Memphis Rent Party by Robert Gordon

Author:Robert Gordon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Rosie Murphy Newborn and Calvin Newborn. (Courtesy of Calvin Newborn)

When the quartet played the 1956 Newport Jazz Festival, Phineas Sr. was introduced in the audience. “Our dad stood up while the audience applauded, and as I stood on stage holding my guitar ready to play, I could feel his sadness,” writes Calvin. “I knew he wanted more than anything to be playing drums with us.” Sadness and disappointment would shadow Finas for the rest of his days.

The Phineas Newborn Jr. Quartet was included on the 1957 Birdland tour, along with Count Basie, Sarah Vaughan, Lester Young, and others. Calvin was asked to keep his eye on pianist Bud Powell, who was not well. “Our quartet came on before the Bud Powell Trio at the concert hall in Toronto, Canada. We finished our set, and on the way to our dressing room backstage I noticed that Bud was butting his head against the wall and stopped him. I went into the dressing room and put down my guitar and when I came back out, Bud was on stage playing his opener, ‘Un Poco Loco.’ After that he played the most prolific interpretation of the standard ‘Like Someone in Love’ I’d ever heard. It was supernatural! I knew how Junior loved Bud’s piano playing, and though my heart was bleeding when chaperoning Bud, I’d missed something. Suddenly I knew why Junior dug Bud so. Though I had no way of knowing it then, some years later my heart would bleed for Junior just as it had for Bud.”

Though the prominent critic Leonard Feather would soon proclaim him “the greatest living jazz pianist,” Junior’s talent provoked a heated debate among jazz fans. He was always praised for his technique, though some critics said his skill overpowered his emotion; they said the opposite about Calvin. “When I got to New York, I realized what I had been missing by not practicing. On the first record, they wouldn’t give me a solo. We were with Atlantic, and they said when Junior got through playing there was nothing left to play. Someone suggested that I take some lessons from a CBS staff guitarist, Barry Galbraith, and I learned a lot from him. I learned how to relax mostly, because it was hard for me to stay still and play. I was used to doing like Magic Johnson—flying.” The showman and the perfectionist; the extrovert and the introvert.

There is a picture of Calvin as a young man, his face contorted and intent on his playing; it is clear that this man is deep into what he’s doing. And upon closer inspection, one sees that he is airborne, his legs pulled up higher than the nearby tabletops. “I was about six feet in the air,” he says, “playing the guitar.”

He pauses, then reveals, “As a matter of fact, I used to think I could fly.”

He lets that image sink in, then continues: “I felt like I could make myself as light as I wanted to. I have jumped off a two-story building and never really hurt myself.

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