Toots Thielemans RIP
Wed, 09/21/2016 - 07:58
Hi Winslow,
I was sadden to learn the great Toots Thielelmans past away August 22, 2016. Any recordings from Toots are still required listening and study for me.
You had numerous occassions to meet and work with the Maestro. For our benefit, can you share your best moments with Toots?
Kinya
Wed, 09/21/2016 - 20:10
#2
Wow Winslow--thank you for
Wow Winslow--thank you for transporting all of us to San Francisco 1980's ... absolutely wonderful recollection!
Kinya
Gosh, Kinya, there are so many! Where to start . . .
Let me go back to the first time I met him (I think). He had a gig at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco sometime in the 1980s. He had a local backing band, with Victor Feldman on piano (who had recorded with Miles Davis in the 1950s), and the team of Tony Dumas on bass and Raph Penland on drums. Tony and Ralph seemed to often work together as a rhythm section for hire, although I know that Toots knew Ralph from his New York studio days.
I had transcribed a Django Reinhardt solo guitar piece, and gave him a copy after the gig. I remember him walking away, whistling the melody from the sheet music. But that was later, after he'd also received a demo tape from the guy who whistled the Woodstock the bird parts on the Charlie Brown animated TV specials.
When the show was about to start, suddenly the whole room went dark. Everything - exit lights, incidental stuff. Seemed like a dramatic opening, except that nothing happened for several minutes – it became evident that the power had gone out. But then, a harmonica was heard, starting to play Body and Soul. It moved from the floor up to the stage. Toots had decided to just tough it out and get the show started, electricity or not. Soon flashlights came out and the stage was faintly illuminated as grand piano, acoustic bass, and softly played drums came in to complement Toots' harmonica.
The show went on like this for a good while. And the darkness seemed to bring out some whimisicality. The drummer was in the middle of a rather uninhibited kazoo solo when the lights suddenly came back up, leaving Ralph looking a bit sheepish. The power went out at least once more before it finally came back on to finish the night.
You must understand, Toots was a lifelong asthmatic and for him to project acoustically in a large-ish hall must hve been quite a challenge. He mostly cupped a Shure SM-58 mic to his hamonica (in later years ot was replaced by Greg Geumann's Ultimate 58) and he made a specialy of playing super fast, super softly. Yet he decided to go for it with no electricity or amplification. Some of that was professionalism, but he had a daring, what-the-hell side that must have responded to this unusual situation.