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Funding for the Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program NEA Jazz Master interview was provided by the National Endowment for the Arts. GEORGE BENSON NEA Jazz Master (2009) Interviewee: George Benson (March 22, 1943 - ) Interviewer: Anthony Brown with recording engineer Ken Kimery Date: April 17-18, 2011 Repository: Archives Center, National Museum of American History Description: Transcript, 108 pp. Brown: Today is April 17th, 2011. This is the Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program interview with NEA Jazz Master, guitarist, vocalist, composer, and arranger George Benson in his house in Phoenix, Arizona, conducted by Anthony Brown with Marty Ashby and Ken Kimery present. Good afternoon, George Benson. Benson: Good afternoon. Brown: I just want to say, first of all, that it’s indeed a pleasure and an honor to be here to conduct this oral history interview for the national archives, and I just want to say that the last interview we conducted was with Hubert Laws, last month with Hubert Laws, and of course when I think of both of you, you two basically created the soundtrack for my college era in the ’70s, the music on CTI, and then you later on, on Warner Bros., was a music that I came of age with, and I just want to thank – as I did thank Hubert Laws – thank you for giving my life such a blessed soundtrack. Benson: He’s a great musician. I really enjoyed – I knew I moved up in class when I started working with him. Brown: If we could start by you stating your full name, your birth name, your date of birth, and your place of birth. For additional information contact the Archives Center at 202.633.3270 or [email protected] 1 Benson: As far as I know, my name is George Washington Benson. I was born in 1943, March the 22nd. I’m from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. That’s my beloved home town. That’s my beginnings. Brown: Let’s talk about your parents: your mother’s full name and your father’s full name. I know your stepfather was very influential in your life, but whatever you can share with us as far as your family history. Benson: It’s incredible. My mother’s name was Irma, and her last name was Benson. I was born when my father was in World War II. I didn’t see him until I was four years old. I guess I was two before he even knew I was alive. By that time he was married to a French girl. They were both kids. He was only 19 or 20 or so. When he came home from the army, he saw – well, someone came to him. The story was someone came to him. They were in a foxhole. The guy said, “Man, that boy looks just like you.” He said, “What boy are you talking about?” “That boy you got by that Benson girl in Pittsburgh.” He said, “What are you talking about?” He said, “Yeah, you got a son. He looks just like you.” I think I was about two then. That was the first he heard of me. Two years later, he had a son who was almost two by the French girl, whom he had married. When he was four, I finally met my dad. I remember him taking me on my shoulders – on his shoulders, rather – and taking me to meet his dad, who owned a filling station about a mile and a half from where I lived. We lived in a very poor neighborhood of Pittsburgh, but we didn’t know what poor was, because nobody ever defined it. We just lived from day to day. I ate every day. The sun shined every day. My mother treated me kindly, and everyone around me was kind. So there was no difference. It was just life itself. But it was something different when I met my father and found that I had a father, first of all. I remember that day just like it was yesterday, meeting my grandfather at his gasoline station. I remember he was a stocky built guy. My father was an average built guy, but he had muscles. He was a pretty live-wire kind of guy. Any other questions? Brown: What was his name? Benson: His name was Charles Evans. Brown: And you mentioned your grandfather. For additional information contact the Archives Center at 202.633.3270 or [email protected] 2 Benson: My grandfather’s name was Major Evans. He was a businessman. He was always doing something to create a livelihood. His favorite hobby was picking up the back end of a – what do they call the first Fords? The A something? T. Model T Ford – he would go pick up the back end of the Model T Ford. That’s how he showed his prowess, “my strength.” I remember that story, because my father made a point of getting me to hear that story, and I’ve always respected – I wanted to see him do it. I never saw him do it, though. But I loved him, though. There was something about him that was very different and special. It was years later when I found out – I got a chance to hang out with him and find out what kind of guy he was and how I had a lot of his traits too. Brown: It sounds like your father’s side of the family was native in Pittsburgh? Benson: They were actually from South Carolina. Brown: Where? Benson: I don’t remember now, but recently I started finding out – trying to find the history, and I found out what date my grandfather married my grandmother, who was a full-blooded Indian. They got married at a very young age. I think it was 1915, something like 21 they got married. Then she moved – no, he moved to Pittsburgh. Then she moved to Pittsburgh after that. So I got a chance to see her while she was alive. Not for long. She passed away in the 70s, I think. So I got a chance to see pretty much who I was, through them. I found out I had a lot of their traits. I used to have these high cheekbones as a kid, and always wondered why. My father had a lot of freckles on his face. His father was part Irish and Welsh and African-American. On my mother’s side, it was closer to African-American all the way. My grandfather on her side – her father – was from Alabama. When I was there not too long ago, not too many years ago, there was a kinship. I could feel some of that. I’m walking along a riverbank. I think it was in Mobile. I said, wow, this is part of my origin. I’m from this part of the world. I could imagine my grandfather back in those times, quite different times. I was near this fort. They had this big – it wasn’t actually that big. I guess they called it big in those days. It had guns pointed toward the water – the river. I began to feel that history and get a chance to know who I really was, my roots. For additional information contact the Archives Center at 202.633.3270 or [email protected] 3 Brown: Let’s talk about Pittsburgh. You’re growing up. You already mentioned your neighborhood. Could you tell us exactly where your neighborhood was when you grew up? Or could you tell us where you were born, what house in what neighborhood? Benson: I was born at a place called Magee Hospital. Magee was in a different part of Pittsburgh. It was in – not Schenley. What’s next to Schenley? It’s in Oakland – Oakland, Pittsburgh. My mother ended up working there. Brown: At the hospital? Benson: Um-hmm. She was only 15 when I was born. I was born a few days after she turned 15. She turned 15 March the 16th, and then I was born March the 22nd. She worked there for the first few years of my life, until she met my stepfather four years later – no, seven years later. Sorry. Brown: Seven years after you were born? Benson: Seven years after I was born. This is when the music started to come alive. Brown: What was his name? Benson: His name was Thomas Collier. He was a guitar – a novice. He loved the instrument, and he loved Charlie Christian. But now, if you could imagine. I’m playing on a – I lived in an alley. It was called Gilmore Alley, right in the heart of the ghetto of Pittsburgh. The next connecting street, a cross street, was Fulton Street. Now that’s a very friendly street in Pittsburgh. All day long you could hear sales people coming through. “Got any I? Do you want any I today?”, meaning, do you want any ice? These were ice farmers. Brown: Oh, so these were street hollers. Benson: Yeah, they were hollering in the streets. They wanted to sell this ice for our ice boxes. There was no refrigerators, because we didn’t have any electricity. So we had an ice box, and we had gas lamps on the wall. If it wasn’t that, it was “Coal man, coal man, coal, coal man.” This day, something happened. They dumped the coal right at the entrance to our alley, Gilmore Alley, a big pile of coal. For us kids, we loved that. So I went up immediately, playing on it, running to the top of the coal mound and running back down.