Last month, in Brain Candy # 128, I wrote about black musician Louis Jordan, and Brain Candy # 121/Unsung Heroes #2 was about black musician Sun Ra. This month, I'm writing about Billy Strayhorn, a black musician and composer, who was Duke Ellington's right hand man throughout much of his career. Between the three men, there were interesting parallels and similarities, but as far as I can tell, little or no direct interaction. Even with the similarities, they were very different men, exploring very different styles of music within the jazz/blues conduit that was open to black musicians of their age.
Billy Strayhorn was indeed a completely different man. He was born on November 29, 1915, in Dayton, Ohio. As a newborn, he was not given a name, since he was in very poor shape at birth, born with rickets and not expected to live. He did survive and spent his youth from the age of five in Pittsburgh. Where Louis Jordan had a supportive musical environment, since his father was a music teacher and band leader, and Sun Ra doesn't seem to have had a stressful home life, Strayhorn's father was a bitter, abusive and violent man, although his mother was as supportive as she could be under difficult circumstances. Young Billy was frequently sent away to live with grandparents in Hillsborough, North Carolina. His life there was quite a change from life in the poor neighborhoods of Pittsburgh. He had the freedom to roam in a pastoral small town and when he received attention, it was invariably benevolent. His grandmother owned and played a piano regularly - she was church pianist. Billy very quickly began experimenting with the piano, mimicking tunes he heard in church. His musical outlets when he returned to Pittsburgh were limited to those of a young black child living in a poor, mixed-race neighborhood.
He set out to change that as he got older. Starting out with a paper route, he added helping out a local pharmacist in a more prosperous neighborhood and then took a job with the pharmacy. The paper route and the pharmacy job acquainted him with a large number of people and provided him with the money to buy a used piano, and then large quantities of sheet music.
Strayhorn's early career followed a progression typical of the other black musicians I've profiled. He was a musical prodigy and with little apparent effort built a name for himself in the Pittsburgh area. He played in his high school band and was able to connect with teachers who were well qualified to help him progress. Strayhorn's strength was composing, although he was also a highly talented pianist. He favored classical music, but it was not a welcoming genre for a black youth in the early part of the 20th century. At the age of 19, he wrote a musical, "Fantastic Rhythm," which was eventually performed professionally in the Pittsburgh area.
His big break, one that would define his career for the rest of his life, came on December 1, 1938 when a friend of a friend, George Greenlee, arranged for him to meet Duke Ellington. Greenlee had never heard Strayhorn's work, but spoke highly of him nonetheless, and Ellington agreed to meet him the next day after the first show.
As reported by Strayhorn's biographer David Hajdu, Strayhorn reproduced a piece, "Sophisticated Lady," which Ellington had played in that day's show. He then played it his way, changing keys and speeding up the tempo. Ellington called for another member of the band to come and listen. After more questions, more band members summoned and more playing, Ellington put him to work immediately.
Strayhorn's "Take the 'A' Train" and "Lush Life" are his two most famous works, but he wrote or co-wrote hundreds of other pieces, some of which are still being discovered. He was an extremely close collaborator with Ellington, until Strayhorn's death. His relationship with Ellington was complex and prone to misunderstanding by those observing their efforts. Ellington almost always took the center stage while Strayhorn tended to avoid the limelight. There are some who thought that Ellington exploited Strayhorn, but there was one more aspect of his life that made Strayhorn's reticence understandable. Billy Strayhorn was openly gay in a time when it was a serious handicap for a popular entertainer and even more so for a black man. While he seemed amazingly serene about his lifestyle and work, the pressure of his complex life took its toll. In pictures of him as an adult, he almost always has a lit cigarette and in later years, he drank heavily, both contributing to his early death of cancer in 1967.
It seems clear from what I've read that Duke Ellington was open and honest about Strayhorn's contributions, and generous in both praise and monetary terms throughout Strayhorn's life. Early in his career, Strayhorn actually lived in Ellington's New York City home with Ellington's relatives. There was occasional friction between the two that led Billy to do some work outside Ellington's sphere of influence, mostly in the 1950s, but there was never a permanent break between the two of them. Strayhorn was a huge creative force in the Ellington franchise, though Ellington played a role beyond fronting for Billy. There were synergies between the men: public acclaim, musical creativity and business savvy, to name three, that greatly benefited both men. Ellington was already popular before Strayhorn came along, but perhaps his six decade popularity might have been less prolonged and less pronounced without Strayhorn.
Strayhorn is yet another multifaceted person who can't be summarized in a few lines of text. His Wikipedia article is a good place to start and has a good collection of related links. David Hajdu's "Lush Life: A Biography of Billy Strayhorn" covers his life story while Walter van de Leur's "Something to Live For: The Music of Billy Strayhorn" focuses more on the technical aspects of his music. I used all three in preparing this article.
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Catbar - Brain Candy #129 - Unsung Heroes #5 - Billy Strayhorn / Brian Rock / Tue Oct 21 19:42:19 EDT 2008
