They left Chicago, hoping to find a measure of fame and fulfillment as musicians. And to see how they rated against the best in the world. Three moved to New York City. One to Holland.
The journeys were rough, with low pay, grueling hours, fierce competition. There were triumphs. But there were disappointments: One ended up broke, another was evicted from his apartment.
So now they are back, certain of one thing-their lives and their art will never be the same.
Even under the best of circumstances, life as a jazz musician can be a struggle, with too many gifted artists chasing too few decent gigs.
For Chicago players, there’s the additional issue of cultural geography: Do you move to New York for fame, to Los Angeles for money, to Europe for respect? Or do you stay in Chicago and build a reputation from here, as a number of musicians have done (including saxophonist Von Freeman, band leader William Russo, pianist Ramsey Lewis and avant-gardists such as Kahil El’Zabar and Malachi Favors)?
There are perils in each option, and no one knows it better than four musicians who recently returned home to Chicago after years away: pianist Don Bennett, bassist Fred Hopkins, vocalist Kimberly Gordon and multi-instrumentalist John Campbell. Their arduous journeys and deep ambivalence on returning home say a great deal about jazz life in America today.
DON BENNETT
After years of shuttling between his hometown, Chicago, and the East and West Coasts, pianist Don Bennett packed up and moved to Holland in 1993. He had visited there before, knew that just about everyone spoke English and figured he could make The Hague his base for launching a career in Europe. Indeed, with his brawny approach to the keyboard and a huge repertoire of jazz and blues standards, he became a popular attraction across Europe. It wasn’t until he left the U.S. that he won a multiple-album recording contract with a noteworthy American label, Candid (the best record deal of his career). Once in Europe, though, Bennett felt pulled in two directions. The quality of his life seduced him into staying in Holland for years, but the need to be near his teenage daughter, he says, finally lured him back to the U.S. So, at 57, he toils by day as assistant director of security at the Monadnock Building, in the Loop, by night as one of the finest jazz pianists playing various Chicago clubs.
“I’ve left this city so many times and swore to God I’d never come back. I’ve sworn I would never come back to this country. But when you’re away, the longer you stay away, the magnet gets stronger. I can’t explain it.
“Holland was great. There were some hard times, I’m not saying there weren’t, but they were worth it, because I made a lot of connections over there, I got to do a lot of traveling, eventually, that I would never have gotten the opportunity to do from Chicago.
“In Holland, you’re kind of in the center of things: I could drive from there down to Germany, France, Belgium, Italy, Croatia. In Spain I’ve played Barcelona, Valencia. You just won’t make connections like that from over here.
“In Europe, being an American is a big thing, they treat you with great respect. Go to Italy, for instance. We (Bennett and sidemen) drove there, parked the car in front of the hotel and never touched it again. We were driven to and from the venue, we were wined and dined every night. They pay you in American dollars, and a lot of dollars, to boot. They feed you well, put you up in five-star hotels. You spend no money (of your own), they take care of you.
“The audiences really come out and pack the place. All over Europe, the treatment of the musicians and the level of respect is 5 times, 10 times better than here. They know the tunes. They can tell you who wrote it, when it was last recorded. CDs over there are as expensive as hell. They buy ’em.
“The only one thing I missed was the level of musicianship over there. The Dutch, for instance, they have these conservatories, and technically the musicians are unsurpassed, but that feeling, that soul is missing, at least in Holland.
“When I got back to Chicago, I felt like I wanted to quit playing music, because it’s such a struggle here. I mean, even if you’re working, it’s a struggle.
“The club scene is depressing. Some clubs I would never play again–if I was starving I wouldn’t play them. They treat musicians like cattle. Maybe there are guys who think they need it so much that they just continue to accept that (treatment). I’ve heard a lot of guys tell me that, and I think that’s sad.
“In general, the club owners are not interested in music–it’s about business. In that case, why be in jazz? Go get a rock ‘n’ roll joint or something.
“At one club, they give you this rigid schedule (of sets and breaks) to follow. But you have to be able to read the crowd. If it’s popping and you’ve got them locked, you may want to play a couple more tunes. If it’s not cooking, you may want to play only a half-hour set.
“Generally, the pay is poor here. I know some guys who will work $50 gigs, but I never worked any of them. These guys think so little of themselves as human beings, not as musicians, that they beat up on themselves and let other people beat up on them.
“Of course, now that I’m back, I would prefer not to have to work (a day job) at all, just devote all the time to the music. But the scene here is not conducive to that. The reason I work (the day job) is so I can maintain my level of integrity, so I will not have to prostitute myself and feel bad about what I’m doing because I need the money.
“I don’t want to be at the mercy of these club owners, because if you put yourself in the position of banking on them to pay your rent and put food on your table . . . I’m just not going to do it. I’m too old for that.”
Don Bennett plays April 7-11 and April 28-May 2 in the Metropole of the Fairmont Hotel, 200 N. Columbus Dr. Phone 312-565-8000.
KIMBERLY GORDON
At 29, Kimberly Gordon already is a veteran of jazz travails in Chicago and New York. Having spent a few years establishing herself as a hard-working local vocalist, Gordon went to Manhattan in 1995 with stars in her eyes. Less than three years later, she found herself ready to leave, though she says she wouldn’t trade a minute of the time she spent there.
“There comes a time when you feel that you’ve done all you can do in this town, and you need more opportunity. You want to see what else is out there.
“I was scared to death of New York, and, of course, growing up in Chicago, you’re taught to really not like New York. So never in my wildest dreams did I ever want to go there.
“It was Thanksgiving of ’94, and I had reached a point of frustration in Chicago, musically and otherwise. So I called up this friend in New York City. She owns Cleopatra’s Needle (a club) and said, `You can come live with me. I’ll give you a job (waitressing), you can sing (at the club), so get your buns out here.’
“I hung up the phone, and I had a new lease on life, though I remember my aunt dropping me off at the subway to go to O’Hare Airport, and I was thinking: `I’m going to New York. What the hell am I doing?’
“When I got to New York, I started hanging out at Small’s, which was the most exciting place, with all these old masters and young lions coming together in an atmosphere of growth. The place breathed music.
“I spent every night there for the first year-and-a-half, and I got to meet and hang out with all these amazing people: Roy Hargrove, Stanley Turrentine, Nicholas Payton, Wess Anderson, Wynton Marsalis.
“Then I started to sing cafe gigs. Of course, the pay ranges from `pass the hat’ to `$20 donation and a meal’ to `anywhere from $40 to $60, depending,’ so I always had to waitress.
“At first, I found there was so much to inspire me in New York: The beat of the city, the subway, the people walking in the streets–it’s all music, so I felt very comfortable in New York. I was inspired every day, every moment, just being there, and I couldn’t imagine being anywhere else in the world. I was soaking up the environment and listening.
“But then, around 1996, I stopped singing completely, I didn’t even sing at home. I had gotten to the point where I had done so much hustling and so much p.r. that I think I burned out and needed a break. Plus I found love, with a saxophonist named Stephen Riley (who has recorded with Marcus Roberts and performed with Marsalis’ Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra). So I enjoyed living vicariously through him for awhile and just following him around, going to exotic places, like New Orleans and Brazil for the jazz festivals.
“A year later, in ’97, I started getting hungry again (artistically), and when I began singing, my voice was better than ever. It had gained a richer quality, a deeper quality, and I was more relaxed onstage and confident.
“But then the living situation in New York–our tiny apartment and the crowds and the noise and all–started to get to me. We started calling the place we were living in the Dead-End Hotel. There were just too many people in New York, and I realized that I needed some space, and Stephen did too.
“I had spoken so fondly to Stephen about Chicago–the food, the people, the lake. I wanted him to meet my friends and family, and I also wanted to give Chicago a little taste of Stephen Riley.
“So we moved here at the end of ’97, and it was an interesting experience. It was great to see my old friends and fans again, it was great to feel relaxed for a change.
“Musically, though, it’s a little frustrating. There’s not enough jazz out there. The Underground Wonderbar (where Gordon launched her singing career) used to have jazz seven nights a week, now it’s one or two. And I find that people just aren’t listening, either. They go to the clubs, but they drink and talk and make a lot of noise. I guess, in a way, that’s good, because it means the clubs have found the tourist trade, but it’s also a little disheartening.
“I think people in the U.S. are afraid of jazz. They don’t know that they like it, which they must, or you wouldn’t be hearing it on so many ads on TV. Unfortunately, jazz has had a bad reputation in this country. Maybe that’s because of what it stems from: It comes out of repression and hatred (of African-Americans), and those things scare people in the United States, they don’t want to face it.
“So that’s why it still hasn’t come to the point where most jazz musicians can make a living at it, why so many have to have other jobs.
“I’m getting to the point where I don’t want to be a 30-year-old waitress who’s hoping to become a singer. So I took a job as an ad sales rep when I got back to Chicago. It’s something that I have to do right now, it’s a reality, because I cannot survive just on singing.
“But it sure would be nice if I could.”
Kimberly Gordon plays Tuesdays at the Underground Wonderbar, 10 E. Walton St. Phone 312-266-7761.
FRED HOPKINS
Trained in jazz at DuSable High School, on the South Side, and in symphonic music in the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, Fred Hopkins became one of the busiest and most important bassists in Chicago avant-garde jazz in the late ’60s. Nearly a decade later, he was repeating his success in New York, where he thrived for more than 20 years, until returning home last year. He says he couldn’t wait to get back.
“I moved to New York for two reasons. First, my ex-wife, who’s a jeweler, thought she could do better in New York and said: `I’m going, are you going with me?’
“The second reason was because I think every musician should go to New York, because it’s fantastic, and you will be challenged. Every culture is represented in New York, musicians from all around the world are there, waiting for you.
“When I went, I was scared. I thought, `Oh, my God, I’m going to New York, and when you go to New York, that means you start working, you get on drugs, and then you die.’ That I knew from all the reports and all the biographies I had been reading.
“When I first got there, it was very difficult, because I wasn’t working. You introduce yourself to a person (club owner or musician) 10 times, but everybody’s very cool (to you), because you’re the new guy on the block, so I got a little discouraged at first, and broke. I had no money.
“Then I got angry. and I said: `I can play, now gimme that gig, let’s go.’ And I got that first gig and didn’t stop working after that. When they (other musicians) found out I could read and bow the bass too, I started getting all kind of different gigs. But that was about two years after I got to New York.
“Once you’re playing there, it’s a challenge. One time, we had this bass choir, with Richard Davis, Rufus Reid, Art Davis, and I was kind of cocky back then.
“So Art Davis is on one side of me and Richard Davis is on the other side, I’m in the middle, and they ask me to take the first solo.
“I did all my best stuff, everything I had.
“Then Art Davis glances at Richard Davis and gives him this look–I’ll never forget it–which says, `OK, I’ll take him, I’ve got it covered.’
“And he started playing, and he played everything I played, practically every note. And then he played it all backwards. Boy, talk about being humbled!
“And the thing was, it was not done with any ego, it was just about music. It was like saying: `Oh, you think you can play? Listen to this.’ And I actually started laughing on stage.
“Believe me, being in New York makes you develop yourself. The place is a great mixture. You could be playing with Indian musicians who want to play jazz, and jazz musicians who want to play Mexican music, and African percussionists who want to play blues. You’ve got all this stuff going on, and you’ll be walking around the street running into people who want to play with you.
“One time I was playing and Miles Davis turns up in the audience. That’s the kind of thing that happens in New York. And most of the giants of the music, they like to go out on weird nights, like Tuesdays and Wednesdays and Thursdays, and they go to little old clubs, because they’ve been hearing about you, and they want to check you out. You never know who is going to come into the club, so consequently, you have to do your best any time you play.
“So I got really busy. At one point I was working in about seven bands, and finally I had to get out of town, because I was burning out. I was so tired, I’d be having two rehearsals in one day and I’d work that night, then go to the studio the next day, at 10 o’clock in the morning.
“That was during the loft jazz period (when New York musicians were putting on informal concerts in unconventional settings), in the late ’70s and early ’80s.
“Still, I never made enough money. I think I was doing as well as people playing traditional (mainstream) music who had to wear bow ties and such to go to work. But in terms of the megabucks they were paying people like (trumpeter) Wynton Marsalis, I never got to that.
“But at the time, we didn’t care, man, we were having so much fun playing music.
“My generation, we were celebrated when we first got to New York, in the mid-’70s through around ’80. They (the media and music industry) pumped us up, and we were traveling around the world, we had sold-out concerts, it was going good.
“But what happened was that over a period of time, they started pumping up a new group, which would be the Wynton Marsalis disciples.
“Now I have no problem with that. It’s their turn, it doesn’t bother me at all. But the thing is, between the musicians and the corporate (record industry) people, they pushed us aside to bring them in, and I don’t know why they think they have to do this, when we can all be performing at the same time. What’s wrong with that?
“In other words, there are some older musicians that I know, excellent musicians, and no one ever writes about them–nothing. Hey, man, I learned from this guy, I listened to this guy when I was a kid.
“But they choose certain musicians that they keep on the pedestal, then they drop all the rest, then they bring in the new group. Seems like there should be some kind of way that they can do both.
“And being in New York was very stressful. You never get a chance to relax. And it never got quiet; as soon as it did, at about 4 or 5 o’clock (in the morning), the garbage man comes out banging those cans. They’ve got to wake you up. There are ambulances all day and night.
“So over a period of time, the stress builds up, and that’s what happened to me. It’s a slow build, but it does have an effect on you.
“To put it in a nutshell: After 20-some years in New York, I had one friend that I could give the key to my apartment. One, just one.
“Everybody is out for themselves, they’re into survival.
“Just before I moved from New York, there was this mix-up over rent that was due at my apartment, and I got to the point where I said: `Enough is enough. I don’t have to be in New York to play my music, I can be anywhere on the planet to play music.’
“I’m 50 years old now, I’ve done at least half of my life. So the next part of my life I want to do here. I’ve been a sideman playing with all these very gifted musicians, and I’ve enjoyed it totally, but now I want to do my projects, I want to do things with dancers and poets, and I think there’s an incredibly viable situation here in Chicago.”
Fred Hopkins performs with Douglas Ewart and Hamid Drake at 4 p.m. April 19 in the Washington Park Fieldhouse, 5531 S. Martin Luther King Dr. Phone the Jazz Institute of Chicago at 312-427-1676.
JOHN CAMPBELL
After establishing himself in the late ’70s as one of the best pianists in Chicago–a city famous for its virtuoso jazz keyboardists–John Campbell heard New York calling. Because he’s also adept as a bassist, vibist and drummer, he was able to eke out a living until he was hired in 1986 for the job that made him a national name: pianist for singer Mel Torme. That’s still Campbell’s greatest claim to fame, though he broke out on his own again in 1990 and returned to Chicago late last year.
“In 1983, I was doing some gigs in Chicago with David Liebman (the exceptional saxophonist), and he said to me one day in the car, `You should move to New York, it would be really good for you to do that.’
“And he’s such a great musician and spiritual leader that I seriously started to make plans to do that.
“I guess I didn’t want to just sit around Chicago and wonder, `What if?’ And if Liebman thought I should be in New York, then I should be there. Plus I had exhausted the musical possibilities of the band I was working in, some of the clubs had taken a (financial) bath, a lot of the pianos around town were lousy. I felt it was a good time to take a break and see what New York was all about.
“The first two years I really just kind of got by, and it was definitely an adjustment. The thing about that city is that there are just so many guys and so few venues that whatever (work) you get is really almost a blessing. So many guys are fighting for so few gigs, and they will just undercut each other — everyone will play a gig cheaper than someone else, so the bread (payment) never really gets any better.
“Playing for Mel (Torme) was great fun and wasn’t terribly hard. It was really good for me, because it exposed me to an entirely different audience. Mel’s fans, you know, are not your typical jazz listeners–they’re really into Mel. On the other hand, it took away my focus as a jazz player.
“I really hadn’t planned to stay with Mel for four years, but it ended up that way, and we made two records together.
“By the end of ’90, I was burned out on that material and really wanted to try to get back into some (bona fide) jazz playing, so it just seemed to be the right time to pull out.
“The next couple of years were fairly lean, but in ’93 I got this hotel gig playing two nights a week (Mondays and Tuesdays).
“I started looking at some property, found a couple of nice houses, but then I looked at myself in the mirror and said: `Do you really want to stay out here for another 15 or 30 years, or whatever a mortgage is?’
“So I just decided to make a change and came back to Chicago last June.
“I’ve found there are some really good things about the scene in Chicago, some good players, and a lot of young cats coming up who really can play. The pianos are much better–Joe Segal (at the Jazz Showcase) has a really nice piano, and so does Dave Jemilo (at the Green Mill).
“As for the money thing, you really have to compromise, but you can’t give it away.
“What I like about Chicago is that everybody here, for the most part, tries to sound like themselves. You’ve got so many musical personalities in this city, and I think that gets lost in New York, where everybody is trying to cut each other and sound like somebody great or somebody in the past.
“Then again, though there are all these really great musicians in Chicago, the level is not New York, that’s just a fact.
“I guess the ultimate reason I came back here is so I could do the kinds of gigs I wanted to do, not just whatever happened to be available. I really love playing piano trios, that’s what floats my boat, because I like playing the melody.
“And that’s what I can do here.”
John Campbell plays Sundays at Pete Miller’s Steakhouse, 1557 Sherman Ave., Evanston. Phone 847-328-0399.
