Straight Life - Art Pepper [277]
The notes Art wrote for the performances he liked are full of praise for the band and for himself; they're decorated with joyful little cartoon characters kicking up their heels. Of his original "Arthur's Blues," he wrote, "My whole life went into this."
His whole life also went into "Everything Happens to Me" which should have been Art's theme song. To the best of my knowledge, he did play the tune fairly frequently during his early years. But he never really recorded it, and he could never have played it-or in my opinion anything else-the way he plays "Everything Happens To Me" here. (In my opinion, though, which is worth very little at this point because it's so subjective, nobody ever played anything quite as wonderful as this "Everything Happens To Me.")
I'll tell you Art's opinion. One afternoon he sat down and listened to it seriously. When it was over he looked up at me and shook his head. He was absolutely dazzled. He said, "I don't know... Am I crazy?"
I knew exactly what he meant. He meant that he didn't think anybody had ever before played anything quite as wonderful as this "Everything Happens To Me." But, obviously, he must be crazy because the world was not beating a path to his door or crowning him with lilies or electing him emperor-or even putting his picture on the cover of down beat.
We went back on the road after recording ended, returning to Berkeley in April of '82 to record a duo album-just Art and George. Art was eager to be recorded playing clarinet. He considered it a lovely but intractable instrument, practiced on it, just a little, nearly every day, and never believed that he could really master it (many serious critics disagreed), though he sometimes felt he came close. This would be the perfect setting for it.
The tunes were chosen by Art and George and Ed. I suggested "Goin' Home." When we'd been in Japan the previous November, I'd heard George fooling around on the piano before a soundcheck. It was the last concert of the tour. We'd been away a month, and the following morning we'd be flying back to Narita to change planes for L.A. George was playing, appropriately enough, "Goin' Home." Since Art was always hungry for clarinet-appropriate tunes, I brought it to his attention. Art brought a cassette of Ray Charles singing "Don't Let The Sun Catch You Cryin"' to the studio for George to listen to. It was a favorite of Art's, something he'd always wanted to play. He played saxophone on that one. George suggested "Isn't She Lovely," which Art never stopped calling "that weird Stevie Wonder tune," and he played it on both alto sax and clarinet. He had a hard time with it for some reason. But George had a hard time with "Billie's Bounce," an Ed suggestion and another alto tune. Most of the rest of the tunes were Art's choices.
Unfortunately, there were some technical problems. The plan had been to do that date direct-to-digital. Ed and his engineer were inexperienced with the technology. The sound they'd recorded was much too dry. It could be transferred to analogue and remixed (as was done later for an album titled Tete a Tete), but that wasn't true digital. George said we ought to try again. We all went back to Berkeley. Art and George played some of the same tunes, including "Goin' Home," and some new ones.
I've been to a lot of record dates but none to equal those for sweetness and light and dedicated hard work.
Immediately after this, we left for a short tour of the U.S. George was unavailable. He was working with Sarah Vaughan. We brought Roger Kellaway along with David and Carl. We went to Chicago, Milwaukee, and then to a big KOOL jazz festival in D.C. where Art got to see one of his oldest friends, Zoot Sims, and where he played like