Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: evaluation

Transcript context

…It doesn’t need explanation. It’s the opposite which requires explanation. It was an incredible cultural experience. But a good friend of mine was the babysitter for Thelonious’s drummer. So one night he had a hot date. He said, “Kareem, you’ve got to stand in for me and babysit Cory.” Cory Riley, who is — Ben Riley’s the drummer. I said, “OK, I’ll do that.” I went and did it. Ben’s wife came home. She didn’t know me. She was like — . [laughter] But she knew who I was. Because I would do that for Ben’s family, they said, “Once Inez gets home, you can come on down to the Vanguard and catch the act.” Starting from when I was in high school through college, I went to the Village Vanguard anytime Thelonious was there and I was in town, I tried to go. It was a great part of my life. The funny story was Thelonious would get up and dance sometimes in the club. The New York cabaret laws are really weird. You can’t dance in the club but you can stand and rock around with the music or something. I don’t know. Thelonious would get up and dance. Then me and my friend who babysat for Ben, we would get up and dance with them. Max Gordon was the owner of the Vanguard. He said, “Look, you can’t dance with Mr. Monk. I’m going to have problems with the cabaret commission. ” Because if you are dancing in this, it’s no longer a jazz club, it’s a dance hall, and he would have all kinds of difficult problems and get summoned by the City of New York. We’re trying to dance, and Mr. Gordon is pulling at us all night, “You got to sit down.” And then Thelonious looked at us like we can’t muscle in on his act, and he continued dancing, and then he sat down. That was a pretty funny night seeing this little — Mr. Gordon was only about 5’2” or 5’3” yanking on me and trying to say, “Sit down and let everybody see the stage.” My other favorite jazz player, Sun Ra, what did you think of him?…

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