Don your space suits and get ready for a quick flash across the eons to a smokey late night place not so far away as planetary time travel goes: for the second round of celebration, we cross Paris to the heart of the old city in the Sixth Arrondissement, Saint Germain des Près in ’67. Two characters, habitués of the nightlife, are showing each other around the 88s in the Living Room.
“Art Simmons was really the glue that held the African-American community of artists and intellectuals together in the 1950s and 1960s,” said no less an authority than drummer Kenny Clarke, a Bebop kingpin and longtime Paris resident. Simmons was from West Virginia and held sway at the Mars Club and later, the Living Room. “Paris was jumping then. The best period for African Americans… was from 1948 to ‘68.” You can take Simmons’ word for it, but with so many Americans on the road these days, maybe something similar is shaping up now ?
Samson François, the man playing Debussy for Simmons at the start of the video, is a legendary French pianist. Born in Frankfurt to a diplomatic family, he travelled all over Europe as a young man, winning prizes and plaudits wherever he went (debut age six playing playing Mozart under Mascagni in Italy, studies in Belgrade, Nice and Paris under Cortot and Boulanger). He played English camps and factories during World War II, toured the United States and China after. In some ways the inverse of Glenn Gould, who fled the stage for the studio, François’ is remembered for his thrilling, authoritative performances. No piece of music was ever played precisely the same way twice and like Gould, François enjoyed a memory like a vault, playing without a score. “He played in the moment, as if he were improvising,'“ says one account, and he pretty much died on stage, suffering a massive heart attack a year after this short film was shot. He may be the last of the 19th century prodigies, who just happened to live mid-20th century.
The camera pans the faces in the room, listens to François’s take on jazz before Nancy Holloway badgers her way to the mike for a rendition of the Gershwin nugget They All Laughed that hits all the right notes.
That’s it for the time travel, folks, Part II of Catalina’s birthday. Enjoy.
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Back with longer, substantial essays about life in Paris and France shortly, three or four longer pieces all in process now, all almost there - before the end of the month. I’m busy editing a novel for a New York agent who will inevitably pass on it, but it can’t hurt to put the effort in. Continental Riffs is my small island where I keep pumping out news, lest publishers and others forget I’m alive, here - and books ought to be about more than American feelz… Meanwhile, Riff’s novel-in-waiting subscription drive is here, and the secret +1 plan is hidden at the bottom of the page here. A steal.