm just locked into what I'm doing, and it's good for me to think way above that. We won't be able to do it this next week.

PATTERSON

OK.END OF DOUROUX[1].Margaret.2.04.17.2007.mp3