Straight Life - Art Pepper [123]
I was never involved with drugs myself. Certain players striving for total excellence, trying to go as far as they could artistically-a lot of them felt they needed it, most of the players that I knew. Well, like I say, I didn't get involved in too many of their lives socially, you know. I could only stand by the side and hope it wouldn't happen because in the end it has a devastating effect. I never was around Art when I thought he was out of control. He always had that same composure and played beautifully, and I couldn't tell whether he had been on drugs or if he was straight. There were one or two times that Art showed up late on my sessions, but I understood what the situation was and it didn't bother me at all. I just loved him so much that I sort of bypassed it and worked around it because I knew when he got there, everything was going to be fine. And this came later. Not in the earlier times. It was later that the problems started to happen. But, you know, people in this town at that time: if you showed up late, it got to be a scene, and the word would get around, and things like that, but, listen, that is nothing compared to today. Today players show up two or three hours late with nothing said, so, you know, signs of the times.
One thing musically that I definitely have to stress, and that is the fact that in addition to Art playing such beautiful notes ... There were many players that did play a lot of nice notes, but they floated. They sort of moved around the swinging part of it. They were so engrossed in the technical aspect of what they were doing to get the notes, the swinging suffered. But Art had them both together. He had the notes, and he was swinging all the time. That's very important. I hope you mention that. Art always swung, and that's the thing that put him above everybody else. And he played all the instruments, and he played them all exactly the same. He put them in his mouth, and it was Art Pepper. I don't care if it was baritone, tenor, clarinet. He's the greatest. He always will be.
(Steve Kravitz) I think it was in the early part of 1960 that I met him. I was Art's student until probably a month or two before he got busted.
It was really weird. I had some class in high school and for one of the assignments you had to interview someone in the profession you wanted to go into. So all these people in the class were making appointments with accounting firms. I went to the Lighthouse because Art was playing there with Conte Candoli, and I asked Art if I could talk to him, and he said okay. I listened to the band, and then they took a break, and Art said wait a minute, and Conte sat down and started talking to me. I was so naive at the time. He was layin' all this stuff on me, like, "My family doesn't know I'm out here playin'. They think I'm back in New York sellin' dope." I said, "Really?" I was sixteen years old. As soon as he said that and I reacted to it honestly, I realized that he was puttin' me on. Art was still in the kitchen, and Conte wanted to know what I was doin', and I told him that I was here to interview Art for this project, and Conte said, "Why the hell don't you study with him?" I said, "Well, uh." It never occurred to me that somebody like that would teach. I didn't know anything about musicians. To me, Art, guys like that, were stars like Marlon Brando. It never occurred to me that I'd get as far as I'd actually gotten. I had his albums. I listened to them all the time.
Art came out of the kitchen, and Conte left, so I asked him the questions. They gave you a list. Then I asked him about studying with him. My heart was goin' like this. And he said, "Oh, yeah." I remember he had an incredible Lincoln car. I remember it being pink; maybe it was maroon. It had to be the biggest car ever made. I asked him, "How do you make it from the valley to the Lighthouse?" And he said, "Well, I spend most of my paycheck on gas."
He gave me his address and told me