Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra Early Personnel

When Thad Jones and Mel Lewis first began drawing up who they most wanted to hire for their new big band, the choices weren't necessarily the same as those who eventually made it to the first rehearsals or the first gig at the Village Vanguard. In the left column are those who were originally slated for the band. The right column are those who made the first Vanguard gig on 7 February 1966. Who thinks Nick Travis would've taken the concertmaster chair over Snooky Young? Who laments the fact that neither Phil Woods nor Clark Terry made it to the band? Phil Woods did sub for Jerome Richardson occasionally but is there any record of Clark Terry playing in the orchestra? On the Chuck Stewart photo below, who can identify the personnel (other than Thad, Mel, Dodgion, Richardson, Herman)? Is that Eddie Jones on bass?

Thad Jones +

trumpet trumpet

Snooky Young (lead?) Snooky Young (lead)

Nick Travis (lead?) Jimmy Nottingham (Travis deceased)

Jimmy Maxwell Bill Berry (subbing for Maxwell)

Clark Terry Jimmy Owens (Terry's absence unexplained)

trombone trombone

Bob Brookmeyer (lead)  Bob Brookmeyer (lead)

Willie Dennis  Garnett Brown (Dennis deceased)

choice not known Jack Rains

choice not known Cliff Heather

saxophone

Phil Woods (lead) Jerome Richardson (lead)

choice not known Jerry Dodgion

Wayne Shorter Joe Farrell

choice not known Eddie Daniels

Pepper Adams Marv Holladay (subbing for Adams)

rhythm

Hank Jones Hank Jones

guitar not planned            Sam Herman

choice not known Richard Davis

Mel Lewis                         Mel Lewis

Looking Ahead to 2015

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas (that ever so conveniently rolled into the weekend). 2015 looks like an exciting year for my Pepper Adams work. As always, I continue to revise the pepperadams.com Chronology and Discography whenever new information presents itself. As it turns out, some new data has surfaced recently. Now that all the databases are in PDF format, I'll be updating quarterly. The next update will take place in January.

I continue to look for lecture opportunities. If anyone works at a college and is interested in having me give a talk on Pepper, please let me know. Since the 2012 publication of Pepper Adams'Joy Road I've done about fifty such talks. I love doing them because most students don't know anything about Pepper. Such is the state of jazz history survey courses and textbooks to this day. Because Pepper remains an historical footnote, I always get out to spread the word.

The biggest project of 2015 is the CD issue of Ephemera. Although available on iTunes, it's amazing that the date has never been issued on CD. Tony Williams of Spotlite recently sent the original master to Robin Springall at Repeat Performance in London and the date sounds magnificent! I think it will sound even better if Mel Lewis' drums are brought up in volume. His brushwork is too low and his toms need more definition.

As I wrote a few weeks back, Pepper asked that all alternates from the first day be destroyed, due to some ridiculous antics that took place in the studio. Hence, everything on the date is a first take from Day Two. I hadn't heard Bouncing with Bud, Jitterbug Waltz, Quiet Lady or Hellure in years. What a joy to hear this great music again, especially Quiet Lady. I completely forgot what a brilliant performance this is, right up there perhaps with Day Dream and I've Just Seen Her as one of Pepper's greatest studio ballad performances. Roland Hanna steals the show with his unaccompanied intro, solo, and spectacular unaccompanied coda and Pepper really lays way back in his time on the theme and in his solo.

Bouncing with Bud brings tears to my eyes. It so perfectly captures the language of the 1950s and is played so well by the ensemble. Adams' arrangement of the tune is quite daring. Mel Lewis takes an unaccompanied solo after Hanna's, then George Mraz solos before Pepper. The delay of Adams' solo builds tension, released by Pepper's dramatic entrance. The tune, almost eleven minutes long, feels like a club date performance.

Ah, how about that Adams ballad atmosphere? Is there anything else like it? Civilization and Its Discontents is such an amazing thing, isn't it?

Mel Lewis' driving percussion on Jitterbug Waltz is just wonderful. How about his unaccompanied intro to the tune? What a fine arranging decision on Pepper's part, as is the terraced dynamics in the theme. As I wrote a few weeks ago, Ephemera is one of Pepper's masterpieces. I eagerly look forward to writing new liner notes.

I'll let you know about the timeline of Clarion Jazz reissue. Early September still looks reasonable at this point but no word yet about that from Dale Fielder. Happy New Year everybody! 

A Word About Mean What You Say

© Gary Carner. Copyright Protected. All rights reserved.

On a long drive this morning I listened to Mean What You Say, the only studio recording ever made by the Thad Jones-Pepper Adams Quintet. Although the group (with Mel Lewis) continued to work throughout the '60s and '70s, much to Pepper's disappointment the group was eclipsed by the establishment of the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra.

Mean What You Say is a record that I've always held in very high esteem, one that I've heard thirty or more times though not recently. What struck me today is just how spectacular a recording it is, how fresh it still seems, how original Thad Jones' small group arrangements are, how wonderful the tunes are (with two waltzes and no ballads) and how great Thad's soloing is throughout. Actually, everyon e plays brilliantly, including Duke Pearson, who, despite his Blue Note A&R gig was still a very strong soloist in mid-1966.

This is a recording of historic proportions on so many levels. It's one that should be dissected in jazz texts and wildly appreciated as one of the seminal recordings of the 1960s and in jazz history, just as Kind of Blue or A Love Supreme are discussed. Woefully, it's completely overlooked by critics, authors, jazz fans and even musicians.

First, the personnel: Thad Jones flh; Pepper Adams bs; Duke Pearson p; Ron Carter b; Mel Lewis dm.

Three Detroiters plus one honorary Detroiter in Mel Lewis (though from Buffalo, but with that wide Elvin Jones kind of beat). Add Atlanta's Duke Pearson, a close friend of Pepper's. What a band, all playing at their best! In fact, for those very familiar with Thad Jones' playing, has he ever sounded better? It's certainly the best Thad playing I've heard! With his performance it's easy to understand how revered he is by brass players, who have placed him firmly in the trumpet lineage right in there after Dizzy, Clark Terry and Miles, and before Clifford Brown, Lee Morgan, Freddie Hubbard and Woody Shaw.

The next thing that struck me about Mean What You Say is Thad and Pepper's phrasing. Their dynamics and time feel lock up as if they were together for many years. In fact, the band was only playing gigs on and off for about a year, but it shows.

The tunes? The title tune should be a standard of the jazz repertoire. Why aren't musicians besides Peter Leitch and Gary Smulyan playing it? Thad's "Bossa Nova Ova," one of the hippest bossas I've ever heard, is a spectacular Thad arrangement with a dazzling soli. Why isn't this being played? Can you believe Mel Lewis' amazing Latin playing on this tune? 

The uptempo Burt Bacharach waltz "Wives and Lovers?" What a great tune. Musicians are asleep on this one too. Duke Pearson's great tune "Chant," better know and which Pepper had recorded twice before with the Byrd-Adams Quintet (once with Pearson at Live at the Half Note), is another tune that should be a standard. How about Thad's outlandish arrangement on this version? 

For those who think Pepper was an extreme double-time player who couldn't play with sensitivity, check out his (and Thad's) beautiful, behind-the-beat, amazingly poignant solos on Ron Carter's "Little Waltz?" So much for that stereotype.

Thad's hip "H and T Blues?" (Does that stand for Hank and Thad, by any chance?) Thad's swinging "No Refill." Que pasa? Why aren't musicians playing these tunes? 

And how can you top the wonderful slapstick rendition of "Yes Sir, That's My Baby?" Here Thad and Pepper hilariously deconstruct the tune as if they're 11-year-old struggling jazz soloists, then re-equilibrate, as a startling contrast, and completely tear it up. Dick Katz, who was Milestone's A&R man, told me that Thad's solo is "historic." Milestone's Orrin Keepnews was horrified by the band's approach but what a way to evoke musical satire!

The only flaw I can speak to on this dazzling landmark recording is Pepper's sound on the Fantasy digital remaster. Like the original it still has far too much reverb. I'm surprised it's not repaired but, again, another lame decision made about the date without understanding its real significance. 

Significance? Yes, five of the greatest musicians of their time playing absolutely unique and brilliant arrangements by one of jazz's greatest arrangers, with soloists all at the top of their game. I want to hear from you about this recording. Isn't it a "dessert island recording" and one that's been completely overlooked?

Photo by Rick Mattingly

Ephemera to be Reissued in 2015!

© Gary Carner. Copyright Protected. All rights reserved.

Just a few minutes ago I awoke to an email from Tony Williams, owner of Spotlite Records. Williams wanted to let me know that he transferred from the original master all seven of the magical tracks from Pepper Adams' date Ephemera that he produced 41 years ago. Williams is mailing me a copy of the CD today. What a Christmas gift!

Many of you know that Ephemera is one of Adams' greatest achievements. It was recorded at a time when Pepper was out of fashion and couldn't get a recording date as a leader. It had been five years since his Encounter session was recorded. Even though that date was eventually sold to Prestige, it was independently produced by Fred Norsworthy and funded by Norsworthy's girlfriend. The intent was to sell it to an interested party but no one was interested! Eventually, Don Schlitten at Prestige took it, which of course meant for virtually nothing and with limited distribution.

If you consider the stretch of time between Ephemera and when Adams was last recorded by a commerical entity, it had been eight years since the Thad Jones-Pepper Adams Quintet date Mean What You Say was done for Milestone and eleven years since Adams' last date for Motown. That one remains unreleased and in Universal's vaults.

Ephemera is significant on several levels. For one thing it includes four original compositions by Pepper Adams. He had never written more than two tunes for any of his previous dates. Those tunes--Patrice, Hellure, Ephemera and Civilization and Its Discontents--stand as some of Pepper's greatest achievements as a composer. In fact, Adams felt that Ephemera was his greatest piece. I'm inclined to agree, though Patrice and Civ is right up there with it. Additonally, the quartet plays the standards Bouncing with Bud and Jitterbug Waltz, plus the Thad Jones ballad Quiet Lady. The playing is outstanding!

The date, recorded in London on 9-10 September 1973, uses the extraordinary rhythm section of the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra: Roland Hanna, George Mraz and Mel Lewis. All tracks are from the 10th because the first day was marred by all sorts of bizarre technical difficulties. Because of that, Adams asked Williams to destroy everything from the 9th. 

Jones-Lewis was on tour of Europe at the time. As some of you know, Adams was right at home with the rhythm section and visa versa. Pepper and Mel were very close musical buddies since 1956. Mraz was Pepper's all-time favorite bass player. And Roland was a Detroiter. Need I say more? 

How can it be that this date has never been issued on CD? Well, saxophonist Dale Fielder and I are correcting that injustice. Fielder, based in Los Angeles, operates Clarion Jazz. He'll be putting the date out, we hope in early September in time to celebrate the 42nd anniversary of the recording and in time for Christmas sales. Fielder will be repackaging and mastering the recording, possibly with the help of engineer Jim Merod (a passionate Pepper Adams fan). I'll be writing a new essay and providing photographs, never before seen, that were taken by Jill Freedman at the London photo shoot.

Shopping with Harry Carney

© Gary Carner. Copyright Protected. All rights reserved.

Not long after Pepper Adams' death on 10 September 1986, his old college roomate from Wayne, Bob Cornfoot, prepared a remembrance for radio play of almost an hour in length to commemorate both Pepper and Thad Jones. Both Detroiters died within three weeks of each other. One of the things that Cornfoot discussed was the time when Adams replaced his student model Bundy baritone sax with a Balanced Action B-Flat Selmer. The Bundy was Adams' first baritone saxophone. He discovered it by chance while working as a Christmas extra at Grinnell's in 1947. His Selmer is what he used on all of his historic recordings from 1956-1978. Ultimately, metal fatigue made some of the keys unfixable. 

Cornfoot pointed out that Adams brought Harry Carney with him to Ivan C. Kay so the master could check out the instrument for the acolyte. Who better to check it out? The Duke Ellington Orchestra was in Detroit, playing the Paradise Theater from 15-30 October, 1948. Some of you would've read in an earlier post my account of Rex Stewart befriending Pepper in early March, 1944 at the RKO Temple Theatre. Pepper also met Carney at that time and it's presumed that Pepper stayed in close contact with the Ellingtonians. 

Body and Soul, Sonny Rollins and Pepper Adams

© Gary Carner. Copyright Protected. All rights reserved.

We know that the 1939 Coleman Hawkins recording of Body and Soul is an iconic masterpiece of the jazz canon but don't we lose sight of how it influenced a generation of musicians? I recently read a piece by Marc Myers and was struck by how Sonny Rollins' experience as a young musician paralleled Pepper Adams'. Here's what Sonny Rollins recently told Marc Myers in the Wall Street Journal about Coleman Hawkins' recording:

"It's hard today to fully appreciate how different Coleman Hawkins' Body and Soul sounded when it hit Harlem jukeboxes in late 1939. On that three-minute record, Coleman took a popular torch song and, with his tenor saxophone, turned it into a personal statement without ever losing track of the original melody. Wow, that was completely new and it really changed me.

I first heard Body and Soul when I was 10 years old. I was standing outside the Big Apple Bar on the corner of 135th Street and Seventh Avenue, across from Small's Paradise, and heard it on the jukebox through an open window. Back then, I was playing alto saxophone and idolized Louis Jordan — and still do. But when I heard Coleman's Body and Soul, a light went off in my head. If he could personalize a popular song like that without lyrics, any song was possible if you had that intellectual capacity.

People in Harlem know their music, and I remember marveling at how many of them were touched by his record. Coleman went beyond what musicians were doing then by creating new harmonic inventions. Right after hearing the record, I bought a tenor reed and began using it on my alto mouthpiece to get that big Coleman Hawkins sound. Some years later, after much pleading on my part, my mother bought me a tenor sax and I was on my way."

For Pepper Adams, Hawkins' recording also propelled him to get a tenor saxophone and emulate Hawkins' big sound and more aggressive style. Up until that time Adams was playing clarinet, imitating the melismatic and lighter New Orleans playing of Jimmy Noone and Johnny Dodds. Here's a touching excerpt from my book, Pepper's Adams' Joy Road, as told to me by the noted Eastman School educator Everett Gates. I interviewed Gates about Pepper and Pepper's March, 1978 performance at Eastman:

"Adams dedicated Body and Soul to Everett Gates, a professor at Eastman and an early mentor to Adams who was in the audience. Regarding Adams’ performance of Body and Soul, Gates said, “That completely floored me!” In 1942, when Pepper Adams was eleven years old, Adams started visiting Gates on a regular basis at Gates’ home in Rochester, New York. They used to listen to music and discuss jazz and music theory. “He came to the house,” Gates continued, “and one day he said,

“Do you know Body and Soul?” I said, “Sure.” “Well,” he said, “could you write it out for me?” I said, “Sure.” At that time he was going to get a saxophone. So I wrote it out in D-flat, which of course was the key we always used, rather than any other when we’re playing. When we were improvising, it was always D-flat. And, so I wrote it out with the chords. He said, “There’s a record by Coleman Hawkins.” I said, “Yes, he made that a couple of years ago.” He said, “Well, he’s all over the place.” I said, “Yes, it’s very complicated and he gets up even to the high harmonics on the saxophone, like high G, so you have to be pretty advanced to control those.” So he said, “I wonder: Could you write me out a little improvisation that’s simple? Something simple I can play?” I said, “Sure. You can play this either on tenor, or you can play it on a clarinet.” So he got so he could play that, [and] this is what [he began his solo with] when he played at the Eastman Theater with the Eastman Jazz Ensemble. (He played this just with a rhythm section, and the other things he had played with a big band.) And, unbelievably, he played that, and then, of course, he went into his own [thing]. Well, of course, I was just overcome with what he had done there!"

Portrait of Everett Gates that hangs in a gallery at the Eastman School: http://instagram.com/p/t20Ku4pnv3/?modal=true

Korean War Gigs, 1953

© Gary Carner. Copyright Protected. All rights reserved.

Here's my 4 July 2014 interview with Al Gould, co-author of Boots on the Ground with Music in My Hands, Korea 1952-1953. Buy the book here: 

http://www.amazon.com/Boots-Ground-Music-My-Hands/dp/1935089455 

Along with Pepper Adams, Gould was a member of the elite Second Platoon of the U.S. Army's 10th Special Services Company. At one point in the conversation co-author Jackie Gould answers a question.

GARY CARNER: First, thank you for this photograph. (See below). The picture of band, playing in Korea with that rugged backdrop: It really paints a perfect picture of exactly what you guys did. Right out of the truck, surrounded by sand bags, with a makeshift stage. It's an amazing document!

AL GOULD: That makeshift stage thing we did most of the time. We very rarely wore our special show uniforms. We were wearing our fatigues and so forth. We'd pitch in an open area someplace, or anywhere near where these different groups were. Where there was 50 men or more we'd put on a show. It could be the Turks, it could be the English, whatever. Actually, we did a lot of Americans. That's typical, the picture that you see.

C: Do you know where it was shot? What approximate date and location?

G: I wish I did. 

C: The Bulldozer Bowl. (See photo below.) Do you know what that is?

G: We played there several times but the first time could've been in mid-January of '53. It looks like they've got on heavy wraps. That would've been probably early- to mid-January.

C: You've got a picture of the audience. That's a big audience! What show is that for?

G: That would be one that we played before Pepper left in May, 1953. The cease fire didn't happen until June.

C: All the shows that you played with your platoon, Platoon #2, Pepper was on, correct?

G: Yes, that's right. Now, he left for home before I did. We can get to that later but we were definitely together. 

C: You guys were traveling, packing up, doing sometimes two shows a day, living in a tent when you could; a very intimate relationship with thirty guys, particularly the guys in the band. You must've had a chance to know Pepper very well.

G: I'm going to give a qualified "yes," but it's not too clear. I was talking to a lot of the guys all the time. He was fantastic, but I can't say we were bosom buddies, just us two together hanging out or whatever. I was with all of them.

C: Did he have particular friends, maybe Mack Saunders? Was he closest with a few of them?

G: Not really.

C: Tell me what Pepper was like? What were your impressions of him?

G: The impression was what a fantastic musician! You couldn't help but have that rub off at all times. Let me make one correction right now. You were referring to the Eighth Army Band. I don't think it should be referred to that way at all. There was an Eighth Army Band at Eighth Army Headquarters that had no connection with the Tenth Special Services Company. We usually referred to them by the platoons. We were the show band in the Second Platoon. There was a show band in three platoons. There were four platoons but the Headquarters Platoon, which was Platoon #4, didn't go do shows at all.

C: Yeah, they didn't tour. So you were the show band. What were the other two platoons doing?

G: They were doing identically the same thing, but we were on the road 24/7. We had passes signed by [General] Maxwell Taylor that got us through checkpoints any time of day, which was fantastic! One of the most important things which we haven't discussed was that the U.S.O. shows had civilians in them. They couldn't play closer that twenty miles from the front lines (MLR). Consequently, that's the reason the Tenth Special was so darn important because we could play within 500 yards. But the Bob Hope shows and so forth, which were fantastic, couldn't get any closer that twenty miles of the front line. They weren't trained to defend themselves.

C: The front line is not the same thing as the MLR is it?

G: I would say it's different nomenclature for the same thing: The Main Line of Resistance is the front line.

C: There wasn't a Demilitarized Zone, a DMZ that separated the two countries, like there was in Vietnam?

G: No, that came at the cease fire. I think it was for a mile in both directions.

C: Getting back to Pepper, do you remember anything at all about him, traveling with him, in the tent, any habits, any humorous anecdotes?

G: He was not a driver. Some of the members were drivers. He would probably be riding shotgun with one of the drivers. We had thirteen vehicles. We'd vary from maybe 28 to 33 men, depending on who was rotating home. The one vehicle that was the main one that we carried a lot of our uniforms and that kind of stuff kind looked like a metal-covered two-and-a-half-ton Army truck. We would always throw a tarp over it which said "R&R." R&R stood for the name of the show: Road to Ruin.

C: Who came up with that name?

G: It might've been Skippy Lynn. She was a "battle ax" but we have to respect her highly. She was fantastic! If you didn't cut the mustard, she'd take you right out of the platoon and you'd be in the infantry or something!

C: They didn't cut your band when Pepper was there?

G: No, not at all. 

C: In this picture he's playing baritone. I assume it was his instrument from home?

G: It could've been his instrument.

C: My hunch is that he at least took his own instrument to Ft. Leonard Wood.

G: I'm positive he would've done that.

C: I'm wondering if he might've brought it home, left it there, then just got a horn in the military and used his own mouthpiece?

G: He could've had his own in Korea. There's a timeline that bothers me. You had said that he left for Korea on October 10th. I left for Korea on October 25th. There wasn't time for that ship to leave on the 10th, go to Korea, and get back for me to load on the 25th. He would've been on the ship ahead of me but it couldn't have been October 10th. He was on the USS Walker and so was I. It would have to be at least a week before the 10th. Pepper was probably earmarked to go to the Tenth Special but they weren't ready for him when he reached [Camp] Drake so he stayed there. Pepper would've played there from when he got there in early October until he left in November and would go to Incheon. He would've been playing pickup shows identically the same as I was. I was blessed that they needed an accordion player the first part of the year or I never would've made it. Pepper probably played at the Ernie Pyle Theater, same as I did. He probably played at the Rocker Four Club, which was called the "Showplace of Japan," for people who were there on R&R (relax and recuperation). [Both were in Tokyo.]

C: Was there access to cigarettes?

G: Yes, very definitely, and we'd stop along the road occasionally when they yelled, "Pot!" Pot was growing wild. Marijuana was growing all over the place. They'd run out and get whatever they wanted to get. I didn't smoke so I didn't do it. We had cigarette rations all the time. 

C: You said you were the second person to enlist directly into the Army band in February of 1952.

G: Yeah, right, that was a brand new thing. As I took my infantry training on detached service, I never pulled guard duty or KP, because I didn't get on the roster and I sure never told anybody.

C: Pepper enlisted in 1951, in July, and he said that he was hoping to get into the band. So I guess at that point he wasn't sure.

G: The Sixth Armored Division Band; let's touch upon that at this time. There were three bands at Ft. Leonard Wood: the 6th Armored Division, the Headquarters was "326" (that I was in), and there was an all-black band also. I don't remember what number that was. You had actually written that, while at Ft. Leonard Wood, he made a little band that played later in Korea?

C: That can't be true?

G: That would be impossible, for the central reason that we were sent over individually, not as any unit at all. How would they know who would've ended up in Tenth Special? They wouldn't have known at that time.

C: It was up to Skippy Lynn to actually put them into groups and organize them, correct?

G: Yes, right. A lot of the guys were from the main bands of the day. He was probably already earmarked that, if he went to Korea, he would in the Tenth Special, whereas I got in by an audition.

C: Do you think he was very far ahead musically from everyone else in the band?

G: Yes, there were other excellent guys from main bands but Pepper stood out. Even though we had written arrangements, I'm quite sure what he was playing wasn't written. There was just the background, where the band was backing it up, so he was probably doing his own ad lib completely.

C: Did Pepper have a chance to write any arrangements for the band or were all the arrangements pretty stock?

G: I do know that we had a couple of guys writing arrangements for the band. He might've been one of them who was writing the arrangements.

C: What was the typical performance? Walk me through. If I was in the audience, tell me what I'd see?

G: A typical show was an hour long. They'd always open up with some fantastic uptempo arrangement of the band and maybe even play a couple of them before getting to any of the specialty acts. It was really trying to get the guys excited right off the bat. Then the specialty acts varied between the different platoons. We had this hypnotist, Bob Weiss. If I hadn't seen it, I wouldn't have believed it. I know he had no way of getting any shills in the audience. He would make a post-somatic suggestion: He would say a certain word and they would do something. I couldn't believe that a hypnotist was that good to do it. The Country Western player was from Nashville. He was playing the hit songs of the day. He went over extremely well. We did have a number of singers that were quite good. 

C: So the band would break into small groups and you'd have little performances, singing or whatever it was?

G: Right. The band would still be sitting there but we'd be playing in front of the band. The band would back up the singers or the things of that nature. I'd play some solos, but the band would also be backing me up. The band varied from maybe twelve to fifteen members, depending on who was rotating in. The band was fantastic! I would've never had the opportunity to play with that high a quality of group if I hadn't been in the service. 

C: You had the comedian Al Lamo?

G: He was very, very good! All of the specialty acts had different outfits.

C: Did you ever get a chance to record the band?

G: I'm going to give a qualified "no." I wish I did. 

C: You had a three year tour of duty, correct?

G: Right. I got out a little early because I served overseas. I was what they called an "RA." I enlisted. That's the reason I was three years. If you were drafted, you were only two years.

C: I'm trying to figure out Pepper's tour of duty. Do you think it was shortened because of his service overseas?

G: It could've been. He went in '51 and he came out . . . ?

C: He enlisted on July 12, 1951 and he got discharge papers at Fort Custer, Michigan on June 5, 1953. 

G: OK, then he was drafted, but he could've been earmarked for Tenth Special when they needed one. He left [Korea] in May and they pulled the shows off the road at the cease fire in June. 

C: Where was Pepper based in Incheon? What was there?

G: He wasn't based there. He landed there.

C: Where would he have gone then?

G: He would've gone to Seoul, and from Seoul they would've gotten him as soon as possible into the second platoon.

C: In Seoul he would've been in a bunk somewhere? 

G: He would've been in Seoul probably no more that one or two days at that time. 

C: What was that place called?

G: Eighth Army Headquarters. Actually, the Tenth Special Service Company was a member of the Adjutant General Corp. of the Eighth Army Headquarters. On our collars we wore a shield that stood for the Eighth Army Adjutant General Corp. 

JACKIE GOULD: "Adjutant General," in today's nomenclature, are the lawyers. It's the legal arm of the Army.

G: I think it's important that you do mention Tenth Special as a member of the Adjutant General Corp. of the Eighth Army Headquarters because that's very high on the hog.

C: Who were some of the guys doing logistics?

G: There were usually about 18-19 players or entertainers. The others were in charge of keeping the trucks in shape. They were the ones that put the tents up and took them down. They helped set up the props if we were using them. They were very, very important people, especially when we were on the road and we weren't using our trunks. When we were at MASH Units they already had tents there. I'm quite sure Pepper would say the same thing: We really enjoyed playing the MASH Units because here's where the guys were that were severely wounded right off the front lines. They sure needed morale boosters.

C: How often did you doing that?

G: We were doing that fairly often. We were going back and forth from the MLR to the MASH Unit. We probably did MASH shows maybe twenty times. 

C: You did basic training at Ft. Leonard Wood? How long was basic training?

G: Eight weeks.

C: What was that like to get through? 

G: That was actually very interesting because they were giving you all kinds of training: On bazookas, going through obstacle courses, all kind of things. I was one of the top sharpshooters since I had been a rifle instructor before being in the Service. But I never did any shooting at all in Korea.

C: Did Pepper or any of these guys do any fighting?

G: Not in Korea, to my knowledge. When the enemy broke through at times at night, we were there but I don't think you could say we did any actual fighting. We were riding with the infantry guys at the time. We were prepared. We carried M-1s or M-2s--whatever it was with us--but I don't think we ever did.

C: The great drummer Mel Lewis said that Pepper picked up a really nasty foot fungus in Korea and he still had it three years later when he toured with Kenton in 1956. What was it like with personal hygiene and traveling?

G: It was a little bit rough because it wasn't too often that you had the ability to take a shower. If you did, it might even be a cold one. We sometimes would play an extra show--it wasn't on schedule--for officers, who would have their own shower and all that kind of stuff. They were at the front lines. By doing it, they would maybe allow us to use their shower facilities. 

C: Normal things like going to the bathroom. Did you go outside?  

G: Sometimes there'd be latrines at different areas but you'd stop along the road and take a leak. You had toilet paper. They provided it for you.

C: Did you eat mostly cold food or did you have a designated cook?

G: Actually, we did have what they call "C Rations" (canned food) occasionally, but we would quite often eat with whatever group we were playing shows with. We played for the British, which was in the wintertime, where you cleaned your utensils afterwards. It was frozen over. You couldn't even clean your utensils. It was the most filthy I'd ever seen.

C: Pepper left before you got re-assigned?

G: He left before the shows were off the road. He only started playing shows maybe six weeks before I did but he would've still played in a heck of a lot of shows. I never kept track of it but when I was in Korea, when they awarded me that special medal, they said I played in 268 shows in front of an estimated 189,000 troops in less than a year. 

C: Wow! That basically averaged one a day.

G: The highest we ever did, and it only happened once, we played four shows in one day. We very often played two shows in one day. 

C: Was that because you were playing two shows in one spot and then you'd play another two shows in another spot?

G: We did four shows. We did some traveling that day, so we played two shows in one area and two shows in another. But four shows in one day is tremendous because the roads that we had to travel through in the MLR were so terrible, you couldn't go more than ten, fifteen--twenty miles an hour would be fast! We couldn't go very fast at all.

C: How about flat tires and breakdowns? Did that happen a lot?

G: That did happen. We had one truck that was terrible. When went to a motor pool one day to do some work on it. Ultimately, we exchanged the hood of the truck with a brand new one, putting our hood on a new truck so it had all our information on it.

C: Was Pepper part of the command performance for President Rhee at the Presidential Palace?

G: Yes he was, very definitely.

C: Have any photographs or any information about that surfaced?

G: I have heard that there was a recording made of the Tenth Special, all the way through.

C: Where?

G: That would've been around the time that the recording was made of Jerry [Lehmeier, in April 1953]. It was on the road.

C: Did a performance ever stop because of an insurgency or artillery or anything?

G: There were times when shows were cancelled, yes.

C: How about in the middle of a show? Did you have to stop because you had to duck and take cover?

G: That didn't actually happen. I didn't know until after I published the book, but there were three people killed from the Second Platoon. 

C: That was before Pepper and you?

G: Right. One was killed by a sniper and two were from land mines.

C: About those dud mortars that had "We enjoyed the show too" in English, Pepper was in the band at that time?

G: Yeah, very definitely.

C: There were two mortars that said, "We enjoyed the show?"

G: Yes. They probably wanted to make sure that at least one of them came through OK.

C: That's hilarious! You were on the road almost the entire time, but tell me about the time with the house boy and where you would've been staying then. That was in Seoul, right?

G: That was in Seoul. When we were on the road, not very often, we'd be in Seoul just a day or two while we were redoing different supplies or things changed. I was actually stationed at Fort Headquarters after the shows came off the road and that's when I got to know Kim Byong Joo. I didn't know him earlier when we were there for a day or two at a time. That's only when Pepper would've gotten to know him because [Pepper] wasn't there after the show came off the road. 

C: Regarding the chronology, where would you've gone from Seoul to do your very first show?

G: I think there was one rehearsal and then I went.

C: You have a map in your book but I'm trying to get a sense of how all this flowed. The first stop was the British Commonwealth UN Unit. A lot of this was in territory that was barely marked, right? How did you guys get around? Who navigated?

G: We had thirteen vehicles. One was a Jeep. One was a three-quarter-ton truck, and then there was this one special, large truck that was the same size as what they call a "Deuce-and-a-Half." And all the rest were Deuce-and-a-Halfs. Our trucks were pretty well filled with all the stuff we had to carry. 

C: What does Deuce-and-a-Half mean?

G: Two and a half tons. 

C: Were you traveling a lot at night or in the dusk?

G: It could be any time. If you were traveling at night, you didn't use much of any headlights. We tried to travel during the day if we could but at times we definitely were traveling at night.

C: There's a picture of Able Battery in the book. It's on page 20. Did you guys perform there?

G: Before the cease fire we definitely did play there. Able Battery is the farthest north we ever played.

C: The Bulldozer Bowl? Do you know where that was?

G: That would've been back about twenty miles from the front lines.

C: Do you remember any of the shows or locations when you were doing two a day for ten straight days? You said that week was especially grueling.

G: That would have been near the MLR to do that many that often. We played in Pusan, which was sort of near the end. They brought all of our thirteen vehicles and us back on flatbeds aboard a train. It took us two days to get back up to Seoul. On the front of it, while we were on the flatbeds, we were playing and going through these little towns where the Koreans were. They were rather amazed. It was like a circus. These weren't scheduled as performances. We were just playing for ourselves, goofing around. That would've been on our way home from Pusan. We were eating "C" Rations only.

C: What kind of horrors did you see? I'm trying to understand what kind of horrors Pepper would've seen on the battlefield.

G: We would've seen that when we were at MASH. We would've seen people with limbs missing. Around the countryside things were bombed out. Seoul was virtually 100% bombed out. The Chosen Hotel was still there, because the military used it for their high brass. What they called the Dak Soon Mansion (or Blue Roof Mansion), where President Syngman Rhee lived, they never touched that. Otherwise, it was really almost completely a bombed out area.

C: Pepper told me that the Koreans were absolutely terrified of the Chinese invading their country.

G: That's true.