Backstory to “The Jazz Flute”

When I initially took up playing the flute, I was only interested in classical music. Except for a brief enchantment with Miles Davis’s Sketches of Spain when I was a teenager, the jazz genre didn’t interest me.

The main problem was that I didn’t understand what jazz was about.

Some years later, a friend and excellent jazz vibes player, John Obenar, took me in hand and explained the process of improvising on the chord changes of a tune. What I learned was that most jazz improvisation is variations on a theme — or, more accurately, the harmonic implications of themes. So I started to learn how to play jazz on the flute, and eventually joined a number of improvisation groups in Illinois and California.

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Here’s a tale of weird gig I played on New Year’s Eve in 1969 with our band called Thesis (Hammond B3 organ,  drums, electric bass, electric guitar, 2 singers and myself on electrified flute.) We performed our version of tunes included works by Gershwin, Sly and the Family Stone, other pop and jazz composers, and some original works we created for our group.

Our manager scored us a job to play in a large hall at the south end of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park.  Our equipment guy came early and set us all up,  including what I needed for my electric flute (octaver, reverb unit and even a wahwah pedal) . We all smoked or drank something to put us in the right mood for the occasion.

At around 11 o'clock our audience was assembled and marched in by their supervisors.

Supervisors?

About 20 or 30 folks from one of the local metal institutions came in looking somewhat confused but pleasantly expectant as they moved onto the dance floor.

“Whoa,  this is crazy!” Said  Ron, leader of our band.

True in both senses.

But as we started to play, our initial doubts vanished as the “crazy” dancers threw themselves into the vibe of the music.

I particularly remember one fellow came up to us and kept shouting “Play Popcorn! Play Popcorn!”   — a currently popular James Brown number.

Short people were dancing with tall people, young with old,  Black Asian and White — all dancing together in celebration of the coming new year.

Then the midnight hour struck. At once the supervisors came in, lined up the dancers and marched them away.

All of us in the band looked at each other with a sense of astonishment: it felt like a hallucination that had never happened, but one we remembered anyway.

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