Albert Gardner, Jr. interview recording, 1994 August 12 / Behind the Veil / Duke Digital Repository

Albert Gardner, Jr.

You see how my voice would.

0:01

Kate Ellis

I don't want to do that. Tell me, why don't you state your name.

0:03

Albert Gardner, Jr.

My name is Albert Samuel Gardner Junior. Everybody knows me as June Gardner.

0:08

Kate Ellis

What I want to find out about first is just your growing up time in New Orleans. What do you remember about, well, first of all, you were born in New Orleans. Where'd you grow up?

0:17

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Not too far from here on St. Andrew Street, St. Andrew, between Magnolia and Robinson. I moved there when I was, say, three years old and I spent all the rest of my life there. I started traveling from there. I went to school from there.

0:27

Kate Ellis

You started traveling?

0:48

Albert Gardner, Jr.

From let's address here.

0:49

Kate Ellis

During high school.

0:52

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Elementary school.

0:53

Kate Ellis

Traveling to play?

0:55

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Play music, yeah. It was just that one address at that time in the beginning until I got married. This was St. Andrew, between Magnolia and Robinson, across from the 12th Precinct. That was a police station. It was a fun neighborhood.

0:57

Kate Ellis

It was a fun neighborhood. Tell me about it.

1:18

Albert Gardner, Jr.

This was early '40s. It was integrated before integration came out of— Just people knew what integration was. The shop owners lived in the neighborhood and everybody got along as well.

1:25

Kate Ellis

Really?

1:39

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. It was there you couldn't go certain places. But I'm just speaking about in the immediate area where I lived at, it was White, Black, Spanish. They all played together and everybody grew up in with their own way.

1:39

Kate Ellis

Their own separate ways.

2:00

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Different professions, and some were police. Some was fool, some was wise men and the whole spectrum, but it was fun.

2:03

Kate Ellis

Really? So you hung out together?

2:16

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, that's where I started playing music. I started talking the phone, elementary school under Professor Valmont Victor.

2:19

Kate Ellis

What was his name?

2:27

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Valmont Victor.

2:27

Kate Ellis

Valmont Victor?

2:30

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Victor.

2:33

Kate Ellis

Victor.

2:33

Albert Gardner, Jr.

God bless him as Sam. He contributed a lot of music to this city and a lot of young Black guys before me, men who are much older. Some are still living, some went on on, when I say on, that mean they passed.

2:36

Kate Ellis

But he is somebody who taught a lot of the Black musicians around here?

2:57

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. It's a shame nobody mentions his name, very, very few people. But he was a very great man. He had his way of teaching, but I'm satisfied with what he did.

3:08

Kate Ellis

So he taught, he was your primary music teacher?

3:13

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, drum teacher.

3:15

Kate Ellis

Drum teacher, when did you start playing? When did you first become a musician?

3:18

Albert Gardner, Jr.

In elementary school, it was 1946, '45, '46.

3:22

Kate Ellis

So how was that? I mean, when you were young, what made you decide to start playing drums?

3:33

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I don't know. It just something. One day, it was twenty-five cents a lesson. Had a couple of friends and was in the band and I came and asked my mom. Lot of things was tough. Quarter was a lot of money. I mean, me being a kid, I wanted to do, said, "I want to play the drums." So thank God too, found a way, and my dad, I was able to pay the twenty-five cents a week and listening to the records and I was living on St. Andrew Street. We had a lot of ballrooms and the music would be playing all the time.

3:40

Kate Ellis

Really? So you—

4:19

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Come up around that. There's always music in the house. We always had a piano. Nobody really played it. My sisters was taking lessons and the Professor would come over and they would play it and I would just be beating on the table. This type of thing.

4:21

Kate Ellis

While your sisters were playing?

4:43

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Sometimes.

4:44

Kate Ellis

This same professor, this—

4:44

Albert Gardner, Jr.

No, Professor Victor was not my sister's piano teacher. He was my teacher in performance school. He was my first.

4:47

Kate Ellis

So their own music teacher would come out.

4:54

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. I don't know the teacher's name. I said I was a youngster and I was, like I said, again, being a baby in an old family, my sisters was much older than me, was a lot of love with them. And I was just a little dude running around there trying to peep everybody's hold cards.

4:56

Kate Ellis

Trying what?

5:16

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Trying to peep everybody's hold cards. That's the term from gambling. You got to get—

5:19

Kate Ellis

No, tell me.

5:25

Albert Gardner, Jr.

When you'd be looking at the cards when you're playing cards, and that's what they call peeping, you look to see what the card is.

5:26

Kate Ellis

So you'd be trying— You're just getting stuff around the family.

5:38

Albert Gardner, Jr.

What it means is in terms is you find out what was going on, just being curious.

5:43

Kate Ellis

Because everybody was much older than you.

5:44

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, everybody having a cocktail or something and other. I'm looking, but it was fun.

5:45

Kate Ellis

That's interesting. But you had music. Did you ever sneak into those barrooms, or you went, how old were you when first starting going in there?

5:52

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, I was fourteen years old. I started, let's see, I don't— fifteen, I started working at the Dew Drop Inn.

6:04

Kate Ellis

Oh, really?

6:06

Albert Gardner, Jr.

That's where I'd been playing.

6:06

Kate Ellis

When you were fifteen?

6:08

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Fifteen years old with Edgar Blanchard & The Gondoliers.

6:12

Kate Ellis

I'm sorry?

6:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Edgar Blanchard & The Gondoliers was the name of the group. I'll show you. I think I got an old photo of us. I show it to my friends and says, "See, I told you I was a child once."

6:16

Kate Ellis

You have that photo here?

6:31

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, I think I have it in the—

6:35

Kate Ellis

Really?

6:35

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I'll try if I can find—

6:35

Kate Ellis

I'd love to look at it. I'd have to see that. So you started, how did you get that job with him?

6:35

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I was playing with the local band, a big band here. It was called Jay Johnson. A lot of the guys, we all went to school together with about fifteen pieces, and we used to rehearse, practice, in the Dew Drop.

6:41

Kate Ellis

Oh, you practiced at—

6:57

Albert Gardner, Jr.

We used to practice there. They used to let us practice in the room called the Groove Room that's next to the Dew Drop. It's all part of the Dew Drop. But then this guy, Edgar Blanchard, came in one day and said, "Hey, I like the little drummer." And I'm young and about 119 pounds, I was playing the drums and then gave me the opportunity to play with him. I was too young to get a drink in the place, but I was the drummer and that was one of my really first experiencing exposure to playing shows and learning how to keep time, because I was ridiculous at keeping time during that time.

6:58

Kate Ellis

Really?

7:45

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. The singer would come out and he'd be singing at a slow tempo, like a slow song.

7:45

Kate Ellis

And you'd start going—

7:52

Albert Gardner, Jr.

And when he'd finished, said he'd be out of breath and I'd be out of breath. So if looks could speak, like I said, I wouldn't been able to make it to the next day. But all that was part of it.

7:53

Kate Ellis

So they weren't too hard on you as far as they were patient.

8:09

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, they were hard on, because I was getting paid, it was chump change. By that I mean, you don't got the money.

8:13

Kate Ellis

I know. But they kept you on.

8:21

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, but I appreciate it to this day, because it made me a better person, first of all. Than it made me a better musician.

8:22

Kate Ellis

It's something that you say just strikes me as far as working at the Dew Drop and the fact that your band could practice in the Groove Room and stuff like that. Sounds like, I mean, at the time, that was a place that it seems like a lot of people got their start. Is that right?

8:35

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, well, it's quite a few. A lot of people lie about it to getting their start there. Everybody likes to be part of a winner.

8:51

Kate Ellis

So it has this legendary—

8:59

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I stay out to politics of that, excuse the expression, that bullshit. Everybody was there. I was there. So I'm listening. I just turned it on. But I know, and I know a lot of other people that's living know, but a lot of people did get their start there.

9:01

Kate Ellis

And you worked, obviously, [indistinct 00:09:22].

9:20

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Oh yeah, I was fortunate.

9:20

Kate Ellis

This might be making too much of a leap, but having been working on this project for a couple of months now and talked to a lot of different people, one of the things we're interested in is how during Jim Crow segregation, different communities were formed, different institutions were formed within Black communities. And it just strikes me, [indistinct 00:09:48].

9:26

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, there was a lot of places to play. With integration, we couldn't go— We could work on Bourbon Street, we could work on [indistinct 00:09:56] Street, and any one of the White clubs and hotels go in the back way and on the break had to sit in the storeroom with all the cans. Well, but somebody bring in a bottle of rotgut whiskeys, and say, "I want you boys to get hot tonight." And that's the kind of bullshit and everybody would say four letter word, I don't mean love, but I mean everybody, we got along fine.

9:48

Kate Ellis

Who got along fine?

10:23

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Everybody in the band and the proprietor.

10:26

Kate Ellis

So the band got along okay with the proprietor?

10:27

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. What could you do? This was the law of the land. I didn't appreciate it. Never did, never will. I was a man then and a man now. But you worked in this place, you couldn't go to the bar. Different people would come and say, "I enjoyed." We were working at a place on Bourbon Street, Earl Williams.

10:30

Kate Ellis

Earl Williams?

10:54

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. This was years later. And people say, "I like to buy you guys a drink." All we had to do is sit against the wall, because we couldn't go from where I'm sitting— Like if the bar was right at this wall, they wouldn't sell it.

10:56

Kate Ellis

Wow. [indistinct 00:11:17].

11:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

So, you being a man, so you could understand why a lot of people have high blood pressure. So you didn't appreciate it, and I'm just trying to be kosher.

11:16

Kate Ellis

Trying to be what?

11:30

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Kosher.

11:31

Kate Ellis

Just trying to keep the cool.

11:35

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, well, I'll give it to you. They know and you know, they know that you knew it was wrong, but that was part of things to come to survive that.

11:36

Kate Ellis

But as far as how you interacted with them at the time, they knew that you would—

11:47

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Because everybody, we had friends. We weren't allowed to play together, Black and White musicians at the time, but we found ways to play together.

11:51

Kate Ellis

How would you do that?

11:58

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, it would come early or you'd stay late.

11:59

Kate Ellis

You mean at a club or something, come early or stay late?

12:04

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. We always had a way of playing together but we did.

12:06

Kate Ellis

It's interesting because I think it was Mr. Dejean who was telling me about how sometimes he had, I guess, they had a White guy playing with them and somebody would sort of say, "Hey, you're not supposed to be here."

12:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, everywhere they would go.

12:23

Kate Ellis

And they'd say, "Oh well, he's Mulatto," or, "He just came out really—" Or something [indistinct 00:12:28]

12:24

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, there's a variety of colors in New Orleans. It was very hard, and speaking of colors, we had a friend of ours, the bartender was working at the Dew Drop. And we would come to the show bar on Bourbon Street, we had to come in through the side door.

12:27

Kate Ellis

On Bourbon.

12:43

Albert Gardner, Jr.

The side door was right by the bandstand, not by the bar, the front door. And we would go through the side door, right to the bandstand. And the friend of ours is very light-skinned guy. Let me see this. [indistinct 00:13:01]

12:46

Kate Ellis

[indistinct 00:13:01] too. You're talking about coming in through the side right by the—

13:01

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Like I said, the bartender, he's a very dear friend and very light-skinned guy. He would go in there with the crowd. We'd be on the bandstand.

13:08

Kate Ellis

He was the bartender, but he was light-skinned?

13:18

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Oh yeah.

13:20

Kate Ellis

His employer knew that he was Black, so to speak.

13:22

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Oh yeah, everybody knew he was Black.

13:24

Kate Ellis

Because of the [indistinct 00:13:27].

13:26

Albert Gardner, Jr.

We're Colored at that time.

13:27

Kate Ellis

The color was what—

13:29

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Colored, didn't say he was Colored. You wouldn't say he was Black then, but he was Colored dude. But he would fit right in. Nobody knew who he were.

13:30

Kate Ellis

So he'd go in the—

13:41

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. Well, then some guys, like I said, it was, well, integration have always been here, because people was a people, two people dig each other solid. But back then, that time I can remember some Black guys were passing, they were light skinned. They were passing and they married the White ladies, and then integration came by. They were lost in the shuffle.

13:42

Kate Ellis

You mean nobody ever knew that they were—

14:10

Albert Gardner, Jr.

They didn't know this is what he wanted to be.

14:12

Kate Ellis

So he kind of—

14:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, who am I now? He can't come back to the brothers, because I mean he gave up being a Colored. He don't have nothing to do with you.

14:16

Kate Ellis

That's interesting. That's interesting they should say that because—

14:26

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, New Orleans is full of that.

14:28

Kate Ellis

And so I've heard. That's always struck me. I think you even talked about [indistinct 00:14:36].

14:31

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Families.

14:34

Kate Ellis

But people who would go for White, say, in the '40s and '50s, and then the '60s come around, integration.

14:37

Albert Gardner, Jr.

They had to have the Colored ladies and dudes, your complexion. I had this family, we come up together. Like I said, they were just Colored. I mean but they could easily pass, because as you see it, New Orleans is a gumbo of people and mixtures. But it was cool.

14:46

Kate Ellis

But I mean there were people that you knew that cut themselves off from—

15:05

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Oh yeah.

15:09

Kate Ellis

Then that's what you're saying. Some people, they couldn't go back to the brothers, you said, during integration.

15:11

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, that's there. Exactly.

15:16

Kate Ellis

Because they already—

15:16

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I had one of them, I'll tell you, this happened a long time ago. I had one friend of mine from here, and we all come up together. This other friend was a very light-skinned guy, and he married a White lady, but he didn't let anybody know. A friend from here came, he moved to Los Angeles, and he would knock on his door, and he came to the door and said he couldn't talk to him. Because he went on the other side and he didn't want his wife to know.

15:22

Kate Ellis

So his wife—

15:48

Albert Gardner, Jr.

— that he was associated.

15:48

Kate Ellis

His wife never knew?

15:48

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Exactly.

15:50

Kate Ellis

But wasn't anybody even in his family darker than Black [indistinct 00:15:54]?

15:51

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, I didn't know. I guess he cut everybody off. But it's just some of the things that went on, but it was interesting. Some people said, "No, that couldn't happen." But I know and a whole lot of people who lived through that know.

15:55

Kate Ellis

That must create a lot of pain in families.

16:07

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. Well, I call it edge of night now.

16:16

Kate Ellis

I'm sorry?

16:20

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I call it the edge of night when them—

16:20

Kate Ellis

The edge of night?

16:22

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, that little friction in the family there. Oprah just did a show pertaining to something like that a couple of days ago on her TV show.

16:25

Kate Ellis

Really?

16:35

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. Some people was raised, they didn't know they were Colored. Some of them raised as Colored didn't know they were White. Really, it's in the heart, who cares, but I mean that was part of that time.

16:36

Kate Ellis

Yeah.

16:48

Albert Gardner, Jr.

And with all of that, it was fun. We had a lot of fun, because we had a lot of places to go. Plenty of music, damn near every Colored ball or club had a band. Some seven nights a week, you have entertainment.

16:48

Kate Ellis

So did you play most every night?

17:06

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Every night, I was going to school. I was going to elementary school five days a week. And I was playing at the Dew Drop six nights a week. I couldn't get a drink. I was in elementary school.

17:08

Kate Ellis

So you started, when did you first start performing out in public?

17:18

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, like I said, I was about fifteen.

17:21

Kate Ellis

Wow.

17:21

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I was a little dude, and I was, I'd say a 100 pounds.

17:21

Kate Ellis

[indistinct 00:17:34].

17:21

Albert Gardner, Jr.

All the dancers, I played for all of the shows. All the shake dances, I was everybody's little brother, "Oh, June."

17:35

Kate Ellis

Really, all the shake dances?

17:41

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, we played the shows. It was fun. All the things I did, shaking their booty while I'm playing.

17:43

Kate Ellis

Oh, you mean like strip clubs?

17:49

Albert Gardner, Jr.

No, not strippers. This was floor shows. I mean they have a comedian, a singer, a dancer, a exotic dancer. I didn't even call it, whatever the name.

17:51

Kate Ellis

I see, so you [indistinct 00:18:02].

18:00

Albert Gardner, Jr.

We said shake dance. I mean, she would like, we'd play Caravan. I mean, she'd be a professional dancer.

18:02

Kate Ellis

I see. Did you play strip clubs, like on Bourbon Street?

18:08

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I played strip clubs, not necessarily the way I played it. We played with the band. This was during segregation again, but the band would play like an hour and then the strip shows would come on. But we had to go outside. They didn't want us to sit inside and that's some bullshit. We had to go outside.

18:12

Kate Ellis

They didn't want you to see—

18:31

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I didn't want to see what's on the stage anyhow. All rejects, well, that was part of that that was really funny.

18:32

Kate Ellis

That sounds like an interesting time.

18:46

Albert Gardner, Jr.

It was, just to survive with something else. One of the [indistinct 00:18:55], you had to keep a sense of humor, because you were being put down and all, and you wasn't being paid right. You couldn't go. You had to urinate, you couldn't go to the bathroom. On the bus, you had to stand up, but they'll draft you in the army. That's what happened to me in '51. I was with Roy "Good Rockin'" Brown at the time.

18:50

Kate Ellis

I'm sorry?

19:21

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Roy "Good Rockin'" Brown. He had a record called Good Rockin' Tonight, and I was on the— We traveled all over the country with him, and I was with him when they called me in the army. I had three days. I was in California. I had three days to get back here, and then the army had just started integrating in '51. That was another thing.

19:22

Kate Ellis

Tell me about that.

19:44

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, when you first went in the army, everybody ever take all their clothes off. Man said, "I don't care what color, you'll take it off." Some Black guys was ashamed to take off their clothes in front of White guys. Some the White guys ashamed to take off their clothes in front of the Black guys. Guys from New Orleans, we just took our clothes off, see?

19:47

Albert Gardner, Jr.

But they weren't used to seeing, nobody wants to look y'all in the army. Nobody wants to be there. I didn't want to be there. I'm glad I served my time. It made me a better person. But at the time when they called me, I was, like I said, I was twenty-one. I went in 1951, August. Like I said, I was having a lot of fun all over the country. This guy had a big record. He was a big rhythm and blues, that's before rock and roll. That's a whole nother story too.

20:08

Kate Ellis

Well, tell me about, well, I mean let's—

20:47

Albert Gardner, Jr.

No, listen, I'm speaking about the music, like rock and roll. That was the name that was taken from a record a hundred years ago. Not a hundred, but the Dominoes, they're "rock and roll and all night long" on the Sixty Minute Man. But all the credit went to Alan Freed as inventing rock and roll, and that's the biggest bullshit in the world. Just in the music was known as, excuse the expression, nigger music, rhythm and blues. There wasn't no rock and roll.

20:50

Kate Ellis

Wait, what was it? No rock and, you mean the—

21:19

Albert Gardner, Jr.

The term of the music, what they call rock and roll, no, it was rhythm and blues. But like I said, that was part of the music thing. Well anyhow, at home, I finally ended up getting in the band. That was hard. Like I said, because it was in the beginning of integration.

21:24

Kate Ellis

So it was hard getting in the band because—

21:42

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, they wasn't letting brothers in the band at the time, wasn't letting brothers out in any place.

21:44

Kate Ellis

What do you mean?

21:54

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, you had to be exceptional almost in your talent or whatever you did. They had the auditions, and at the time, I was reading good.

21:54

Kate Ellis

Reading music well?

22:02

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, and then they just wanted soldiers. They wasn't interested in nobody in the band, but I hung in there, and with the help of the Good Lord, I guess, and a lot of prayers, I made it into the band. After basic training, I got out the service in '53 and came back. Went back on the road with Roy "Good Rockin'" Brown again at the time. When I came back with various artists, then I came back in '56, I went out with Lionel Hampton.

22:04

Kate Ellis

In '56?

22:34

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, toured all over Europe and Asia with him and came back. Then I went early years of Ray Charles, I went out there and starved to death with him.

22:43

Kate Ellis

Starved to death with him?

22:54

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yes, before. He was singing, but he wasn't as big an artist.

22:57

Kate Ellis

I see.

23:00

Albert Gardner, Jr.

It was a great experience.

23:01

Kate Ellis

Well, I was curious about that as far as when you're saying you're not paid right, I mean, during that whole period. I mean, how hard was it to survive as far as—

23:04

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, like being young I guess, and strong, because you had to be strong mentally and physically. You would play a dance, and the promoters, I don't know, say like the band was guaranteed, I'm just using this round figure at that time, say, 500 dollars. And they didn't have that many people who come in. They would call those kind of dance see for yourself. Number one, the proprietary table, you see for yourself, I didn't have anybody in here. So that's where the—

23:16

Kate Ellis

Oh no.

23:48

Albert Gardner, Jr.

At that time, so you see, there wasn't no see for yourself job. And then sometimes you would make the money and the promoters would run off with the money. You had all of that done. It had to be something that you wanted to do, and your family was buying you, because at the time I was a younger man.

23:51

Kate Ellis

Your family was what?

24:14

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Your family had to be riding you. You wouldn't want your son out there ripping and running on the road. You said, "Come on, bring your butt home with this." You was able to take care of yourself, it made you a better person. You took nothing and did something with nothing is what I'm saying.

24:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

A little bit of something, like maybe a sandwich. A sandwich, you made it all day on the sandwich to the next job. Then after you get off, you couldn't go to the restaurants because of segregation. You would go to the bus station and then you'd go to the Colored section in the bus station. And some of the little towns didn't have a bus station. So you'd get off from work, if you was fortunate, you had something, what they would call chorus girls in the can. You know what that is?

24:32

Kate Ellis

No, chorus girls in the?

25:05

Albert Gardner, Jr.

In the can.

25:07

Kate Ellis

In the can.

25:07

Albert Gardner, Jr.

In the can, sardines. So that's what the term is, "I got some chorus girls in the can." They made it through.

25:08

Kate Ellis

Wow. So you went hungry.

25:27

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Oh yeah, many times. But this was all part of it if I wanted to be in the business, and I came back to New Orleans and worked around here with just about everybody. Dave Bartholomew, Howard Dave Johnson, a lot of local bands, Jay Johnson. Everybody contribute to my talent with whatever little part I have, and I appreciate it from all of them. I had my own group that I played with, and like I said, '56 with Lionel Hampton, and then I came back. To the '60s I went with Sam Cooke for five years, I was with him.

25:30

Kate Ellis

In his band?

26:22

Albert Gardner, Jr.

He didn't have a band. He had personal musicians.

26:22

Kate Ellis

And you were one of those.

26:23

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I had Cliff White, Cliff White with the guitars. Harper Cosby was a bass player, and I was a drummer. He was one of the first rhythm and blues singers to have his own rhythm section. Because what had happened, like they would be playing different places each night and they had a different drummer. Each night, it's a different beat. So he happened to come through New Orleans, and I was fortunate enough to get the job.

26:24

Kate Ellis

You said after he came through New Orleans, he stuck with, are you saying?

26:54

Albert Gardner, Jr.

In New— Yeah.

26:57

Kate Ellis

He stuck with you.

26:58

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, so it was fun.

26:58

Kate Ellis

So you traveled with him?

27:02

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, until he got killed, you know what I mean? [indistinct 00:27:06] himself. We had just come home. We had just closed. We had did the Copacabana in New York and then we went to Atlantic City. Then we did some one-nighters and we went to Atlanta, Georgia, for three days, and that was just before Christmas. So after the job, we had a big party and he was a very generous guy. I mean, you had your salary, but he would always put extra money. Then we finished the job and he gave everybody a piece of money and said, "Let's go get them children ready for Christmas." Because Christmas Eve, what year was that? He got killed '64, somewhere.

27:03

Albert Gardner, Jr.

We were going open at to Duval Hotel in Miami Beach at Christmas Eve. See with Sam Cooke, I was the only one from New Orleans. Cliff White, the guitar player, lived in Los Angeles. Sam lived in Los Angeles, and the bass player, Harper Cosby, he lived in Los Angeles. The funny thing about it, he was going to buy everybody a house because he was going to move me to Los Angeles. So anyhow, he was maybe about the twelfth or thirteenth of December. After we left Atlanta, Georgia, I came to New Orleans and I had a habit of giving away all my clothes, because I used to buy a lot of clothes on the road.

27:55

Kate Ellis

And then you'd give them away?

28:34

Albert Gardner, Jr.

And when I come home, I'd give them away. I came and give all my clothes away and I'm sleeping, and my niece wakes me up. I forgot the date. That kills you, but she said, "Uncle June, I just heard Sam Cooke got killed on the radio." I was in a deep sleeping. I called California, and it was true, but it was a tragic. It was one of those type of things. Sam was a dude. He was at home in any situation. He lived in Hollywood and he came from Hollywood to another part of town, but that's another story too. But that was a beautiful run whiles it lasted.

28:36

Kate Ellis

Really?

29:20

Albert Gardner, Jr.

So I came back home and mostly had my own group around them, big bands and smaller, like I said, playing around different clubs. I played in Mason's Motel. That was a big club here.

29:21

Kate Ellis

Willie Mason's Motel?

29:37

Albert Gardner, Jr.

No, it's Mason's Motel, it was on South Claiborne Street, and all the different bars. Work was plentiful, you know what I mean? I had my own group. I was working with a lot of locals. I came back with David Bartholomew again. And that's just about it. I've been here, and I've traveled through Europe, like the last five, six years. As a matter of fact, I was supposed to be leaving on the twenty-fourth of this month. But the guy that I was leaving with Lloyd Lambert, he had a operation yesterday. So we were going to [indistinct 00:30:26] Switzerland to the festival. So like I said, right now I'm in town, I'm freelancing, and I play over at the Fairmont Hotel.

29:38

Kate Ellis

Well, how about, I mean, as far as getting ripped off when you're playing, especially, it sounds like that happened a lot more.

30:38

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, that happened then, not now.

30:45

Kate Ellis

Not now.

30:45

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well like I said, it was one of those things where you play for promoters, and it was mostly during the segregation days. You on the stand playing and they collect the money, you get off, he's gone.

30:49

Kate Ellis

Were you part of the union at that point? How much of a—

31:00

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Oh yeah.

31:06

Kate Ellis

How much would the union protect you?

31:06

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, the union, not much, because it was a segregated union. That's why it's 174, 496. 496 was the Black Union. 174 was—

31:06

Kate Ellis

But why couldn't it protect you better? I mean, as far as that kind of thing.

31:18

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Everybody was taking the money and running on both unions.

31:21

Kate Ellis

I mean all the union officials.

31:27

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, you didn't have no—

31:27

Kate Ellis

It was just sort of a [indistinct 00:31:28] union?

31:27

Albert Gardner, Jr.

There wasn't [indistinct 00:31:30] anybody to call, nobody was going to come. Who was going to come from New York to Tupelo, Mississippi, to see, because John Thomas done runoff with the money?

31:28

Kate Ellis

I see. They just run off and they don't concern themselves with those kinds of things.

31:38

Albert Gardner, Jr.

At that time, it wasn't very much help. But I mean, I'm glad I'm a part. I've been a of the union all my life, but in the early years, it really didn't do nothing for you.

31:46

Kate Ellis

So you just pay your dues [indistinct 00:31:59]?

31:58

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Pay your dues, and they would come around if you didn't have union card paying.

31:59

Kate Ellis

So they did, you're saying the union—

32:08

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, they didn't do very much for you.

32:13

Kate Ellis

Well, was there ever much of a, I don't know, [indistinct 00:32:17]?

32:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I mean, you didn't have any help before getting your money, either had to beat somebody's brains out, excuse the expression, kick ass.

32:17

Kate Ellis

Did you have to do that? Did you ever?

32:27

Albert Gardner, Jr.

A couple of times, yeah.

32:27

Kate Ellis

What would you do?

32:29

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, I mean, it was man against man. I said, at the time, you had a family to feed.

32:30

Kate Ellis

You were going to—

32:35

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Don't take advantage of them. That's stupid.

32:39

Kate Ellis

Was it always a White-Black thing? Was it always a White promoter that ran off?

32:42

Albert Gardner, Jr.

It could've been anyone.

32:43

Kate Ellis

What?

32:47

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Either one. It didn't matter.

32:47

Kate Ellis

There were Black promoters too.

32:52

Albert Gardner, Jr.

That's what I'm saying, [indistinct 00:32:53] it was the color, you was trying to make a living, even though you knew it was different, you don't look at it. The way I look at it now, you're a human being, but whoever, it's when somebody mess you around at that time in your family, depending on that little money, but you want to be in the business, you know being had, and it's on to the next job. All of them wasn't bad, but a lot of them.

32:52

Kate Ellis

But in that respect, as far as musicians being ripped off or exploited, it wasn't solely like a race thing that [indistinct 00:33:22]?

33:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

No, it was anybody who could get the money. That's the way the—

33:22

Kate Ellis

I just found this interesting. I guess there just was no real control in that industry.

33:26

Albert Gardner, Jr.

There wasn't much organization, a few booking agents that they had. Look at the acts, you had to be a very big acts that time, like Louis Armstrong or Bing Crosby, these big people, the movie stars. I'm talking about people on the road, musicians. One night is a— But it was a good life and it still is.

33:30

Kate Ellis

Well, I want to ask you about that in a second, but I'm just curious about, it sounds like things have gotten better. I don't know if they got better since integration or if it just happened to be, I mean, how did things get better as far as protection for musicians?

33:53

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, with the union, I mean, a person can hire who they want. A lot of people get pissed off, Black or White. Say, "Hey, when they got all Black band and they got all White band, a person hire who they want to hire. I mean, as far as being Black, and if a job come through the union, I would not know this unless they would call me and they don't call me.

34:11

Kate Ellis

I'm sorry. I'm not sure follow what you're saying.

34:36

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I'm saying I'm speaking to you, say about the jobs, if this is a White or Black thing, I'm not saying it's a White or Black thing. If the job comes through and somebody wants a drummer, if they ask for a Black drummer, I don't know. Somebody want a drummer, send a drummer.

34:37

Kate Ellis

That's now.

34:53

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah.

34:57

Kate Ellis

That's with the union now.

34:57

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, like I said, the union don't do anything for me other than pay my dues and the pension fund.

34:57

Kate Ellis

I guess what I heard is that once the Black and the White unions merged, that's when Blacks had access to a pension fund.

35:04

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah.

35:11

Kate Ellis

That you didn't before?

35:12

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah. Yeah. We didn't have any, the Black.

35:12

Kate Ellis

Why was that?

35:13

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, that's a good question. Everybody taking the money and run. That's what I said, everybody was gangers and they always—

35:16

Kate Ellis

They were gangsters.

35:19

Albert Gardner, Jr.

So everybody bought a house, but you didn't have any protection. That's what I was speaking earlier. Like I said, if you didn't get your money, who you were going to call? The union. Then they weren't going to come to Dallas, Texas. You from New Orleans, he's sleeping. That's what he's going to tell you.

35:27

Kate Ellis

But as far as the music, I mean, this seems like more than almost, not [indistinct 00:35:50], but more than many businesses. I mean, the music really keeps you in there [indistinct 00:35:56].

35:45

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Oh yeah. Well, it's something, I guess, it's a profession like any other profession. Some people wonder why they want to be firefighters, policemens. I like it, music, one of things because music can take me away from a lot of other things. I try to leave all them problems outside and come inside and swing.

35:56

Albert Gardner, Jr.

So because you have to concentrate, especially being a drummer, everybody can mess up, but the drummer, the drummer hit one beat off, and if somebody is dancing and everybody's throwing off. Well, like I said, it's been nice. It's been a good ride and ups and down, sideways. But like I say, overall, it was a better experience, I think, than if I'd went into any other field that I know, because I've had the chance to go around the world almost.

36:20

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I wouldn't have been able to pay for it myself, was the place from Jerusalem to Paris. So like I said, I was just supposed to go this month [indistinct 00:37:08] to Switzerland. I mean, I can't just jump up and say, "Hey, let's go to Switzerland." It can be done.

36:55

Kate Ellis

When you were just saying a minute ago, as far as music takes you away. During the period of where Black musicians were really treated roughly on the road or anywhere, I mean, when you go—

37:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well with segregation, you didn't have to be a musician. You just had to be a Black person. Like I said, the bathrooms wasn't there. Food, you have money, you're looking at a sandwich. You could buy the guy who fixing the sandwich. You got enough money in your pocket to buy him.

37:26

Kate Ellis

But they won't—

37:41

Albert Gardner, Jr.

But you can't go in. This is the thing. That's why I say you're taking little to nothing and made something out of it, and to do this, makes you a better person. I mean, we never know what we can go through suffering or bad times until you put in that particular situation. Then as they say, your true color comes out.

37:42

Kate Ellis

But this is what I'm just wondering as far as when you'd have, I mean, you're there, you're on your break, you're sitting in a stockroom or whatever.

38:05

Albert Gardner, Jr.

What can you do?

38:11

Kate Ellis

I mean, well, then how do you get back up on stage so you're performing [indistinct 00:38:16]?

38:13

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Somebody knock on the door, it's just like the fighter's time or you had your watch, and you had a fifteen minute break. We were working on Bourbon Street, and it was a half an hour on, Sharkey Banana was a trumpet player, Sharkey Banana. He had a White group and was a very dear man, been a good friend. But the segregation, the Sharkey band would play a half an hour. We would play half an hour. But when we come on the stand, we'd want to sit against the wall. We had to go outside and go down a couple of blocks down Burgundy Street to the Black Colored bars.

38:17

Kate Ellis

That's right, your band [indistinct 00:38:53].

38:51

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, we had some pretty good— Rather than just [indistinct 00:38:55], you have to sit against the wall. And if you're standing outside, you had some policemen that weren't very nice guys, and they knew you were working there, because maybe they have some dancers across the street. He's like, "You're looking at the White dancers," and he'd want see you when I passed back and said, "Man, but I work here, what am I supposed to do?" You're just trying to get some fresh air. So you had to put up with all that BS and then concentrate on your music.

38:54

Kate Ellis

And how do you do that? I guess, [indistinct 00:39:32].

39:32

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I was going to say, it made you a better person.

39:32

Kate Ellis

You just—

39:32

Albert Gardner, Jr.

You did.

39:32

Kate Ellis

When you're performing.

39:32

Albert Gardner, Jr.

You take some of them problems out on that instrument.

39:32

Kate Ellis

Well, you were lucky. You got to be the drummer.

39:34

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Yeah, I could beat the shit out of it. Excuse me. Many a nights, yeah, I say, bam, boom, bop, ba-boom.

39:43

Kate Ellis

Let's tear it up this evening.

39:46

Albert Gardner, Jr.

But it was nice though.

39:47

Kate Ellis

So again, it's just been the kind of thing, because many say that music transcends racial boundaries, and yet you get offstage and the first thing you're reminded of are the racial boundaries.

39:52

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Everybody's dancing and all and they popping, "Hey," and they clapping there and you come off the stage and you say, "Hey, what about a cocktail? I can't get up from the bench, not the seat."

40:03

Kate Ellis

That's the—

40:15

Albert Gardner, Jr.

God bless them.

40:15

Kate Ellis

That's the high blood pressure you were talking about.

40:23

Albert Gardner, Jr.

Well, it tests your abilities, ordinary person, but you survive. It makes you a stronger person. I can deal with people. Live in Atlanta, there's fools all over now. It takes a man to walk away from a fool, and this is what happens now. And everybody, if they read the paper, look at the television, they know what's going on in the world, even in today's society.

40:28

Kate Ellis

What do you mean?

41:02

Albert Gardner, Jr.

No, I mean, just overall. I mean in the human race. But it's been interesting.

41:02

Kate Ellis

You go to go.

41:09

Albert Gardner, Jr.

I'm going to have to call him because I'm running, I don't want to—

41:12

Kate Ellis

That's fine. Well, that's great.

41:14

Albert Gardner, Jr. interview recording, 1994 August 12

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1. Albert Gardner, Jr. administrative file, 1994

John Hope Franklin Research Center

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Albert Gardner, Jr. interview recording, 1994 August 12

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John Hope Franklin Research Center

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