Free The Cool School by Glenn O'Brien

Niggers”. I told him they were getting two and three grand a week, but for seven fifty we wasn’t going to take it. We both reached for our heat at the same time and I told him even if he got me, I’d get him. You’d be surprised to know that even a big gangster is humble looking down a thirty-two. I led my men out while the bass player covered us from the rear and made it back to the south side.
    We were stranded in Chicago, so the next morning I went to seethe president of the “Colored” local. He was the first of several “Uncle Tom” officials I was to encounter later in life. The white boss had already called him and gave him his orders. He berated me about being late and flirting with white women, etc. I knew I wasn’t going to get any cooperation from him so I called the New York office of my local.
    When I recorded “PAY DEM DUES” the union officials thought I meant “union dues” so I was held in regard at that time. I spoke to the president and told him of our plight. They wired us three hundred to pay hotel bills and get back. We were almost finished packing when the “spade” delegate showed up at our hotel. He said “why would you call the national office, I told you I would look into the matter.” I told him “Look my man,” my Men are out here stranded and we can’t wait while letters take two or three months to be argued before the boards. We’ll do our talking from New York.” (Bye!)
    As we were waiting for a cab, “Dinah Washington” rolled up with her entourage. After conversing with her, she explained she wouldn’t be needing her station wagon for a while and if I drove it back to New York, we could save our train fare. I accepted her offer and we cut out in style with wheels.
    I Paid My Dues: Good Times, No Bread, A Story of Jazz , 1967

Art Pepper
(1925–1982)
    Many jazz musicians wrote autobiographies, but there is none quite like Art Pepper’s brutally truthful Straight Life. I can’t think of anyone, musician or not, who has written a better description of the experience of heroin use, its veiled allure and rigorous dues. Here Pepper describes his eureka moment with the catalyst of his highest highs and lowest lows. Pepper’s music was beautiful, bright and lyrical, breezy, almost the opposite of his life. It’s fascinating to complete the picture with the hard downside of his history.
Heroin
1946–1950
    W HEN I came home Patti was staying with my dad and my stepmother, Thelma. And when I came to the door my daughter, Patricia, was there; she was walking and talking. She didn’t respond to me: she was afraid of me. I resented her and I was jealous of her feelings for my dad. Naturally, she’d been with them so she didn’t feel about me the way I wanted her to, and that started the whole thing off on the wrong foot.
    I was bitter about the army and bitter about them making me have a kid I didn’t want, bitter about being taken away when everything was going so good. I was drinking heavily and started using more pot and more pills, and I scuffled around and did a casual here and there or a couple of nights in some club, but nothing happened and I was getting more and more despondent when finally, by some miracle, Stan Kenton gave me a call.
    S TAN K ENTON was incredible. He reminded me a lot of my dad, Germanic, with the blonde, straight hair. He was taller than my dad;I think Stan was about six, three, slender, clothes hung on him beautifully. He had long fingers, a long, hawklike nose, and a very penetrating gaze. He seemed to look through you. It was hard to look him in the eye, and most people would look away and become uncomfortable in his presence. And, just like my dad, he had a presence. When he spoke people listened. He was a beautiful speaker and he had the capacity to communicate with any audience and to adapt to any group of people. We would play in some little town in Kansas and he’d talk to the people and capture them completely. We’d be in Carnegie