OUTSIDE AND INSIDE: REPRESENTATIONS OF INTERRACIALISM AND AMERICAN IDENTITY IN WHITE JAZZ AUTOBIOGRAPHY REVA MARIN A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY GRADUATE PROGRAM IN HUMANITIES YORK UNIVERSITY TORONTO, ONTARIO June 2014 © Reva Marin, 2014 ii Abstract This dissertation explores concepts of race, national identity, and gender formation in fifteen autobiographies published by white male American jazz musicians— that is, jazz autobiographies written by male subjects who self-identified, and were identified by their collaborators and by the general public, as white—between 1939 and 2001. A central concern within these autobiographies is the search for authentication within a musical form that has been intrinsically linked to African American musical and cultural forms and practices. A key feature of this quest for authentication is the immersion experience, through which the white male musician seeks immersion in African American musical and cultural spheres as a requirement of his jazz education, and later of his status as a professional musician. In this respect, these accounts reinforce the notion of jazz as one of the few spheres within American society in which cultural authority has been historically granted to African Americans, and in which white musicians, as Burton W. Peretti suggests, “innovated and rebelled by willingly becoming musically subordinate to a socially and culturally subordinated group” (96–97). Through their descriptions of this process, these autobiographers reveal that the playing of jazz created and necessitated interracial and interethnic mingling to a degree rarely seen in the mainstream society out of which these stories emerge. Yet discussions of race in these texts seldom move beyond its specific impact on these musicians’ lives and careers; rarely do white jazz autobiographers attempt a more reflective analysis of race in the United States, nor do they seem willing to iii acknowledge the benefits that their whiteness conferred upon them in respect to career opportunities and economic security. For these reasons, white jazz autobiography provides a fertile source for considering both the possibilities and limitations of culture— and of individual cultural producers—within 20th-century US society to disrupt, challenge, or circumvent dominant legal and social practice. iv To my friend, Marlene Kadar, whose suggestion that I return to school as a mature student turned my life around, and who has provided unfailing support and encouragement to me throughout this experience. v Acknowledgments I would like to thank my wonderful dissertation committee—my supervisor Leslie Sanders, Art Redding, and Michael Coghlan—for their guidance, support, and encouragement throughout this process. Eight years ago Leslie Sanders’ course, Black Song: Introduction to African American Poetry, opened new worlds of discovery for me; since then she has been a mentor and advisor, helping me to see interconnections among the various expressions of black song, including jazz. Art Redding has also been a remarkably generous reader and advisor, providing me with detailed and thought- provoking comments on the various drafts of this dissertation, and in the process introducing me to theoretical and critical perspectives on jazz and on American culture more broadly. Michael Coghlan has shared with me his keen insights as a musician over discussions of music theory and practice in these autobiographies; in addition, his dry wit and wonderful sense of humour has often displayed itself at just the right time for me, when I was feeling discouraged or particularly middle-aged. I would also like to thank Warren Crichlow, who has broadened my perspectives on jazz and jazz culture in immeasurable ways, and who has gone out of his way to provide encouragement and feedback as my work progressed. And finally, many thanks to Sherrie Tucker, who served as the external examiner at my oral defence, and whose detailed and thoughtful critique of my dissertation has provided an invaluable guide for me as I continue to think about and to work on white jazz autobiography. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract .………………………………………………………………………... ii Dedication ……………………………………………………............................ iv Acknowledgments ……………………………………………………………… v Table of Contents .………………………………………………………............ vi Introduction.…………………………………………………………………….. 1 Reading White Autobiography………………………………………….. 8 Theoretical Framework………………………………………………….. 12 Who’s Left Out…………………………………………………………... 35 Selected Review of Previous Scholarship……………………………….. 38 Chapter Outline…………………………………………………………... 40 Chapter 1: The Authenticating Collaborator of White Jazz Autobiography …….. 44 Authenticating Prefaces, Forewords, and Introductions………………….. 50 Intertextual Insertions in the Autobiographies of Eddie Condon and Benny Goodman………………………………………………… 62 The Authenticating Collaborator in Mezz Mezzrow’s Really the Blues 89 Chapter 2: White Student, Black Teacher: Negotiating Race in the Learning of Jazz Introduction: Explanations of Jazz Learning: From the Practical to the Sublime………………………………………………………….. 96 Early Music Experiences………………………………………………… 105 Descriptions of Jazz Learning…………………………………………… 125 Private Studies With African American Teachers………………………. 139 Explorations in Black Musical Worlds…………………………………. 158 Interracial Jam Sessions…………………………………………………. 167 Triumphs and Tensions Within Interracial Alliances…………………… 176 Chapter 3: Representations of Identity in Jewish Jazz Autobiography…………. 195 An Unending Search for Identity: Artie Shaw’s The Trouble with Cinderella………………………………………………………… 200 vii Black and Jewish Blues: Mezz Mezzrow’s Really the Blues……………. 223 Beyond Horatio Alger: Benny Goodman’s The Kingdom of Swing……… 248 Ambivalence and Borscht Belt Humour: Max Kaminsky’s Jazz Band: My Life in Jazz………………………………………………………… 270 Chapter 4: Soldiers for Uncle Sam?: Depictions of Military Service in White Jazz Autobiography…………………………………………………………… 296 Not Fit for Service: Accounts of 4-F Classification……………………… 303 From Those Who Served: Pride, Cynicism, and Despair………………… 312 The Brief Army Career of the Young Chet Baker………………. 313 “I Couldn’t Believe that I Might Die with These People I Hated”: Art Pepper’s Army Experience, 1944–1946…………………… 318 Bud Freeman: Artist and Soldier………………………………… 324 Bob Wilber: Left Wing at Fort Dix……………………………… 327 Artie Shaw’s Navy “Rangers”…………………………………… 329 Honour and Dishonour: Post-War Images of Max Kaminsky and Artie Shaw.......................................................................... 347 Conclusion………………………………………………………………………. 359 Bibliography ……………………………………………………………………. 372 1 Introduction In his monumental social and musical history of bebop, Scott DeVeaux suggests that “the usual narratives for jazz history remain largely suprapersonal”—that is, that even as “jazz writing” focuses on the lives of individual musicians, “beneath the surface of anecdotes, the real agents of change are abstractions to which individual will is subordinated” (28). Although DeVeaux grants the benefits of this approach, noting that historical trends “are often larger than individuals,” he believes that “telling history this way sacrifices the complexity and ambiguity of lives lived in a particular historical moment” (28). For this reason, he explains, in his own study he has chosen to highlight the individuals who contributed to the shaping and development of the musical form that came to be known as bebop: “My concern in this book is to understand bebop as a result of the decision these musicians made” (28).1 With only slight revisions, DeVeaux’s observations may serve as a concise explanation of this study’s decision to focus on jazz autobiography as a way to uncover aspects of jazz history through “the complexity and ambiguity of lives lived in . particular historical moment[s].” This is not to deny, of course, the inherent limitations of the autobiographical form; rather, this study proposes, following Daniel Stein, to adopt “a theoretical lens through which jazz autobiography can be read productively, without 1 DeVeaux also distinguishes his study from “the ‘Great Man’ school of historical writing,” which he believes also subordinates “individual will” to “lofty abstractions” (28). 2 either accepting the basic ‘untruth’ of autobiographical narrative, as poststructuralist critics might advocate, or damning the texts to the status of simple eye-witness accounts” (174).2 (A more detailed explanation of my approach to the autobiographical texts under discussion in this study will follow later in the introduction.) From 1926, with the publication of Paul Whiteman’s Jazz, to the end of the 20th century, more than sixty US jazz musicians published their autobiographies and memoirs; taken together, this body of work offers valuable first-hand accounts of jazz from the music’s infancy to the present day, allowing important insights into changing musical, cultural, and social landscapes that inextricably tie the history of jazz to the history of the United States in the 20th century. While many of these autobiographies were published by trade presses, in the 1980s and 1990s university presses greatly accelerated the publication of jazz autobiographies, clearly hoping to preserve the life stories of aging musicians whose careers represented a wide range of jazz history, including the early music of New Orleans and Chicago, big band swing, and bebop. Although