Once Upon A Time

Once upon a time
From the tiny town of Hibbing
Came someone who
Made the world his sibling

Sailed the muddy asphalt seas
To get to New York City
Visited Woody Guthrie
Recorded with Victoria Spivey

Please note

Once upon a time
Musical images were re-arranging
You didn't need a clock
To know the times were a changing

With pencil in hand
He was feeling kind of mad
Someone passed him
A big yellow note pad

He wrote

Once upon a time
You were in your prime
Threw the bums a dime
Didn't you?

I think I have
Unveiled the mystery
All the rest
Is History.

With Victoria Spivey (1962)

The art is from the Drawn Blank Series by Bob Dylan.

Can You Spare Eighty Minutes?

I thought I knew a lot about Jazz History but this video proved me wrong.









Harlem in Montmartre

Gene Bullard & Love For Sale (CpB #10)

Gene Bullard was a slash man: jazz drummer/entrpreneur/aviator/boxer.
He was also a heroof two World Wars.

But more relevant to the CpB sequence, he provided the welcome mat
when Ada  "Bricktop" Smith first set foot on Parisian soil.

The date was May 11, 1924.


Mr. Bullard was managing Le Grand Duc where Bricktop sang and danced
with a personality descended from Mount Olympus:
Langston Hughes worked at that restaurant, eight years
before his infamous birthday party.

Fred Astaire danced there a few years before famously dancing on Broadway.
Scott Fitzgerald drank there before...ten CpB blogposts told the rest of the story.

The first of those posts includes the lyrics to Cole Porter's most controversial song.

At the time it was written, Mr. Bullard owned a club called Zelli's
and his fellow clubowner, Bricktop explains the inspiration for the song.

The idea of Love For Sale came out of an experience Cole had at Zelli's on the Rue Fontaine. About fifty percent of the girls there worked as taxi dancers. they weren't whores. When Cole asked one of them what she did, she answered,

"I've got love for sale."

It was a great title. Mabel Mercer brought it to Bricktop's.
***

I have saved the best for last.

From beginning to end, the two most important people in Bricktop's life
were her mother and sister.

The most important thing Hattie Smith taught her daughter was...how to learn!

Blonzetta Smith's success as a Chicago real estate broker provided
a financial cushion for her sister's final return to the United States.

Plan 9 Music INTERVENTION (CpB #9)

Django Reinhardt and his Nouveau Quintet

Within minutes of completing the ninth and seemingly last post about Bricktop, my phone rang.

Jack McCarthy, now an honorary member of the Plan 9 Music concept, led me to this tribute to Bricktop by Django Rheinhardt






Photo: Duncan Schiedt

The PLAN 9 MUSIC concept is an affiliate
of the Lewis Carroll School of Logic.
PLAN 9 originated in Virginia
and the logo is on loan from here

Another LCSoL affiliate,
the Institute of Inane Research has proven that,
in the history of New York City Mass Transit,
there has never been an employee more talented
as a songwriter/singer/guitarist/historian/Django Reinhardt
impersonator than bus driver Jack McCarthy.

The next Inane page is here.

 

Full Circle (CpB #8)

A cinematic Zelda Fitzgerald–as played by Allison Pill–said "Let's Go To Bricktop's!"

A cinematic Bricktop–as played by herself–talked about Zelda's destination and told a great joke that was a variation on the theme of "What rhymes with orange?"




The first photograph is from a Woody Allen film about a time traveler in the
"Roaring Twenties." The central character is portrayed by Owen Wilson. Historical figures are everywhere in this movie.

The second photograph is from a Woody Allen film about a time traveler in the
"Roaring Twenties." The central character is portrayed by Woody Allen. Historical figures are everywhere in this movie.

Did Woody Allen make the same movie twice?
Absolutely, positively NO!!!

Here is an accurate synopsis of his 2011 film, Midnight in Paris:

A family travel to the French capital for business. The party includes a young engaged couple who are forced to confront their differing views of a perfect life.

Here is an accurate synopsis of his 1983 film, Zelig:

"Documentary" about a man who can look and act like whoever he's around, and meets various famous people.

Zelig was released in the same year as Bricktop's autobiography. She is listed on the "Full Cast & Credit" page between Saul Bellow and Bruno Bettleheim. Compare those three names with Midnight in Paris' Kathy Bates, Adrien Brody and Rachel McAdams.
In Hollywood-speak, which set of names has more recognition?

But...Zelig co-starred Mia Farrow. However, her character was a chain-smoking psychiatrist and all her scenes are in Black & White.

That twenty-eight years separate Zelig from Midnight in Paris simply proves that the genius of Woody Allen does not have an expiration date.
***

A Zelda Fitzgerald "quote" propelled my interest in BRICKTOP. This is the ninth blogpost about the latter. My research about Brick led me to a fellow blogger, who–in turn–led me to the second photograph above and the youtube clip of Bricktop (hyperlinked in CpB #6).

In closing, I direct your video attention to the opening scene of Zelig. Not only does it set the scene of the "documentary" but it features actual footage of a writer by the name of F. Scott Fitzgerald.
His wife, unfortunately, is nowhere to be seen in this Woody Allen film but Z-E-L-I-G is now my second most-favorite five letter name beginning with the letter Z.
The other Z-person, being ZELDA, was described in BRICKTOP by Bricktop as

...a wisp of a girl, feather-slight, with lovely hair and very white skin. She was very outgoing, but next to Scott she seemed almost retiring.

Bricktop & Peter & Louis (CpB #7)

Ada "Bricktop" Smith and her husband Peter Duconge in Paris. (Dec. 29, 1929)

I would like to thank the New York Public Library Digital Gallery for the image above.
A cropped version of this photograph is included in her book. Bricktop's description of her husband includes the only gossipy reference in the entire autobiography:

I married musician Peter Duconge in 1929. The whole thing never should have happened, and we split a few years later over a girl named Hazel.

But they remained life-long friends.
In Nineteen Fifty-something, Bricktop owned a club in Rome–on Via Veneto–when a touring bandleader was stricken with pneumonia. "The way the newspapers reported it, he was close to death." Within days, the report was proven otherwise when this bandleader booked a party at her club.

Louis Armstrong showed up on the Via Veneto that night. He attracted a crowd big enough to fill the Coliseum. I had a hard time getting into my place. Once I did, we had a wonderful evening. Louis sang, and we talked about the days when Peter played in his band.

Louis lived a very fulfilling life until 1971. The later years of Bricktop's life were equally fulfilling. She survived Satchmo by more than a decade.

We Love You BRICKTOP

Blogger's Note
It is the express desire of the Lewis Carroll School of Logic to make "We Love You BRICKTOP" into a mantra heard across the length and width of the United States of America.