Interview with McDaniel Bluitt, December 1, 2021

Joseph Manning: Yeah. That's right. So, I'm gonna get started by saying -- Let's see. We get some levels and say, I'm here with Mr. McDaniel Bluitt at the West Louisville Academy for the Performing Arts. Did I get that right?

McDaniel Bluitt: West Louisville Performing Arts Academy. That's good.

JM: Performing Arts Academy. Here at the Heritage Center. Today is the 1st of December. And is 12:30. Mr. Bluitt, would you mind to just spell your last name, so I can get some levels, and tell me where and when you were born?

MB: B as in boy, L-U-I-T-T, Bluitt. My birthday is November 22nd.

JM: Happy birthday, late.

MB: Oh, please. It comes and goes. November 22nd, 1948.

JM: Okay, okay.

MB: Like, I still get phone calls, "Congratulations on your 75th birthday." I say, "That's not -- You didn't do the math right. I'm not 75, I'm 73, man."

JM: Where were you born, Mr. Bluitt?

MB: I was born in Jasper, Texas.

JM: Where is that in the state?

MB: It's East Texas like you're heading towards Louisiana.

JM: Oh, okay.

MB: Beaumont area --

JM: Beaumont.

MB: And Kirbyville, Magnolia Springs, and those little towns.

JM: What kinda town was it?

MB: Country town, farming, raise cattle. People had logging businesses and they had -- dairies was still prominent in those days. It was a very rural area. And we had -- I didn't get to do my schooling there. My schooling was done after we moved to Houston.

JM: Oh, okay.

MB: Yeah, so I couldn't talk much about the landscape as far as the education was concerned.

JM: When did y'all move to Houston?

MB: Let me think. In fact, now when I was -- we left Jasper -- oh, before -- when we left Jasper, we really moved about 30 miles away to a town called Kirbyville.

JM: Okay.

MB: And Kirbyville had a little edge township to it. We called them townships then. And what that would -- that township, of course, would be called Magnolia Springs. And in Magnolia Springs, you had above the creek and below the creek, that kind of thing. You don't hear that language anymore, of course.

JM: Yeah, yeah.

MB: But it was --

JM: You mean -- was that black and white? Up and above?

MB: No, it was black and white up and black and white below. I think the separation was where the land area was separated. Most of the lands that are owned by my family and others who were African American, of course, it was like a big bit of geography.

JM: Okay.

MB: For quick, and then -- Then you had whites that lived -- I can't say close 3:00proximity 'cause everything in rural America was like, a mile this way or two miles that way.

JM: Sure.

MB: And they had -- and farmland filled all the space in between. And we had -- of course, we had several hundred acres.

JM: Wow.

MB: Our family did, 'cause we had cattle and we had dairy. We'd milk cows in the morning. And that didn't stop when we left the country. We -- my dad brought some cows with us to the town. So, we milked cows in the morning before we went to school, and then again sometime in the evening after you come in. And it didn't seem like hard work because that's what we would -- it was just a way of -- we lived. And today we're talking about, "Well, how did you -- Where did you get your milk as a kid?" We used to ask that question when we first started teaching.

When I first started. "Where did you get your milk, Mr. Bluitt?" "We got it from 4:00the cows." I say, "Where did you get yours?" "We go to Kroger, Winn-Dixie." I say, "Well, we had stores too, of course." Where do you get your milk? Well, if you kind of control the feeding of the cow -- of the animal, you don't have to be so worried about what product that inevitably comes out.

JM: Sure, yeah.

MB: It was probably the healthiest milk we probably ever -- we drank in our lives.

JM: So, how many generations of dairy farmers are in your family?

MB: Oh, my goodness. My dad was one of the ones that started it with my grandpa, still alive. He went to the military, and the farm -- Dairy continued 'til he got out. And then it probably ran about 10 or 15 years under our family. Now, there were other families around who had smaller dairies. Yeah, ours had -- Well, in those days, I don't know if this makes sense. But in those days, if you had -- the cattle, if you had Holstein, those are dairy cattle, but they don't 5:00give the high cream content, butterfat.

Which means if you have, in comparison, the Jersey cattle, those Jersey cattle, if you get a gallon of milk, almost two-thirds or half of that gallon is butter, cream. You set it on the side to make butter at a later date. But if you had a Holstein cow, you gotta have about mostly milk and then maybe about a third of the jar, butterfat.

JM: Okay.

MB: So, it was really a good thing to have Jersey cattle in your dairy. 'Cause when you go to dairy, the sale, that's what they gonna be looking at. That's what you get paid for.

JM: So, your family is in East Texas for -- doing agriculture of some variety for how long before you came along?

MB: Oh, I was -- I got -- I'm [inaudible] that I come along, Let me make sure I got this right. I had to be about 5 or 6 years old. And mom taught school there. And grandpa was still alive. So, I would say the dairy probably continued another five or six years while I was --

JM: But prior to your -- prior to when you were born, how long was your family in that part of the country?

MB: Oh, I'd say about 15 years.

JM: Oh, okay, okay.

MB: Yeah, about 15 years. I'm just -- I'm basing that based on the war.

JM: Got you.

MB: World War Two.

JM: And your father was in the war?

MB: Yeah. Yeah, he did World War Two. Those we're the difficult times.

JM: How so?

MB: You hear the stories, you can't say, "I was there, I saw it with my own," -- I didn't. I wasn't. But when we got older, and we moved away from the rural area 7:00to outside Houston, we would go back to see about the cattle and the place. And there's a town you go through -- and getting to your question, how so, there's a township you go through. One is called Saratoga, Saratoga, Texas. And then when you leave there, there's another one called Combes. These two townships were reeking with oil wells just pumping on the side of the road.

While you ride, you could see it. [Inaudible] floating around up in there. And when we got to enter the city, you normally see a sign that says, "Welcome to Saratoga." Welcome -- like, Welcome to Louisville.

JM: Right.

MB: But there when you go to that town, and you an African American, a black person, you'll see a sign that will say, "Run, nigga, run. If you can't read, run anyhow." And that was just a sign to people who didn't know, but for people 8:00who had lived through it -- there'd been countless numbers of lynchings right there in Combes. And we had one relative, he was a football player, I think, big guy. Big Red, they called him. He had a flat tire in Combes on his way through. And naturally, he didn't have a triple-A, as they say, but what he did have -- he had a suitcase and his clothes.

He was trying to get changed. It was a little weird for you to change clothes, not if you were black. So, he had to take everything he had in his hands and walk through the rest of -- to where he was going. And there was no cellphone to call nobody. I'm just throwing this in. Big Red got almost to the outskirts of the city limits and they -- what did they call them in them days? It was a [inaudible]. A lynching committee came and they were gonna help him get out of 9:00town. It was -- 'cause you weren't supposed to be left there after dark.

Now, I heard that as a story, but Big Red got a chance to tell it himself. He says, "Oh, it's very real." He says one of the spectacles of the community was -- I don't know if you've ever seen those little towns when you go into them and you got a city hall like in the middle. Western Kentucky is full of it.

JM: For sure.

MB: Owingsville, Maysville, all of them got that same layout.

JM: Right.

MB: We got to the end of the township, he was -- he thought he was gonna be okay, and they came and greeted him. And he had to leave everything he had behind just to --

JM: Took off running.

MB: Oh, yeah, he -- and his car too. Everything. He dare not go back and ask for 10:00it, in those days. So, he gets out of it alive, and he tells the story, and we hear -- our parents hear the story and talk about it. I said, "Dad we're gonna be going through that town on our way?" Our way through to the country where we [inaudible] "Yeah, we gonna take a lunch. We're not gonna stop and eat." And as the years progressed, I guess I was about 10 then. When we got about 17, 18, we were going through there, and dad says, "Yeah, we're going through Combes."

Me and my brother looked at each other, "I know he ain't gonna say go through Combes after all this." But it had -- their laws had changed quite a bit in that little town. We got to Combes, and I didn't remember it, but it was my dad remembered. He says, "I'm gonna go ahead inside, y'all can just wait in the van." The truck. My daddy goes inside, but we couldn't see where he went in. So, 11:00when I was a little fellow, a 6, 7 years old, I had to use the bathroom. And they tell it better than I can, 'cause I wasn't -- I don't remember it all.

He says, "So, Daniel had to the bathroom, did he?" And I take off. And I'm heading to the building that was in front of where the truck is. I'm thinking he went in that door. And I got it in there and we didn't know white and black in those days. We didn't know color. We didn't. We went to school -- it's like poor people don't know they're poor 'til you -- you have to remind them.

JM: Yeah, yeah.

MB: And that's how it was. When I got out of there and went into the to the building, where they -- that cafe diner and I didn't see dad in there, or anywhere. And one -- I didn't know what he said, but one man got up behind the car and he says, "Somebody better get this slave out of here." Whatever he was 12:00saying. By that time, this huge black lady comes from the back behind the double doors. And she scoops me up with one arm. And while she was taking me out, she's apologizing. She says, "I'm so sorry. We're so sorry." And she took me through the kitchen, all the way to the back.

And there was a little space about this size here, and there were people about from here to here. And they're all -- most, all blacks that were sitting there. It was -- that's what the segregation piece would show its face. And we would -- I got back there, I say -- Dad said, "What you doing in here boy?" I said, "Dad, I needed a bathroom." He says, "You're not supposed to come in here." And the lady says, "You are Harvey Bluitt's boy, aren't you?" Great. I'm just -- "That's my grandpa." He says. No, I think she says, "You Clifton's boy."

I said, "That's my dad." He said -- So, Harvey, my grandpa, was an old acquaintance of hers. So, she -- "I thought that's who you were." [Inaudible] And dad said, "No, these people don't care for black people down there at all."

JM: And this is in Combes?

MB: In Combes.

JM: Yeah.

MB: Had -- big changes had been taking place. But they had -- But one of the attractions -- I didn't think of it that way, but the attractions were by the courthouse in the evenings if there was some lynching to be done, people came out like you're going to see a football game, man.

JM: Yeah, I mean, of course, I've read --

MB: You read the books, probably.

JM: I heard the accounts, man.

MB: It's really true though. It's true.

JM: It wasn't that long ago. It was in your life.

MB: Oh, yeah, I got to see some of that with my eyes.

JM: What do you mean?

MB: I mean that when you hear the stories is one thing, but when you actually get a chance to see it then you don't forget it.

JM: What did you see though?

MB: You actually see the ropes, you see the people standing and you see a man gets up with -- not a bow on, but he just actually is yelling out. Saying, "This is what happens to the niggers when they violate the law," or something. I don't 14:00think it was law, but he had other reasons. But -- And that's when the lady was with me, she did my eyes -- like put her hands on me. I say, "This is terrible, terrible times to live in." And I tell you something else that went along with that, that completely different. We got ready to go to -- We drove about 120 miles between where I lived outside Houston, all the way to Magnolia Springs, where the cattle were.

Grandpa -- I didn't believe it, my sister told me it was true. She said, "Grandpa," − In that part of the country, that part of the -- farmers was farming and cattle and logging businesses. He had all of them. And he only went 15:00to third grade. And he's short black man. And he had gained a lot of favor from a lot of the people around him. He says -- this is very funny. But he says to my daddy and his -- my dad had come out of the military. He says, "We're gonna go out of this dairy business. It's not profitable enough. And y'all growing up, y'all got your families. You don't have time to do all this stuff like we did."

And what really happened though, was that, when they picked the milk up from the dairy, in those big old five, ten-gallon -- And they put it on a wagon. And when you put it on the wagon, it's up to the people who are doing the pickups to keep ice on your milk to make -- Yep, you got the story. And so when you got to the 16:00point where all grandpa's milk would get to the dairy, it was already soured. So, he says -- because naturally, my dad and his brother and his cousin, they were pretty upset about it, and do something about it.

But he says, "No," he says, "We're gonna go into logging." And that's what he did.

JM: So, the people who were transporting the milk weren't putting ice on it?

MB: Well, it's supposed -- There're big vats in the back of the truck -- In the, not truck, but the wagon. They had no trucks. And in the vats, the milk is sitting down inside it. And -- not hard ice, just regular ice. And when you get where you're going, the milk stays chill.

JM: Right.

MB: But you -- I think if you're picking up three and four different farms, dairies, and when you get there, everybody else's milk is fine but yours. So, grandpa made some enemies along the way, no doubt. And his popularity didn't supersede that indignation.

JM: What do you -- I mean, it's -- I feel like it's important to document some things like this. I mean, gosh, that it bears repeating over and over again is unfortunate. What do you remember when you had that experience, and somebody covered your eyes? How old were you when that happened?

MB: I'd have to have been about 6, 7, somewhere in there.

JM: Was that in Jasper or in Jasper or in Combes?

MB: That was in Combes. Jasper was worse than that as far as the stories are concerned. You probably remember the article in the newspaper on Jasper. This black man was dragged behind a wagon. And -- not a wagon but a pickup truck. And all through town. Arms fastened out and legs fastened out. And he -- of course, he died. But Jasper was one of the first cities that the media was able to get a handle on it enough to really put it out there.

JM: Really?

MB: Yeah. Jasper, Texas, they've got a real gruesome history of treatment of black people.

JM: And so -- but I wanna reflect on something you said. When you were that age, when you were young, you said, "We didn't see black and white."

MB: We didn't know.

JM: So, how did it come into your awareness? How did you learn? I know, yeah.

MB: Well, our parents didn't teach us color differences. When we grew up and had a few experiences of our own -- we couldn't get the experience at school 'cause the schools were all black. And you didn't -- you couldn't get it at the local store in the neighborhood because the neighborhood was definitely segregated. So, that was -- this is what happened with me that I can remember. When you -- 19:00mentally, you take a snapshot of things as you -- you know what I'm trying to say. You don't go anywhere and document it or anything, but the document is written there.

You don't forget it. And you didn't see it with a lot of love and care, it was more something of disdain. And you really, at that age, you don't have the cognitive skills to be able to say, "This is bad and this is good." But you do know that that wasn't normal behavior. And that we hadn't seen it in our own and in our community. So, when that happened, and daddy got in the car and we drove home -- we went on to the farm, that's where he was. I said -- I think my brother may have said it. He says, "Daddy," he says, "They don't care for us up here too much."

He was a couple years older than me. And I'm listening. I didn't say anything. 20:00And he said, "There's a lot of parts of this country that's like this." See, my dad did military. He saw it from another level, believe me. And he wouldn't talk about military at all. But when he -- after years passed, and he mellowed, I guess got mellowed out he said -- he didn't encourage us to do military. "Go to college. Go to college." And that's what we all did. But he said that the military was so racist. That when the war ended -- They were in Australia. He says that -- who was the president?

JM: When the war ended?

MB: Yeah. His wife had gotten on a plane, 'cause she had heard about the people 21:00in that part of Australia that didn't know the war had ended. I said, "Okay." So, when she got there, and they brought a lot of peacekeeping forces -- I assume that's what they called them in those days -- with her. And if I can remember, her husband was in a wheelchair. The -- Did we have a president in a wheelchair?

JM: Truman.

MB: That was who it was. She got off the plane to take the boys to come back home. They had huge carriers in those days. And she says, "Where are the black soldiers? Where are the negros?" And daddy said, "She got off the plane and walked around and found out that they had -- all of them were locked up and stacked. It's like they were prisoners. They weren't gonna be bringing them back to America. They were gonna be left there. And I said, "What?" He said, "If it 22:00hadn't been for that Truman's wife," he says, "We would have been -- we would have never gotten back home."

And that was the plan. The race -- if you -- He said, "There are places where you could have -- we went that you could actually be -- there was a brotherhood. There was a camaraderie. And that's usually in those trenches where you -- where bullets are flying everywhere, and they don't care what color you are. They're just know to blow your heads off. But he didn't ever talk a lot about it. But when he started talking about the racial divide that was evident in the military, he -- "The military is not good for you."

JM: Yeah.

MB: And that's all we ever heard. He didn't get around the country that often. He says, "Where there's an opportunity, take advantage of it and do what you could have been -- the best you can do is be the best you can be." And my daddy wasn't really a real strong religious type man. My mom was. So, he would go to 23:00church. That's what families did. In fact, church-going families was almost -- if you didn't go you stood out in our little community too. Everybody knew about it.

JM: Yeah. What was your church like growing up?

MB: Oh, it was nice. It was a Baptist church. It was nice. Mom played the piano and dad was the treasurer. So, he was always counting the money. But the good part about it was we established strong camaraderie. And then mom taught school in that little community. So, that was ongoing family -- connecting family. And people in the community -- My mom was real -- well, she was a real people person, man. I thought I was a people person. She did something, and I was old enough. I was in school. I knew this.

Have you ever heard -- now, this was -- you gotta go back to 1961, '59 -- Yeah, 24:00almost back -- The school was about to lose it's funding, and they did lose a lot of its funding for this auditorium gymnasium. And if they had lost the funding, they couldn't do a game together, they had nowhere to play ball. And she says, "I'll tell you what we'll do." And she came up with this plan. And said, "We're gonna have a wedding." And that doesn't seem like that's gonna make any money. "And it's gonna be a womanless wedding."

It'll get some folks' attention today, but in those days -- And they said, "Who's gonna be the bride? And she got one of the leading family -- they called them leading families in the community because there's more than anybody else first of all. And they -- She taught most of the family members, the mamas, and the dads. One of the members who was really a wayward kind of a kid, he was kind of like a local wineo and drunk. And you'd find him if it snowed, which we 25:00didn't have a lot of snow, but if it did, you'd find him by the side of a building and thought he was dead, frozen to death. But he had enough alcohol in him to keep him preserved.

But that's who she -- she got to be the -- and she had taught him too. She says, "The community needs you to do this. And we need some man that will not mind dressing up like a woman. And be the headliner for this," -- my mother's wedding. And they sold tickets, man. And they got up in the thousands.

JM: Okay, I gotta back up. 'Cause this story is a good one. But I'm missing some fundamental aspects of it.

MB: Yeah.

JM: So, they wanna hold a fundraiser?

MB: Yeah, they had to raise the money to keep the gym.

JM: But what is the appeal of a womanless wedding, and who's getting married?

MB: Well, the appeal of it was, that there wouldn't be any women, any bridesmaids, they'd all be men.

JM: So, this is like a -- this is meant to be like a show.

MB: It was a real show, doc. It was a real show. I said -- And then the bride comes down --

JM: Enters the town drunk.

MB: Alvin even comes down with a -- wearing a long gown. The whole place paid -- It was standing room only. Doc, that he -- we're talking about '60 or '59, '58 up in there. That's backward people. You didn't -- We got LGBCT and all the people that they got, the gays. If they -- we probably had them in them days. But they was in a closet, man.

JM: Wow. Wow, what a trip. This is your mom's idea?

MB: Oh, yeah. And sold it to the whole community long before a time when it would be normally -- normally there's no reception for that. But she made enough money to save the school's building.

JM: What was the fellow's name who was a wineo?

MB: Alvin Egoism.

JM: And he was the bride.

MB: He was the bride.

JM: My goodness.

MB: He had that thing on the head.

JM: Oh, man, that's a trip.

MB: And I said, "How in the world did she come up with this?"

JM: Yeah, how did she come up with that?

MB: Well, usually you had to see something somewhere. Something to bring it back. Oh, mama, she came out of Texas College and she taught up there for a while, and then she got married. I guess she and dad moved outside of Houston. But it was real humorous. We had a pretty rich experience with -- In that church, Sammy Davis Jr. used to come down. And she used to play for him. She was the pianist. And all he dance and splitting. He wasn't like a real church-type person. But he was a major entertainment. Major, man.

JM: Major. Man, seriously.

MB: And they called him -- My mom was red-headed, long red hair that -- her father was half white and half Indian. And then my dad was -- his dad was part African and part Indian too. So, I guess that's how we ended up like we are. But it got us some crossing-over stuff. I think really, grandpa when we went up in the east part of Texas by the farm, and we all took place in the logging business, yeah. That -- his name was pretty well respected in that area.

JM: Was he a Bluitt?

MB: He was a Bluitt, yeah.

JM: Yeah.

MB: Yeah, we didn't have as much dabbing in and out of the family. We would not -- we always had some cousins that went outside of the marriage and had other children. Grandpa didn't care. He says, "If you work you can -- If he wants to eat, he'll work. And if he wants to stay here, he'll work." And he raised so 29:00many -- not only three of his own kids, but it was 15 or 20 of them. And when it's time for family reunion, that's when we found out who they are. They have their names, all of them. "Papa was my daddy. Papa was -- Harvey was my daddy. Harvey was my," --

So, he fathered a lot of folks' children. And there was no organized system in place, government mentally speaking to control whether you'd had a child and you left it in and I raised it. Or I had a child and you picked it up and you raised it. The most they could do is get the name and information out from the county − what's it? They call it county seats. And that way you'd know whether the child -- you couldn't track them all 'cause all the kids weren't born in hospitals.

JM: Right, right.

MB: We were born at home.

JM: Yeah.

MB: What are they called? Midwives were really popular for delivering babies.

JM: So, what tribe did your family come from?

MB: Hmm?

JM: What tribe?

MB: Well, they called it -- They didn't call it a tribe. They really -- They were horse breeders out of Louisiana. And somehow came from Iowa. My grandpa was -- whom we were real close with. His daddy was the one that brought him the horse breeder part of the family. And these were racehorses, some were just really big on those -- I forgot what they call those horses.

JM: Thoroughbreds.

MB: Yeah, thoroughbreds, that's right.

JM: A lot of thoroughbred races in Louisiana.

MB: That's right. Track's still down there.

JM: Yeah.

MB: I just remembered back. But grandpa, he was the name down there. And he was respected. He went into the bank one day, and we asked him and said, "Where are you going pop?" My daddy said, "Oh, he's going to take care of some business." 31:00That's the way he put it. And he's got a little pad in his hand with a pencil. And he puts that in his pocket and he goes down there to meet his old friend. And they have to go back entrance if you're gonna go to the bank. And he saw his old friend. He says, "Harvey, where you go out over there? Come on in here."

He brought him -- took him to the front door. That was icebreaking there, man. Everybody in the bank stopped, time stopped in the bank. Of course, he was the president of the bank so he can do whatever he wanted to. And he took -- he said, "I want y'all to know, this is Harvey. This is my friend. And we do business together, been doing business for years." He says, "Y'all get some coffee and bring it. Me and Harvey, we're gonna sit down and do a transaction business. Get some -- buy some trucks.

JM: Wow, wow.

MB: Yeah. So, he talked to him and sold him the cattle from the dairy. And he said, "What do you need Harvey?" And they tell me grandpa told him that, "I'm going to logging. And I think there's some good money in that logging business. And I'ma need about six trucks." He says, "Okay." "I need six brand new trucks." "You got it."

JM: Wow.

MB: He asked to pay for it, and walked out of there with what he needed to get to six trucks.

JM: Shoot.

MB: And he and that banker really were just like a real door opener for a lot of the progress grandpa had in those days.

JM: That's saying a lot in a town where they had such a terrifying violent history.

MB: Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's Kirbyville, what we were talking about just now.

JM: Man.

MB: And it was kind of like -- I almost wanna believe sometime that it was -- it 33:00had become such a way of life that racial discrimination had been -- the people had been so deeply entrenched in that as a way of life. You didn't know, just like I didn't know you was black or you -- I was white and you was black. I don't think a lot of white folks really knew that it was not -- maybe God really didn't say what they thought he said about black people. 'Cause the Bible was being read, of course, in those days, and a lot of it was being read to really leave black folks in worse shape than they were usually in.

JM: Yeah, continued like that way in a lot of ways.

MB: Yeah.

JM: So, you --

MB: Being aware, that's all I'm saying. Awareness wasn't there.

JM: So, mom's in church playing piano. Sammy Davis comes through sometimes. So, you've got music in the family.

MB: Plenty of music in the family.

JM: So, what -- does it come home? Did you all have a piano at the house?

MB: Oh, yeah.

JM: And what's your musical education and when does it start?

MB: Oh, it started right in the living room with mom. She's playing, then I'm sitting on the set trying to learn to do what she's doing. I could -- I probably was about 9.

JM: 9?

MB: About 8 or 9 years old. But you're really picking up before then.

JM: The whole time, yeah.

MB: Yeah. And then so when mom would play at the church. When she'd get off the piano, there I go, I'm sitting over there.

JM: Did she teach -- did you take lessons from your mom? I mean, did she -- did you just mimic her actions, or did she finally say, "Now this is where middle C is, and this is how we're gonna start?"

MB: No, no, she never sat me down and told me, "This is middle C." She would actually -- if you're gonna play -- she says she's gonna play it for the kids. Just the choir was singing, then, "Start on this note." That's okay. And your ear becomes really attuned to what you're hearing, versus what you're playing, 35:00what you're producing. She was -- she could read real well. She was -- but we never took lessons until I was almost in eighth grade, I think. Eighth or ninth grade probably. And I wasn't taking pianos lessons, I was taking trumpet lessons. I wanted to play trumpet like my brother. Man, my brother was a fierce, fierce player.

JM: Really?

MB: Oh, yeah. And by the time I started playing the trumpet, he was in 10th or 11th grade. And the choir director there, oh, she was terrible, man. That little short black lady would tear the piano up. Tear it up. And what she did though, she created a quartet. And all four of these guys' names were Jerrell, except my brother. Yeah all these, same names except for one. There was Jerrel Naps, Jerrell Bass, Jerrell Lemon. Jerrell Lemon's mom taught school there. Jerrell 36:00Bass' mom taught school there. Jerrell Naps, his mom worked in the cafeteria. And then my brother, Clifton. So, I would say, "Why don't y'all call yourselves The Jerrells?" Making fun of them.

JM: I mean, yeah. Jumps right out at you, really.

MB: Yeah. But guys, we don't -- you feel a little bit of it here when -- with the kids singing. Boys are yet quite a bit -- A lot of inhibition. They are a little inhibited. Girls aren't.

JM: Yeah, yeah.

MB: Boys are, "You got to check out who's watching me now."

JM: Right, right.

MB: And in those days, it wasn't really the most popular direction for a young man to go. You wanna be a musician? You know the rest of that story.

JM: Yeah, I do.

MB: Yeah, no more sitting with thee mentors, all these -- those mommys. He says, "I wanna be a dancer." A girl can get away with it.

JM: Right.

MB: A boy says he wanna be a dancer.

JM: Yeah.

MB: "I ain't having no sissies up in here." Oh, yeah, that was the language. You heard it -- Like you say, you heard it straight from the horse's mouth. And, so mom was really -- I guess you could say guarded around me my brother, 'cause we was all both musicians.

JM: So, would you say that -- I mean, do you think that you had natural ability from the get? Some people do, some people don't.

MB: Yeah, I think it was natural for me. Because that's really all I wanted to do. If we go to church, I might sit through the whole series, but the music is what I took with me when I walked away.

JM: Yeah.

MB: Kind of like people come to concerts. I tell the choir members, I said, "If 38:00you do all a lot of new music and it's impressive to other musicians," I say, "But if the people listening, can't walk out of there humming something that they heard, then you really didn't do that good of a job." I made it hard for them. I made it hard. "You really didn't do as good a job as you think."

JM: Oh, man. So in the house, we have you and your mom and dad, one brother. And there was a sister too?

MB: Then the sister came on a little later. Yeah.

JM: Okay. What's everybody's names? Just so I can get it on the record.

MB: My brother's name is Clifton Jr. MacArthur Bluitt. Jr.

JM: Okay.

MB: And me, of course, I'm McDaniel Bluitt. My sister is Deborah Lyette Bluitt.

JM: Lyette's a beautiful name.

MB: Yeah, it's a pretty name. L-Y-E-T-T-E, yeah.

JM: Wow.

MB: Yeah, she's -- she played too.

JM: Wow. And what about mom and dad? Mom and dad's name?

MB: Oh, dad didn't play music. He was an artist. He could draw.

JM: Oh, really? What was his name though? Clifton Senior.

MB: Clifton Joet Bluitt. Yeah.

JM: And mom's name?

MB: Yeah, J-O-E-T, Joet's spelled a little different.

JM: Very interesting.

MB: Mom was Emily, Emma. Old, very old name. Emma, E-M-M-A. Yeah. And then Lee of course that's an old name too. Emma Lee Bluitt.

JM: Okay. What was her maiden name?

MB: Cooper.

JM: MacArthur and McDaniel are interesting names.

MB: You picked it up, didn't you?

JM: Yeah, yeah.

MB: Yeah, well, when -- before we left -- see when we were in the country with my mom -- I don't know about -- I really don't know 'til today, whether they split up or what happened. But mom ended up coming to outside of Houston where we were taught school. And dad was still in the country area. So, and dad, I guess, eventually sold some of the property or something, and decided to move to Houston area. And we stayed with grandmama and grandpapa Harvey then.

JM: Yeah.

MB: Well, I don't know how old we were, but she had two sons. Hear this, their 40:00names were Cleveland and Clifton. So, when -- since we were there, she was calling me Cleveland and my brother named Clifton. I don't know if it was intentional or not to this day. But it was absolutely − I thought my name was, when I first got home, Cleveland McDaniel Bluitt. Now, these are stories you're never gonna read nowhere else. And his was Clifton MacArthur Bluitt. And I said -- then mama, we finally all got together in Houston. She changed it all. "You name your children, I'll name mine."

JM: Oh, man.

MB: I'm sure that was a popular move.

JM: Oh, man. That's something.

MB: Yeah, we think back about it sometime. But you know, something since you picked the names up if you notice -- And mama was -- in that early day, many of the black families, if you look at the names, it's like the George Washington Greene.

JM: Right.

MB: Like Clifton MacArthur. It's like, if there's a name that's associated with prominence, greatness, you can become -- you got a name like George Washington, you gotta be something, doc. And it was supposed to be a way of shaping their image of themselves. 'Cause if all you see is degradation and what we see these days, as a kid, you won't have a lot to aspire to. So, I think that was done on purpose in a lot of that.

JM: I think so too.

MB: Yeah, intentional.

JM: Yeah. So, your given first name is McDaniel?

MB: Is McDaniel, yeah.

JM: Okay. And that's a cool name. Yeah, no, I hear what you're saying. My wife 42:00is from Western Kentucky. And they grew up -- she grew up in a poor family in Western Kentucky. And --

MB: Yeah. Cool man in town. What's the name of your town -- the town?

JM: It's in Grayson County, Leitchfield. So it's just on this --

MB: Oh, yeah [inaudible] Yeah.

JM: Yep. Her name is Savannah Shantall, Savannah. Shantall. And she got a million-dollar name. She came from a pretty poor family but got a million-dollar name.

MB: Million-dollar name to go with it. All right. Are you from Leitchfield?

JM: No, I'm from Louisville. She's from Leitchfield.

MB: Oh, you are from Louisville.

JM: Yeah. Yeah, I grew up here. Been here pretty much my whole life.

MB: Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah.

JM: So, you all -- So, your parents split up at some point. And then -- but everybody ends up in Houston.

MB: Right. Right. Crosby, to be exact. That's the little -- there's a little rural suburban town.

JM: Okay. Okay. So, mom and dad both end up in Crosby?

MB: Yeah.

JM: So, you still -- you see everybody -- everybody's seeing everybody.

MB: Everybody, yeah.

JM: Okay. And when is it -- You say -- was it 10 when you moved to Houston, or Crosby, I should say?

MB: Let me see. When I moved to Crosby, which when I say Houston, I mean Crosby. And at Crosby, we had two little townships too. They had a black side across the track, and then you had the white side. Well, when we moved to Crosby -- It's Crosby Barrett Station.

JM: Okay.

MB: Barrett Station was a kind of typical -- a lot of Creoles were migrating into that part of Houston at that time. And there was a family called Barrett and they owned all of the land. So, they -- even the Catholic Church was built on their land. They had a -- So, they named the township Barrett Station.

JM: Okay.

MB: And I went there until I graduated from high school. One of the granddaughters of the Barrett's -- and they, I think what I was getting at was 44:00that when you -- if you say, Crosby, you're gonna look -- think about the white township.

JM: I see.

MB: And if you say Barrett Station, more black.

JM: Got you.

MB: Yeah, and Creole.

JM: So, and how old were you when you moved to Barrett Station?

MB: Let's see. My brother was 5. We went to the country, he was 6. I had to be about 7.

JM: Okay.

MB: Yeah.

JM: Cool.

MB: I had to be about 7.

JM: I guess I'm curious to know, just like a little bit more about your musical upbringing. So, Clifton is playing music. He's in the Jerrell. You say, "I wanna play trumpet." You start playing trumpet. When do you start getting into groups and kind of breaking out on your own?

MB: Oh, let's see. I started a band in 10th grade. Seven piece, swing band, R'n'B.

JM: Okay.

MB: And we had a really good band director. He was really this -- He played with -- They had extra parts with Houston Symphony.

JM: Oh, wow.

MB: He played French horn on and he was a black guy. Smooth, sharp. And in those days, we studied casts, what they were wearing. And he would come in wearing these tailor-made sharkskin suits.

JM: No way.

MB: And mohair, and -- you name it. So, we were young guys, we were mightily impressed by his demeanor and his presence. Well, he -- when he wasn't doing the orchestra, he was doing -- he had a band. And they traveled around the Gulf Coast area. They were part of the biggest thing in the Gulf Coast area. All across from El Paso, all the way down to Brownsville, Texas all the way to Louisiana Opelousas.

JM: What were they called?

MB: John Roberts and the Hurricanes.

JM: Okay.

MB: They were something. All of them were -- What it was, they were all lettered, they could read real well. And John with almost all the charts.

JM: Wow.

MB: He was a trumpet player with the band, but a French horn player with the orchestra.

JM: Wow.

MB: But he had Clarence Hollimon, he had Joe Sample. I don't know if you remember that name?

JM: Mm-mm.

MB: Joe Sample was -- Oh, man, he was like the Miles Davis of trumpet. Joe Sample was like -- I was just -- Herbie Hancock on those --

JM: Yeah, yeah.

MB: That's his era.

JM: Wow.

MB: Whether he was -- So, he had the best musicians from around the country. There was Jean Synagogue, Clarence Hollimon. Guitar, oh wow. Holliman -- You play guitar, yeah?

JM: Yeah.

MB: Oh, he was -- And John says, "We're gonna do a concert." He'd sit there and -- this is on the stage. He'd sit on the stage. And the players would take 47:00[inaudible] And just playing. The whole audience, they were up clapping and rolling and rolling.

JM: Wow.

MB: And then they'd stop. And the other one would come out and they'd do their base of − the musicianship was just so great. I mean, I'm -- that's coming from a kid.

JM: Yeah.

MB: Even when I got out of high school, they were still good. They were still great players.

JM: Wow. And so they're playing kind of how many pieces in the group?

MB: In Robert's group?

JM: Uh-huh.

MB: It was only seven.

JM: Okay.

MB: Yeah.

JM: And did they have a vocalist that came along with them?

MB: Well, he was a singer.

JM: Oh, wow.

MB: He had records out down there.

JM: Wow.

MB: John Robert had -- I remember this one because John was dating the president's daughter, president of Texas Southern University's daughter. John wasn't right. He didn't do right. And we didn't realize how bad it was until one night we went there. We came into the band room early Monday morning, and John 48:00was sleeping in the bedroom. She done put him out, I believe.

JM: Oh, man. Wow. So, he's your bandleader at school, real role model, a real player.

MB: Oh, real player, man. Real player.

JM: That's cool. That's really cool. And so did he kinda help you kinda figure -- find your footing as far as putting the band together?

MB: Yeah.

JM: Tell me a little bit about what you learned from him as far as how to play with other guys and how to put a band together.

MB: What he taught me was, "Try to get guys that love what they're doing, man, like you do." That went a long way. I could already write a little bit. And I'd see his charts. He let me see the folders he'd bring from -- He'd come to school on a helicopter some mornings.

JM: Come on. Come on.

MB: I'm serious. Not for show, he would just -- He's just -- And he's drugging, 49:00man. You can tell that he's drugging. He got his dark shades on. And when he gets off the field, the principal's out there doing this to him.

JM: You gotta be kidding me.

MB: "You're late, man. You're late." And John says -- He had his trumpet on his arm. And then -- And he's probably wearing a suit and shoes that cost more than the principal's wardrobe. So, John would get off and he says -- he'd take the shades off and he says, "I'll do better next time." I'll do better next time. And we coined it, man. He said -- John said, "He's gonna do better next time." He'd burst out laughing. So, he fired John after the second year when he couldn't take it no more.

JM: Where is he flying in from a helicopter from? Some gig or something?

MB: Yeah. Likely out of San Antonio places, or Denver. He'd fly in and he would --

JM: Dang.

MB: Dropped right off on − They have a practice -- in the old days, we had a practice football field.

JM: Yeah.

MB: And that's where he would land. And we'd say, "John Roberts is here."

JM: That's a trip, man.

MB: But John came in -- behind was the real trip. They were gonna have a band program. And I think it was what discouraged my brother from staying with trumpet. They didn't have a band director hired, that was trained to play. The mailman was -- this is true before I got to sit on them for one year, in the sixth or seventh grade. And old man Warner, he would take his mailbag off and his cap, set it on a chair, and then he'd go in the band room. And he had an hour and a half of band. And then we would all go once he'd come in, and play. And when it's over he'd put his -- And he'd come back. He did that every day for the band, 'cause --

JM: Wow.

MB: Oh, yeah. That's --

JM: And he was a trumpet player?

MB: And he was a trumpet player. Never heard him play, I mean, but he's not really -- He's a little older too. But so when John Roberts came in, he came in, oh, man, it was the best, like a breath of fresh air for us. 'Cause, we had this other old guy who's pretty stale and never played all that. John, you could hear him on the radio, on TV and --

JM: That's exciting.

MB: No, it was very exciting for us as kids, coming up, man. And so what I got from John was just -- I'd model the numbers 'cause we had the same number of players. I got the same instrumentation he had. 'Cause I liked the sound. He had this alto saxophone trumpet. And I think we had a singer 'cause we had guys that would do the singing, but not many girls. Bass player. I think bass player, he needed help from one of the players after older guys. And he became phenomenal, man. And we went out to Boston.

We were on tour one year, and the people from the sugar shack -- I don't know if 52:00-- Those names probably don't ring much bell to you. But Boston had a underground -- and New York had several. But the ones that we played was underground -- Let me see. Sugar shack was Boston. Lloyd Price Turntable. That's it. Lloyd Price had a turntable, that was the name of the club. And you'd go down in the basement and --

JM: Jazz club?

MB: Oh, yeah.

JM: Okay.

MB: And when we'd come out of there, man, it was -- you really -- you know you just went to New York, 'cause there ain't no where he had -- nothing that looks like that anywhere.

JM: Wow.

MB: Fabulous.

JM: Wow.

MB: But most of these clubs are Playboy Clubs, you see.

JM: Oh, okay. What does that mean to you when you say that?

MB: Well, we didn't know the difference when I went there. We were on a circuit in the South. You knew exactly what that meant. That meant you're on a Chitlin Circuit.

JM: Okay.

MB: Chitlin Circuit, basically means you're gonna do certain clubs, and certain clubs you're not gonna get in. Like the Coco Cabana. You get that in Chicago. But when we get to New York, you didn't have as many bound areas. Lester Young, well, I remember him really well. He was with Duke Ellington. And when -- What's his brother's name that came out --

JM: Of Marseilles?

MB: One played the clarinet. Goodman, Benny Goodman.

JM: Oh, Benny Goodman.

MB: And then there's another one too.

JM: I don't know he had a brother.

MB: No, not Benny Goodman. He had a brother. But there were two brothers.

JM: Oh, okay.

MB: And they played -- they were classically trained, really good players too. But they came off the West Coast. And when they got -- when they were in New York that evening they came in sitting with us, man. Like it was -- like it's just a family affair. It was -- we were shocked. But Lester Young, they took him for their gig, and he got a chance to open up with whatever that -- not the 54:00turntable, there was another place.

JM: Okay.

MB: And I mean, he blew the house up.

JM: Wow, man. That must have been so exciting.

MB: And if you ever get to see the old movies where the big band, and you see a sax player would play on the side.

JM: Okay.

MB: And this is -- your sax is over here and he's over here.

JM: No, yeah, I've seen pictures of Lester Young.

MB: Yeah, that's who he was. He was -- really, historically, he's the first black musician to ever integrate the big band stage.

JM: Really?

MB: Oh, yeah.

JM: Wow.

MB: Yeah.

JM: That's fascinating. I didn't know.

MB: Fascinating history. Yeah. They took him in and treated him like a brother.

JM: Yeah, I mean, that's -- I mean, really -- And it happens in so many different genres. And it's like when you get with guys who can play, you just wanna play with them.

MB: That's it. You forget all about what color you are.

JM: Right.

MB: That's right.

JM: "This guy's good. Let's get him up."

MB: Oh, man. "We can learn a few things from this guy."

JM: So, what was the name of your group when you were working with John Robertson?

MB: When John got fired, we stayed in touch because my band was gaining a pretty good -- We did all the proms, all those carnation balls, all the little towns around about. And then we were told about a big audition they had down in New Orleans for the Expo in '72 − '71? Anyway, Ernie Wheelwright used to play -- big old football player. Used to play with the New Orleans Saints.

JM: Okay, yeah.

MB: And he -- well Ernie was calling for bands to come from wherever to audition for this two-week expense paid trip to Expo Montreal. And they said, "Bluitt, you need to go down there for that man." I said, "When is it?" And he told me when it was. I said, "We'll be there." We went down and we won. Sure did.

JM: What was the name of the group?

MB: We were the Continentals then. And the -- which meant -- it was fashionable 56:00to have those little ties [inaudible]

JM: Oh, yeah. They kinda go like this?

MB: Yeah, like that. Right. But when we won that audition. There's a guy there, I don't know who he was 'til today, but he actually was -- he dressed you, or he showed you what you -- if you really wanna be on the -- 'cause you're almost -- When we got to Montreal, it was fire, man, everywhere. I mean, people -- musicians was just everywhere.

JM: Wow.

MB: And all of them would -- they would come from everywhere. But we -- he was from Motown. That's how -- that's where he was from. I just don't remember his name. And he said he was the guy that Berry Gordy and Cartwright, I think that was the other guy's name. They didn't allow -- you didn't go on the stage representing Motown unless they gave you −

JM: It's like the uniform.

MB: Yeah. uniform. That's right. Fuqua. Marvin Fuqua.

JM: Harvey Fuqua.

MB: Harvey Fuqua, you remember him?

JM: Oh, yeah.

MB: Yeah.

JM: Big deal in Louisville, too. In Louisville.

MB: Yeah, that's his home, right.

JM: Yeah.

MB: His sister is still there I think too.

JM: Uh-huh.

MB: We were gonna put together -- a little about 10 years ago, she wanted to do 57:00like a -- what do you call a --

JM: A reunion show, like a --

MB: Yeah.

MB: Wow. But he had -- I think he had passed away then though.

JM: Yeah, I think he passed away in the '80s or early '90s.

MB: '80s yeah.

JM: Yeah. So, you guys -- that's fascinating. Yeah, he had a sister. So, you guys get picked up in New Orleans at a --

MB: Audition.

JM: Audition that's being put on by one of the -- one of the saints?

MB: Yeah.

JM: In order to get -- is it for like a youth band? Is that what they were looking for?

MB: No, no, they're just looking for raw talent, man.

JM: Wow. And what was the connection to Montreal?

MB: Montreal. When you get there you got -- How do you describe it? You already got -- well, you have a manager you're not gonna -- booking yourself in. There's -- you would be already booked in when you get there. I'm trying to remember the guys -- we ended up doing -- and these are the names I remember, Joe Crocker was here. And there's a stage set up. Then -- no, Santana was not there. Sly and the 58:00Family Stones, now that really --

JM: My goodness.

MB: That blows you way back out, I know.

JM: I love Sly Stones.

MB: Well, man, wasn't he a scary cat?

JM: Real weird dude.

MB: Bad -- really weird --

JM: Real weird dude.

MB: Yeah.

JM: Very smart.

MB: Yeah, he was. Good showmanship too, I did like that about him.

JM: Wow.

MB: There was two or three other spots we ended up doing 'cause we were there five days. And you played, oh man, every day. You had a great time. I'm trying to remember. Wait a minute, I'm gonna think of his name in a minute. He was right there and got them -- but we went to -- we stayed at the McGill for a while, the McGill Conservatory is sitting over here. And I think they ended up 59:00-- they would pick us up and all -- We had a Winnebago, we had our own back travel then. And when we got out of the McGill we ended up playing at the -- we didn't do Hendrix. We didn't do -- We did Crocker.

JM: What do you mean you did Crocker. Like you played the same -- you played in his --

MB: In his crew, he has a crew. These guys are all -- they're all dead now, all of them. A lot of them out of New York, and a lot of them out of Chicago. The big cities dominated seemed like most of the spaces. But the -- when I say audition groups we were -- I was the oldest one. How old was I, 20? I might have been 20 'cause I left college and took off. I wasn't fooling around. I ain't gonna miss that opportunity. 'Cause, it's kind of like a once-in-a-lifetime.

JM: Sure. So, the Continentals get picked up, and you guys do some showcases.

MB: We do showcases in Montreal.

JM: And then you're also backing people up?

MB: Yeah, oh, yeah.

JM: Okay.

MB: Edwin Starr was there. That's who it was.

JM: Edwin Starr you told me about that.

MB: You remember him?

JM: No, well, we talked about him last time.

MB: Well Edward Starr was -- He was still riding the waves of 25 miles from home. My feet are hurting mighty bad, that old song he did?

JM: Okay.

MB: And he hadn't come out with War yet. War was --

JM: So, that was the first time you met him?

MB: That was the first time we really got to meet. And when we left Montreal, we came back -- we didn't go up to New York, we came back out to Toronto, Detroit. And, oh, man Starr had -- I mean he -- We were both the hottest -- we were one of the hottest things up there at the time as far as young cats that were doing stuff. And Michael Jackson, those guys they were coming -- they were just cutting their teeth too, they weren't already on top of the world.

JM: Right, were they up there too?

MB: Well, I think some of the family members were there. I don't think as Michael and all --

JM: Yeah.

MB: No, Michael was holding his own. He was still -- he didn't -- he would have been what? 8, 9 years old?

JM: Who knows? He was so young.

MB: Yeah, he wasn't at this -- that particular session where we were.

JM: So, let me just get this straight. So, the Expo --

MB: '72.

JM: Is just an enormous festival --

MB: Oh, man.

JM: Who put it on? Like I'm trying to get a hang of what it is?

MB: Montreal city, they hosted it.

JM: Okay.

MB: So, players who were coming from the south -- I'm saying the south as far as New Orleans. They had guys up in Florida and then there were guys from New York too, though. How they got -- how everybody else got hooked up I don't really know but --

JM: Okay, so it's a big --

MB: When I got there I recognized the names because of the --

JM: Sure.

MB: Songs that they'd produced.

JM: And so the Continentals, play some showcases, and then somebody is telling 62:00you, "Now you go up to Joe Cocker's stage, and here's the charts."

MB: Here's the charts, or you go do your own charts. We didn't always have to do somebody else's charts. We backed up about five or six cats and -- one of the girls was Sue Rainey. Sue Rainey was out of Atlanta. And we had heard about her but we'd never played behind her. So, it wasn't hard to play behind hers.

JM: So, but walk -- like someday if somebody is listening to this interview or reading something in the book -- I mean, and I don't even know 'cause I'm not this kind of player.

MB: Yeah.

JM: What's it look like when you and your group show up to a stage? "All right, guys, we're gonna do 10 numbers. Time to go, kick this one off and whatever." And G -- how do you guys -- how do you get six, seven guys to back somebody up on tunes that you haven't played with them before?

MB: Well, they'll tell you what key they're doing it in. And then Gene will either say or I'll say, "Give me the first eight bars man." And then they'd give 63:00us -- He says -- I'll use something that's common. I have got sunshine on a cloudy day, guitar. "We got it. We got it." That's what -- we were -- we had some very, very good ears.

JM: Wow.

MB: And you may learn five or six songs real quick. Now when Starr came out, he had -- that's when we got a taste of War, but he was still doing that old 25 miles and we did that years back.

JM: Right, so you knew some of these numbers?

MB: Yeah, we knew some of -- we knew all the charts. We didn't -- there wasn't hardly anything that came out -- Sly's the only one brought stuff out that you didn't know. He was definitely in another world.

JM: That's wild.

MB: Yeah. You didn't get connected with people that you couldn't -- so right now music has got real sophisticated. Not now. I'm trying to remember this guy's name. Yeah. Some of the White Circuit you had Steppenwolf, you had -- what's 64:00this guy Bruce Springsteen, you got -- and these guys -- They got writers, they got guys who are doing their charts for them. And all you got to do is be Bruce Springsteen.

JM: Right, yeah.

MB: And it was evident and woven -- 'cause when we came -- when that circuit was over, those two weeks were over, and we flew around and went to -- came back to Detroit, that's when we got connected to Motown on a direct passage because Starr needed a band to sail -- to tour with to get War out there, 'cause there's no need -- in those days it was simple, you didn't have all the technology we have now. But in those days, if you got a new chart and a recording out and it's hot, and you can't go on tour, you can't sell the charts, you can't sell the songs.

So, they brought the show and we were started -- we started up about -- we had 65:00one week in Detroit and we was playing at the Felt Lounge I think for a while, and then in the evenings, we'd rehearse with Starr. He would come over and he'd teach eight to 10 songs just like that. And we knew most of them, it wasn't like it was new. We just changed keys on some of it. He had a good voice, he was a good singer. Some people didn't like his voice but I liked it. I thought it was a nice voice. He didn't strain to get to his notes. He was there. Starr was like -- he was almost like a grandchild to Berry Gordy and them.

JM: Is that so?

MB: That's the way I remember it. His house was located not far from where [inaudible] where he lived. And when we got to Detroit, they did something for him that I never heard them doing for nobody. See, when -- Starr liked -- he liked to gamble quite a bit. And we did Albany, Syracuse, Hartford, all the way 66:00down eastern seaboard to Jacksonville, Florida. All one-nighters which means the --

JM: Whoa.

MB: A lot of wear and tear on the body and the brain. But we were so young, we didn't know the difference, we were crazy. 20 teens. But what I do remember though, we were making about -- we making good money on those tours though. Each band member was making around 250 a night, which was pretty good money.

JM: That's a lot of money.

MB: Oh, yeah, and it was -- it started off being 70 a week. We had 10 guys by that time. We picked up another guitar player who was a friend of the guitar player we had, which was Johnny Reese. I don't know if you've ever heard the name, Johnny Reese. He came out of Berkeley. Oh, he was -- he looks -- he and I 67:00look almost alike when you see him. And we look so much alike that we could use each other's ID when we go out in public. But Johnny was real -- And I think what I learned from him was that he was very particular about his body and what you put in your body.

JM: Really?

MB: The first time I heard a young kid talking like that, and it influenced me 'cause I'm constantly being careful too.

JM: Huh.

MB: Don't eat any place, be careful what you're eating. And Johnny picked a friend of his who came and joined us after we left, he got back to Detroit. But I think -- when we left -- when we did that -- the Motown review in Detroit at the Cobo Arena, that was our first big -- that was the launch for War.

JM: Okay, let me just --

MB: We'd already --

JM: Just let me get the timeline though because -- So, you're up -- you're having an amazing time in Montreal.

MB: Yeah.

JM: And then people notice?

MB: Oh, yeah.

JM: That these guys are good.

MB: Yeah.

JM: And then so does Edwin Starr himself say, "You guys come with me?"

MB: He says, "Take my card," he had some money, "See you in Detroit."

JM: See you in Detroit in two weeks or something?

MB: Oh, no, we didn't have but two days to get there.

JM: Oh, okay. Really?

MB: 'Cause it was at the close of the Expo.

JM: Okay.

MB: And he'd done what he was going to do. And we had a blast it didn't matter if we ever sang another song with him or not. But it was great being there.

JM: So, that's amazing. So, you guys --

MB: Yeah, two days is all we had.

JM: In your teens, in your '20s, you're saying -- calling mom and saying, "I'm not coming back right now. I'm not sure when I'll see you." Did you know that you were going to be out on tour for a while?

MB: Well, we knew that if he goes to sell that record we gotta go on tour with him, and then that was really a high point for us 'cause kids -- you like traveling and you like to see things and big crowds of people applauding. And the money was good, too. Oh, yeah. That was really a great time.

JM: Wow.

MB: So, I think after those -- we did those 14 or -- 10 or 14 nights.

JM: Down to Jacksonville?

MB: Down to Jacksonville. And we were doing all --

JM: And then you're still gonna get back to Detroit?

MB: Yeah, but you're doing all Cobo arenas, coliseums, huge auditoriums, and you kinda got used to it. And see we were just an opening act for Motown review for a while, which was really a nice place to be 'cause that's the first thing that the audience saw. The lights were hidden, and then we were -- They were little fans that caught on. And we were the first to do a lot of them. Like kids started doing something called The Jerk, Robot. Those wild babies, they -- hold on. Hello, Titus. Hey, I'm so sorry, man. I thought my friend Titus has got a new number. That's what it is. All right, I'm sorry.

Sure. But we -- let me put this off period. Yeah it was just that we -- when we came out of that tour in Montreal, and then when we came out of Detroit, we must have went to Albany for the first kickoff of the tour. We had -- like I said, we 70:00made really good money, all the hotels and everything was paid for, you don't have to pay nothing. And what is his name? Make sure I got it right. Star took Sue Rainey on the tour with us. She could sing. She could almost take the show from Starr.

JM: Wow.

MB: Well, the road manager was the arranger at that time. And that was -- that's the road manager used to make sure you got your money.

JM: Okay.

MB: Well, the arranger was Gene Keys. Gene Keys was Stevie Wonder's arranger. And whenever you go on tour with anybody, Motown's supreme, Marvin, all of them, they all want Gene Keys to go with him. And Gene would sit there like he was 71:00half asleep almost all of the tour, man. He get up and he says, "What city are we in today?" It didn't matter to him. I said, "Gene," I said, "Hey, we're gonna be leaving Jacksonville. We're heading out toward Atlanta." And he'd ghost us all the way across the south all the way to Houston.

But this is what most memorable you'd have to almost -- I don't know if I can articulate it to say. But when we left Jacksonville with Gene, the music wasn't right. And they -- 'cause Bohannan and the Motown sound, when we got to Jacksonville, they went back to Detroit. A lot of the players were -- that's their home base. And they do that nightly thing at the 20 Grand, this Motown thing, where they only came because Berry Gordy said, "Gene called and he said, Stevie ain't happy." He's like two little boys talking. He says -- Stevie told 72:00Gene after we left the stage in Jacksonville, he says, "Baby Gene, you gotta do something Gene," he says, "The music ain't right, baby."

Gene said, "Okay." He said, "Which charts?" He says -- He said, "Your brass section is hurting me, man. They're hurting me, Gene."

JM: Wow. Really?

MB: Yeah. And at that time, we really thought Stevie could see, 'cause when we -- the gig before that in Detroit, we went to -- when the Cobo Arena opened up, we all took out -- We were running through the dog out, so to speak to get to where the dressing area was for the stage. And Stevie took out running too. And we said, "It's dark at night." He says, "Stevie, it don't matter to him 'cause it's always dark." That was one of the most memorable evenings.

JM: Wow, I bet.

MB: Yeah, but Stevie told Gene, he says, "You got to do something, Gene. I can't sing with this here going on."

JM: What was the problem?

MB: The problem was Gene walked up half asleep. The Musicians Union sent musicians in to play the charts and half -- a lot of them were older guys, the chaps just weren't there no more.

JM: Oh, no.

MB: Yeah, and when you hear that grid, when you're used to hearing guys like Marius Cook, Louis Smith, on the first, second trumpet, and fourth, fifth trumpet. And they had fire braising across the back of the stage and --

JM: Wow.

MB: And then all of a sudden you get up there and there's some guys up there that are just puking missing notes and laughing at each other, taking a little sip.

JM: Wow.

MB: And I sat and watched it. We opened up the show as we always did. But until Gene got the rest of us, Stevie wouldn't wanna do the rest of the show. That's 74:00what he was really gonna do. And his manager, the girl was there. And I think his mom came too, they weren't playing. And if Stevie ain't happy ain't none of them happy. He said, "Gene, you gotta do something." But Gene got up and he [inaudible] like you can play a tape back, he'd just sit out and listened and he says, "Get all the musicians, tell them all to go home."

He says -- called his friends from Detroit to come back down here and he says and get the musicians out of Atlanta 'cause he had some players that he knew. All new players, all new faces. I only got to play two nights 'cause I was probably one of the few in my group that could really read the charts. But when you come up behind guys like Louis Smith and Marius Cook, those guys open up, high Gs -- start off on them. And they don't even flinch.

JM: Wow.

MB: And he had two kids out of New York who were just -- they didn't even warm up. I warmed up about 50 years ago with Louis, I don't even wanna warm up no more. Got out there in Minnesota on high -- oh man it just -- let it stir your bones up almost to say. I guess you don't need to warm if you got all that going on.

JM: Wow, man. So, after Stevie kicked those guys --

MB: They got rid of them.

JM: You played for a couple nights before the Atlanta guys showed up?

MB: Before the new guys showed up, yeah. They told me I could stay with them. I said, "Man, I can't keep up with you guys." They'd done it for a living, like play TV shows, studio work, a lot of those guys have some rich backgrounds and degrees to -- they would -- I hadn't graduated from college yet, really. Not that the college is gonna make you play any better, but the point was I didn't have enough -- I don't think I had the experience to read this. I can keep it going as just some amateurs running around. And then when those cats came in --

JM: Wow.

MB: They separated the boys from the girls, man, the cream from the -- the 76:00butter from the cream as they say.

JM: Yeah.

MB: Yeah, they were -- that was an eye-opening experience for me. But --

JM: What happened after that tour?

MB: That tour, let me see, we had -- hit up Jacksonville. I'm sure that I can't even remember the cities but Augusta, Georgia, always said -- we went to James Brown's homeland which was Augusta. Again, we went over to Atlanta, and then we went to -- I don't know, I'm trying to think of the name of the -- there's a place in Mississippi, the only city we didn't do was Kentucky -- State we didn't do was Kentucky. But when we got to -- the tour was supposed to end in Houston at the Coliseum. And that's where it ended.

JM: Oh, okay.

MB: Yeah. And I don't remember how many nights it was. One was 14 nights and one was 10. I think that was the 10-night tour. And them guys stayed with us all the 77:00way through it man. And it kind of makes a big difference in the show that people are gonna get. If you got something that -- somebody can get up there and really light the place up from the very beginning. Yeah, that's we on -- we're going somewhere tonight. This is gonna be good. And then you got a big grid of 26 musicians in a orchestra playing behind Temptation Supreme, Marvin, Stevie Wonder -- all the bling-bling guys is on top of the mountain so to speak.

JM: My goodness.

MB: It was just an experience you just have to talk about. You can't relive it.

JM: Okay.

MB: The only thing that came close to what we experienced between Montreal, Detroit, and Motown tour and when War came out was the first Woodstock. Boy that was -- and we were headed there. It was 1976. I remember. And Joe Cocker -- 78:00what's he say? "I'ma be there baby." You know how -- Joe Cocker, you know what he was known for, right? He says, "I'm a white man," he says, "But nobody don't know," he says, "Cause I sound black as the blackest man here." And he could. He opened that mouth -- everyone is screaming. And he had that raspy sound.

JM: Yeah, very unique, very unique.

MB: Oh, very unique. I kept saying, "Old boy can sing."

JM: Oh, yeah, he was good. So, did you go to Woodstock?

MB: I didn't go. We didn't go. We didn't write to him. We were supposed to head on out. I'm trying to remember, we ended up in -- got to Detroit, went to Toronto. And I think we started doing studio work for a while. We recorded three or four songs right there in Detroit.

JM: At Motown?

MB: Yeah.

JM: For what? For whom?

MB: It was for the Houston Outlaws. You see, 'cause when we got back to Detroit 79:00-- we hit Detroit with Starr that's when we got renamed to Houston Outlaws. And so Continentals name was history. But although there was one song the bass player wrote called the Raving Cancer. I said, "You think that's going to sell Donnie?" He said, he'd stutter, "Bluitt -- Bluitt," he said, "People are dying." He imitated that emphysema-type sound, on the recording.

JM: What?

MB: Yeah.

JM: Wow, man.

MB: I said, "Do it again." He said, "When they hear it Bluitt they're gonna wanna buy it." Like that. Boy. And that took us all the way up to the West Coast.

JM: The song?

MB: The song.

JM: Really?

MB: Yeah the Raving Cancer or something like that, the Raging Cancer.

JM: No way.

MB: Yeah, he was -- took us -- took it on up to the next place.

JM: Amazing.

MB: Yeah.

JM: The Houston Outlaws so --

MB: Yeah.

JM: Okay, so I see now that I didn't kind of get the gravity of that -- those first couple of tours. So, you all really got cherry-picked by Edwin Starr.

MB: Yep.

JM: And this is when he was going to be rolling out War.

MB: War was -- that's right.

JM: Which was gonna be huge. An enormous number.

MB: Oh, and it was. It was huge. 3 million --

JM: 3 million sold?

MB: In just the first few months, man. Yeah. They hadn't had anything -- Marvin Gaye didn't have anything out that could do that.

JM: Really?

MB: Not like that one.

JM: What was going on that he didn't already have a group a couple of weeks before he's supposed to go on this tour?

MB: Hey, we heard but we didn't ever meet him. I don't know to this day whether or not they dumped Starr, 'cause Starr didn't use them to the record. He used a studio named Funk Brothers. Those guys did the recording.

JM: Yeah, yeah.

MB: And so all we had to do was come in and get -- hit the 45 and play what we 81:00heard and we had to go.

JM: Yeah, yeah.

MB: I don't know what happened. Plenty of musicians were running around up there.

JM: Sure.

MB: That's for sure. And at Bohannan -- Bohannan had the cream of the crop.

JM: Now let's talk about this a little bit. So, you all get picked up, go out on tour, opening act for the Motown review. And Bohannan is putting this whole -- he's arranging, putting everything together. And what you have is what -- you said it's like 26 musicians.

MB: 26 piece orchestra, man.

JM: And then people are just coming out on like one after another.

MB: Oh, yeah, one after the other, doc. The MC would come on between, like the entertainment for the mid -- between the songs, and they'd tap dance or they'd do moonwalk out there. And he says, "And now we're gonna have the," -- And he'd call the song, "Marvin Gaye. And we're gonna have Martha and the Vandellas." 'Cause, all of them were there.

JM: And so you guys are traveling from one city to the next with this whole 82:00crew, the whole Motown crew?

MB: The whole entourage was there, man. And nobody missed. Now back at the -- Bohannan was a drummer. And I'm saying he couldn't write but probably could write. He's the one that pulled the band together. And he could put some good musicians. I don't know where his training came from but Gene Keys was the guy that did the arranging. And so they said, "The music gotta be right."

JM: Wow.

MB: Yeah, that was something. And Fuqua was actually the one that's gonna make sure you look right. You weren't going on stage -- Four Tops came down, and this is a funny story. Four Tops came in, they was with Atlantic first for a while. And they're gonna -- 'cause they -- and then -- and I think the biggest controversy was they weren't supposed to be released -- Temptations weren't supposed to be released first. It was supposed to be the Four Tops. But Gordy said, "No, these are the guys. Get David Ruffin out there now. And that meant -- 83:00Four Tops had to always take second seat.

JM: Oh, man.

MB: To the Four Tops.

JM: Wow.

MB: Temptations -- Yeah, they had the lead line. All the other groups, Chi-Lites, Spinners, you name it, they all had to come -- Delfonics, they all had to come in after Temptations.

JM: Right. They knew the pecking order but you're saying --

MB: They knew the pecking order that's right.

JM: Okay, okay.

MB: Yeah.

JM: So, was there like an actual rivalry between Four Tops and Temps?

MB: Oh, yeah, 'cause when the Four Tops came in, they were ready to go on tour. Martin says you can't go because the Temps have already got that spot.

JM: Wow, man.

MB: And so they knew that Gordy had stuck them.

JM: Oh, no.

MB: Berry Gordy, he's the only one that can change.

JM: Yeah, for sure.

MB: And then he made it clear. He says, "Now Davis, you gotta take the boys. They're going on out to West Coast."

JM: Wow.

MB: Sure enough, they got stiff. They got a lot of local play, but they never get that premier position that they were supposed to have 'cause it was a bit -- there was supposed to be some kind of an arrangement to get them to leave -- was it Atlantic down there, and then to come to Motown.

JM: Okay.

MB: 'Cause they were not -- they weren't really born and bred Motown boys.

JM: Okay.

MB: Not like Gaye and Stevie, and those guys, where they were born right there, and their families are there.

JM: Wow. That's wild, man, that's wild.

MB: Yes. A lot of politics went to work up in there. And all of them were good, and all of them was -- They looked good, they -- of course, they only had one David Ruffin there, he was -- And they all had the little drug problems and other things that go with territory when -- I get to look back at it now. I 85:00really am thankful that God spared me from a lot of those --

JM: Yeah, for sure.

MB: 'Cause a lot of cats didn't come back the way they left.

JM: No, they didn't, they really didn't.

MB: Yeah, and it wasn't the military that did it to them, either, it was a lot of -- the drug scene was just a pretty bad place to have to pull up from.

JM: Yeah, yeah, no, I hear that. I've lost a lot of friends.

MB: Really?

JM: Oh, yeah.

MB: The drug scene?

JM: Oh, yeah. It's providence that I was -- I came out of it the way I did.

MB: Yeah. Yeah.

JM: So, let me -- I wanna think about -- well, we should probably wrap up in a couple minutes. I know you're a busy guy.

MB: Sure.

JM: Which means we gotta do this again, 'cause we barely got the ball down the field.

MB: I enjoy talking about it 'cause a lot of it I wouldn't remember if --

JM: Well, knocks things lose to talk about it.

MB: Yeah. It's true. Some things that you experienced -- If some of the people that were experiencing it with you, or are doing that same thing, you never have a reason to talk about it. And it was just kind of [inaudible].

JM: Right.

MB: Maybe if you talk about it 20 years from now.

JM: Sure.

MB: Maybe not.

JM: Did Berry Gordy come on the tour?

MB: I never saw him on tour. He came out when we did the Cobo Arena. And at that time, we didn't know who he was really. He -- and most of the entertainers out there they went into the big room watching down or looking over. I don't ever remember Gordy coming on stage. Smokey -- he and Smokey Robinson had a real good thing going there. I don't know what it was all. But they're like contemporaries, of course.

JM: Okay. Okay. Man, that must have been wild.

MB: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

JM: And I think Harvey Fuqua, married Gordy's daughter or something like that.

MB: Something like that. That's right, that's right.

JM: Yeah, I think -- So, you're on this huge tour with all the star power.

MB: Star power. Okay.

JM: People -- and so you got plucked out of East Texas, dropped into Toronto, and all of a sudden you're playing huge arenas, with the biggest talent --

MB: In the world.

JM: In the world, right?

MB: Yeah. I mean, the real movers and shakers of --

JM: Of the industry.

JM: Soul music and R&B in America.

MB: Mm-hmm. They were there, man.

JM: That's crazy. What did that feel like?

MB: It was just -- I was -- But you said picked, I was just picked to do it. 'Cause, a lot of the guys were I guess coming from a country town like I came from.

JM: Wow.

MB: You have dreams. You -- I guess God had a way to make our dreams come true.

JM: Wow.

MB: And I told -- I had a little boy's prayer once, I said, "You know, Lord, I'm 88:00not really living right like the book say, but I didn't make myself like this." That's what I told God. I said, "This is something I've gotta do." 'Cause, when I was at Texas Southern University, I was -- I had grown up a little bit, then I was about 18, 17. And I said -- If you go out there, and you start -- and this is all at the backdrop of my religious training. If you're in church, you don't be mixing the church and other stuff and all together.

And if you do, you'll probably end up in hell somewhere. No, that's what you was taught. And I didn't fight it. I set out -- So, I said to the Lord, if he would let me take care of my soul when I go out there. As in -- and I laid the backdrop -- I was -- "I don't know why I'm like this, I don't even know why I think this way." But I told him, I said, "It's in me. And I've gotta live out 89:00what's inside me. You made me." Now, we weren't arguing, I was just telling him what I could see at the age I was and the little limited maturity I had. And I don't know what to say the answer was.

Point well taken. I'm just using this as an example. You do what you got to do, and when you get through I want you to come back in and help kids do what they do.

JM: So, let me get this straight. Are you saying that when you were in university, you're 17-18 years old --?

MB: Yeah.

JM: You had a -- you feel like you had an awareness that you were gonna go out and at some point, come back and do the type of work you're doing now?

MB: Oh, I knew I was coming back. Yeah.

JM: Really?

MB: Yeah, I had to come back. That was a part of the arrangement. These are the little secret closet prayers you pray and you and God have a real clear vision 90:00of where it says I've dreamed of performing -- 'cause, see, when I was a boy, Sammy Davis would come by the house, dance and play. We had all their recordings, man. We had well, in those days, The Mills Brothers, I don't know if you remember the big band?

JM: Uh-huh, sure, sure.

MB: You do? Okay, then, you had -- I had all with my Hager Jackson's, Sarah Vaughn, Net Ella -- My mama she had the collections like Nat King Cole, [inaudible] him out. So, those -- they helped to kind of shape my dreams of where I wanted to go. And you'd hear -- And see, we -- I don't know if you remember, those were album covers, those LPs. You read on the back of them, you can almost get a picture where what that must have been like. 'Cause, we didn't get to travel to see those places. But then you get a chance to go and see it.

Yeah, that's the same thing I read about. So, I was already getting -- I've been 91:00-- I'm being programmed, man, from a kid that this is one of the -- and one thing I didn't wanna be, I didn't wanna be a musician who had a lot of excuses why I didn't -- If you give me half a chance, I think I can pull it off. And then the preacher would be preaching, he says, "If you tell God about what you," -- this is what he said, he said, "If you tell God about what your dreams are, what it is you wanna do, you wanna be," he said, "He'll help you." And it was just that simple.

And I said, "Okay," I said so -- and I look back at Motown, I look back at Detroit and Toronto 'cause we had some -- you have some pretty life-threatening situations you go into. And, I think back but I'd never had any fear. We were in 92:00a -- when we did the sugar shack in Boston, there are groups that would come through there, one was from Louisville.

JM: Moonglows?

MB: What's the name?

JM: Moonglows?

MB: No, The Moonglows, I heard about them too. We never did a show with them. There was a group called the Funkadelics.

JM: Oh, yeah.

MB: Oh, they were --

JM: What do you mean? Funkadelics, then Funkadelic, then Parliament?

MB: Yeah, and Parliament, you know the whole story then?

JM: Yeah, yeah.

MB: Oh, The Parliaments, that's what they started out as, right?

JM: They started out as The Parliaments, that's right.

MB: Right. 'Cause, when we hear -- We were on a bus ride with them after the gig to New Jersey where a couple of the guys are from. And -- but back to my -- my point was that when we were at the Sugar Shack, the Funkadelics, and there was another group that came through there. Ronnie Dyson. I don't know if you remember him or not?

JM: No.

MB: But he was a trainer opera singer.

JM: Really?

MB: Bad boy, man. Big, old, huge and he would come on stage. And he was -- he would come on stage -- and he'd go out in the stage. And he wrote this song, "If you let me make love to you, why can't I touch you."

JM: Wow.

MB: And his mom would run out on stage, get the handkerchief. Boy, we would be sitting in the audience just rolling. And Ronnie would be trying to say, "Mom, I got it. I got it, mom." If you let me make love to you then why can't I touch you?" And then she'd put his towel around his neck.

JM: Oh my goodness, man.

MB: Oh, she wasn't thinking about that.

JM: Shit man.

MB: Oh, bro.

JM: That's so funny, man.

MB: Yeah, that was funny.

JM: Wow.

MB: Oh, man. But with this danger -- only dangerous part of it was my -- the sax 94:00player who was -- we were all -- we had graduated from high school together, roommates in college, but, man, did he -- [inaudible] but John, pretty -- I guess pretty good looking cat according to women's standard. He was looking at this girl. And she looked pretty, nice little girl. And I told John, I say, "Man, you know you -- that girl." "That's a woman, first of," he says, "She might have a boyfriend in here. Her husband might be coming in here, and you're making plans."

I know what he's doing, making plans. That was over. John said, "No, Danny, no, I'm not gonna do nothing." I said, "You know, this is a," -- And remember the Sugar Shack was a Playboy Club in those days.

JM: Okay.

MB: Brother. You go in and − The Barrino family. That's who they were. All Italian boys. Them boys played -- People be showing up on the channel to see men's shoes and stuff. And I told John, I said, "We need to get out of here as soon as this gig is over. John, you're coming with me." "But, Danny, they just want to say bye to us. They wanna say hi." And I said, "We're all gonna get killed." That's what the guys -- "Get John. Get John." 'Cause he's trying to -- that's the man's wife John's looking at.

JM: Oh, no.

MB: Oh, God. So Johnny, he said, "I'm sorry. I didn't know that it was his wife." And I said, "Well, we got escorts to the door." They took us to the door. And I said, "Man, thank goodness we got all -- we played already." Those people don't play up in that way.

JM: No, sir.

MB: They don't ask questions at all. Just -- there you go.

JM: That's wild.

MB: Yeah, so I said -- So, I got a lot of mercy when I was out there.

JM: Yeah. Wow.

MB: Yeah. But this is what I was supposed to come back and do.

JM: Oh, man, I can't wait to get to hear about that. And I'm very really, really interested to hear about how y'all ended up in Louisville. We just got to do it again, this wasn't enough.

MB: Oh, it wasn't enough? Okay.

JM: No, you're a really great storyteller. And --

MB: I'm trying.

JM: And you have a great memory, which is good. And also --

MB: Well, you're helping me though.

JM: Well, I had --

MB: If you didn't ask the question, I wouldn't have any reason to think back about any -- some of this stuff.

JM: Yeah. It's nice to be able to kind of tap into those recollections you haven't thought of in a long time?

MB: Yeah it is.

JM: Yeah.

MB: Yeah.

JM: Well, okay, I'm gonna turn this off and --

MB: Okay.