Nine Fingers (7 page)
Authors: Thom August
It took another half-hour to get the system right. I’d do a little more tweaking when everyone got here. After all, I had
equalized it all to the piano, and this wasn’t a solo piano concert. So when they got here I’d have them take a minute to
get warm and tune up to the piano, and I’d fiddle with the dials again one more time, just a hair or two. But the way the
system was at that moment, anybody could play into it and it would work.
By this time it was eight thirty-five. I took a water-based red Magic Marker and marked the levels on the dials, in case someone,
particularly Jeff, fucked with them, then headed out to the bathroom to take a piss. No weed tonight, not until after. I wanted
us to play well so I could wash that last scary gig out of my head. I looked around at all the glass in the walls and the
ceiling. I didn’t want to get all pot-paranoid and start hearing that glass breaking when it wasn’t.
So it was Straight City for me, or as close to it as I come, at least for the next three hours. Please, I thought, no murders,
no blood. Just let it be music.
Airport Marriott—Tuning Up
Saturday, January 11
8:00
A
.
M.
:
Getup tonight is Joe Businessman. Blue worsted suit. Dark blue socks. Cordovan shoes. Black galoshes over them. Blue button-down
shirt. Maroon tie, cordovan belt to go with the cordovan shoes no one can see under the galoshes. Black-rimmed glasses, thick
lenses, with a clear prescription. Toupee. Mousy brown. Mustache and Vandyke to match. Eyebrows dyed to blend in. Black gloves,
black coat, black scarf. One word—inconspicuous.
Review the objectives:
Do not get caught
Do not get noticed
Leave nothing behind
Reconnoiter
Figure what went wrong
Here to watch. Time to see for myself.
The boys? Tell them what happens? They say nothing. “Shit happens.” Do they want to try again? Do they want to clear this
up? No. They say, Back off. They will get in touch.
Me? Not happy. All this time, this never happens. Always get the job done. This job, when it comes in, it looks simple. Maybe
it still is. See for myself.
Check the pain status. Three on a one-to-ten scale. Same place. Dull ache. The back is livable. Two of the striped pills,
all ready. Two more handy if it gets any worse.
Park the car myself. Lock up. Keys in the right front pocket. Walk to the big glass door. Wait for the doorman to open it.
Put the shoulders up. Put the head down. Pass on the coat check. Head for the lounge. Find a seat in the back, near the corner.
Hang the coat on the back of the chair. Leave the scarf on, the gloves on. Waitress wanders over, her own sweet time. Tall
dirty blonde. Uniform that is maybe a size eight when she is at least an eleven. Do they have a size eleven? No idea. She
looks past me.
I stare off at the ceiling, like what I want to drink is written there. “Ginger ale, please.”
Do not give them too much of anything. Do not give them too little of anything. Be normal. Be average. Give nobody anything
to hold on to.
She wanders off. Time to check out the room.
8:05
A
.
M.
:
Some sound in the air. Like a single note played over and over. Now the piano comes into my line of sight. It looks like a
body is sprawled on it.
Then the body moves. One hand reaching into the guts of the piano. One reaching around for the keys. Guy is tuning it.
The drink comes. I lay a Jackson on the table, gloves still on. She swoops it up, fumbles for change. Drops it on the table.
Gives me the big phony smile. Give her one right back. Leave the money on the table. One more soda, later, maybe. Whatever
money is left is her s. Normal tip.
Pretzels and nuts and crackers on the table. Glass bowl. Do not touch.
Cannot see the face of the guy tuning the piano. Just hear the sound. Hypnotic. Easy to get lost in.
Know something about this. Studied music, when I was a kid. The clarinet. Couple a years is all. Remember a little bit about
it.
8:10
A
.
M.
:
Early yet. Band starts at nine. Scan the room. Thirty-five people. A handful of couples. A scattering of middle-aged men,
having a few pops. One table of noisy twenty-somethings. Talking too loud. This is not their kind of music—they will be gone
as soon as it starts. Two bartenders behind the long bar, one male, chunky, five-ten, thirty-five-ish, one female, stringy
hair, forty-five-ish, working steady. Three waitresses, including size-eleven-in-a-size-eight. One guy, the corner of the
bar, clear drink with a wedge of lime, also scanning the room—the bouncer. Suit a little too tight around the shoulders. Hair
a little too short. Neck a seventeen-and-a-half. Gray slacks, blue blazer, black mock turtleneck, gold chain. Does not appear
to be armed. Makes two of us.
Tuning guy also dressed up—suit, shirt, tie. Hair a touch too long, beard.
Remove the gloves, tuck them into the coat along with the scarf. One sip of the ginger ale. Cold, nice, brings on memories.
8:15
A
.
M.
:
Tuning guy almost done. Plays a few chords, tweaks one or two strings. Plays some…what is the word? Arpeggios. Guy does
a thorough piece of work—this I can appreciate. Not something I could do—had an ear for rhythm but not for pitch. One reason
I stopped.
Turns around behind him, turns back to the piano, plays a few chords. Nothing to tap your foot to. Gets up, starts to walk
around.
Thin, wiry guy, late twenties, early thirties, six feet or so. The guy the papers said was the real piano player? Who was
taking a break when I showed up? Could be him, doing double duty. Must not be very good. Doubt if Ellington tuned his own
piano.
8:30
A
.
M.
:
Still waiting, watching. Amatucci, if that is who it is, still playing with the speakers. Same chords, over and over. Dedicated
to his work. You can tell it is sounding better. The loud twenty-somethings are making wisecracks—“Hey. Dig the chops on this
guy,” “A freaking Elton John,” “Did he go to Juilliard for this?”
8:45
A
.
M.
:
Waitress circles behind me. Reach for the glass. Take another sip. Place it on the table in the same wet circle it has already
made on the coaster. She sees this. She veers off.
Time to count the house again.
Ninety-one patrons, staff of six. Make that seven. Guy in a tux. Black guy. Light-skinned. Slacks pressed like knife edges.
Right shoes for it, what do they call them? Patent leather. A bow tie, a cummerbund, the whole rig. Looks at his watch twice
a minute. Checks the room. He is counting the house, too. Checks in with a few tables, smiling, hey-how-ya-doing, can-I-get-ya-something?
Shakes the hands, pats the shoulders, air-kisses the ladies. Maybe the lounge manager? Could be.
8:55
A
.
M.
:
Tuner is done, heads out of the room. Reaching in his right front pocket. Pack of smokes. Guys starting to come in with suitcases,
instrument cases, whatever. Sit up in the chair, try to get comfortable. One good belch. Thank you.
One last look around the room.
Show time.
Airport Marriott—The Gig—First Set
Saturday, January 11
Paul shows up about twenty minutes early and hands out copies of the set list to everyone, on three-by-five cards. I put mine
down on the piano, like I’m in no hurry to see what we’re playing, and say hello. He hangs up his coat, unpacks his trumpet,
a gleaming brass King, a classic. He reaches into his case for some valve oil; he’s like these people who put salt on everything
before they taste it, whether it needs it or not. It’s not the valves that need oiling, just his routine that needs to be
fed. I look away and scan the list.
It’s typical Paul. He tends to program the sets chronologically, from old to new. It’s not in exact order that way, but it
has that feel. The first set is almost all Dixieland, traditional stuff, a nod to the old days when that’s all we could manage.
I look up, and he’s got the trumpet upside down, dripping oil into the three valves, two drops each, and pumping the valves
with the fingers of his other hand, getting things loosened up, as if it needed it. If I know him, and I probably know him
better than just about anybody, he’s already spent half an hour cleaning and oiling the horn this afternoon. I’ll tell you:
If it weren’t for the valve oil, you could drink champagne out of Paul’s trumpet and it’d be so clean you could tell the vineyard
and the vintage.
By the time I come out of this reverie, he’s finished reoiling the valves, and he runs them, checking, and tightens number
two, just a hair. He turns toward the felt backdrop, slides in his quietest mute, an old aluminum Harmon, and starts to warm
up, long tones, in an ascending scale, then runs, arpeggios, then trills and tonguing drills, classical shit right out of
the Arbans book, no melody, no tempo. He’s not warming up his head, just his embouchure and his fingers. He knows enough not
to tune up until he’s warmed up, because until he is, the sound is a little pinched, and maybe a quarter-tone sharp. When
he’s ready he turns around, his head only, and looks at me. “Hey, Vinnie. What have you got?” This is a little of our code,
my signal to play a B-flat. I strike one, he plays his C. I keep tapping it, slowly, and he adjusts the tuning slide out a
hair, plays another C, moves it back in half a hair. I give him some octaves, he runs up and down the scale, looks at the
tuning slide but doesn’t touch it.
“Nice,” he says. “I perceive that you’ve been working.”
He knows. Ninety-nine percent of the crowd will have no fucking idea, but he knows.
Sidney wanders in, always looking as if he sees where we are at the last minute, carrying that big string bass as if it were
a football, cradled under one arm, and his huge tuba under the other. He has his dazed smile on, which means he’s a little
nervous, which is good. When he’s frowning or just staring steadily, it means he’s somewhere else, engaged in some philosophical
problem, some mental experiment, miles away. Not tonight.
Akiko had gotten there at 8:30, and had set up and tested the skins, tightening and tuning the heads. Then she disappeared
somewhere until just before nine.
At about a minute before we’re supposed to start, Jeff practically runs into the room, holding his sax case like a weapon,
clearing the way before him. His eyes are wild, he’s checking his watch. The guy is always late. He climbs up on the stand,
no eye contact, but nods at Paul like he’s ready. But he still has his coat on, still has his sax in its case. Paul looks
him over, and then Jeff looks himself over, says “Shit,” strips the coat off, flings it over by the wall, drops to one knee,
takes out the sax, slides on the mouthpiece, clips on the neck strap, ducks his head into it. He looks back at Paul, like
he’s ready.
Paul hates this. Here’s Jeff, late again, he hasn’t tuned up, he hasn’t warmed up, his breathing is still ragged from running
in from the cold. He always tunes up on the fly, halfway into the first song, and Paul knows this is just wrong, it’s an affront
to us, to whoever’s listening, to the music itself. Jeff hasn’t even looked at the set list. That’s wrong, too.
Paul is being cool with it tonight. He’s standing with his horn held down around his belt, running the valves, and he gives
a look at Jeff’s set list. Jeff gives him a stare, like “Just start, man,” but Paul stares straight ahead, waiting for him.
Jeff finally picks up the card, looks it over, says “Hey, we got some old-timey shit here tonight,” all sarcastic. He still
thinks he’s ready.
I jump in and play a B-flat. Jeff tenses his shoulders, looks like he’s ready to turn around and glare at me. He slowly brings
the mouthpiece up to his lips, slowly wraps his lips around it, closes his eyes, plays one long baleful G. Lots of vibrato,
which is just fucking stupid if you’re trying to tune up. He’s sharp, but he makes no move to adjust it. I glance at Paul,
who’s still just staring off into space. I play another B-flat. Jeff half-turns toward me, then reaches up, pulls the mouthpiece
out a hair, plays another G, straight this time. Pretty close. He doesn’t remove the mouthpiece from his mouth, just mutters
around it, “Let’s play some fucking music, all right?”
Paul turns his head, taps his foot, counts out, “1…2…3,” the “4” unspoken so he can bring his horn into position,
and we start.
The first tune is the old spiritual “Just a Closer Walk With Thee.” We start it like a funeral dirge, all modal chords, Akiko
drumrolling on the edge of the high hat, Sidney humming way down low on the tuba. Then we start into it, with the tempo up
to a walk, playing it straight at first. We play two choruses—there is no verse—then Paul nods at Jeff, who solos.
With Jeff, there’s no transition. Jeff plays what he plays, and doesn’t change much from tune to tune to fit the music. He
thinks he’s doing Charlie Parker/John Coltrane, all long runs and thousands of notes and the occasional soulful honk, but
after a chorus or two you’ve heard what he’s got and there isn’t any more to learn, but he just goes on and on. After four
choruses, Paul comes in on the change and vamps it over to me.
I start back toward the older feel of the tune, a little ragtimey, jumping my left hand with the bass. I’m OK with my right
hand, but I really take pride in my left. I find a repetitive figure and work it rhythmically, then carry it over from the
first chorus to the second. Now I’m swinging it in a more Earl Fatha Hines mode, doubled octaves on the right hand with the
left laying down the rhythm. I take this through the second chorus and into the third, then the chords take over and get more
dense. I start to invert the chords, vary the rhythm off the beat, then, as Paul starts to vamp, signaling a hand off over
to him, and I surprise myself and kick it up a key, a run of triplet chords pulling it upward. Sidney is right there and rides
on it, and Akiko pushes the tempo a little.
We didn’t plan it, but Paul hears it coming. He’s doing with a single note at a time almost what I did with the chords, finding
the notes on the inside. Then he ramps it up into the upper register with a long run that doubles back. He’s playing ahead
of the beat, pushing it.
Coming into his last chorus he starts to soar, that big tone cutting through. He makes a circle with the horn and we all see
it and chime in, except Jeff, who races to catch up. Now it’s all contrapuntal, Paul riding on top with a solid punch, Jeff
running underneath, The Professor striding along, Akiko kicking the pedal on her big bass drum.
Coming down the stretch Paul does a slowing staccato run that slows the tempo back to a dirge and pushes the pitch up to the
actual melody. We finish the last eight bars almost in unison on the melody, then add a little coda with the original dirge
again, Paul trilling modally, Jeff actually going along with it, then we wrap up and close it out.
Except that Jeff doesn’t finish when we do, but has to add some little bop run, like an ironic comment. He does this all the
fucking time. The crowd almost likes it this first time—by the middle of the set they’ll be tired of it, and it’ll turn from
an ironic “I know this can get a little corny” to a sarcastic “Man, does this shit suck.”
In the meantime, except for that, it’s tight, and the crowd likes it, and responds. Jeff nods like they’re clapping for him;
the rest of us bow quietly, smile slightly.
As the applause dies down, we’re right into “West End Blues,” with Paul replicating the classic Louis Armstrong run at the
start from the record with Kid Ory and Baby Dodds. Then “East St. Louis Toodleoo” and “Beale Street Blues” and “The Sheik
of Araby.” Finally it’s “Muskrat Ramble,” an old raver, complicated, at least eight sections to it, all arranged. When this
works, it’s a great way to close a set of the old stuff. All that complexity keeps circling back, but never coming back to
the same place.
But this time it doesn’t work. This is really not Jeff’s thing, but tonight he’s playing it like he hates it. He usually doesn’t
take a solo on this, but this time he cuts Paul off and dives in ahead of him, and doesn’t take one chorus or two, which is
all you want in this song, but drives on past three and four. He thinks he’s Paul Gonsalves going twenty-three inspired choruses
on some Ellington tune, but it’s turning into some kind of free-jazz polyphonic poly-bullshit thing, no tempo, no melody,
just honking and over blowing, rocking back and forth, his eyes closed. Akiko takes charge and signals the last chorus. Jeff
barely hears her, but we overpower him and he fades to nothing as we finish. As the crowd claps, a little uncertainly, he’s
already jumping off the stand and heading out of the room. Fucking rude.
And that’s the way the first set ends, not with a bang but a rebellion.
