No one anticipated The Ed Sullivan Show to be controversial, however due to an notorious efficiency by jazz musician Rahsaan Roland Kirk, one among its ultimate episodes proved a memorable spectacle.
Having run for 23 years straight, The Ed Sullivan Show was an iconic platform that drew tens of millions of viewers throughout America and had been each a beacon and barometer of fashionable tradition; crucially, it was instrumental in introducing the broader American public to pioneering home-grown musicians like Elvis Presley and worldwide acts resembling The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. During its 650+ episodes, it additionally showcased many jazz artists, particularly within the Nineteen Fifties, when it featured Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, and Duke Ellington. In the next decade, nonetheless, jazz’s business descent was mirrored by the present providing fewer efficiency alternatives for jazz acts, particularly Black ones.
By 1971, Kirk was generally known as a charismatic and outspoken maverick who was annoyed that jazz and its creators had been ignored by the American media. The 35-year-old musician was a virtuoso whose get together trick was blowing three horns concurrently. He was additionally deeply captivated with jazz – or what he most popular to name “Black Classical Music” – and wished to lift its visibility in a rustic that appeared oblivious to its indigenous artwork type’s historic and cultural significance. Inspired by the local weather of protest sweeping America within the counterculture age, he and his good friend Mark Davis established The Jazz and People’s Movement (J&PM), which started in 1969 initially as an everyday jam session occasion on the Village Vanguard on Monday nights.
Using the slogans “Stop the whitewash now!” and “Hire more Black artists on TV!”, Kirk and Davis collaborated to jot down a manifesto that castigated the American media for its position in underwriting bigotry and discrimination; the motion’s goals, they said, had been to “enable Black artists to reach the positions of prominence that their artistry so deserves – to breathe new life into Black culture.”
Emboldened by the primarily constructive response from different jazz musicians, Kirk and Davis put collectively a petition demanding that tv exhibits give Black musicians better visibility. They organized a spirited however peaceable disruption (the place their followers blew whistles and held placards) of The Merv Griffin Show in August 1970. It obtained them on TV information throughout the nation, however they had been branded “Black militants,” which led the FBI to observe their actions carefully.
According to Kirk’s biographer, John Kruth – whose superlative 2000 e-book Bright Moments paints a definitive portrait of the jazz magus – the J&PM and their rising military of peaceable whistle-blowing protesters additionally infiltrated Johnny Carson’s The Tonight Show and efficiently introduced organized chaos to the set of The Dick Cavett Show.
Their subsequent goal was much more prestigious: America’s most well-known TV selection program, The Ed Sullivan Show. Kirk and Davis despatched the present’s producers a warning letter, informing them that it was now within the J&PM’s crosshairs. Seeking to keep away from controversy, Sullivan’s manufacturing staff supplied Kirk a efficiency slot on the present. The provide got here with one proviso: that he carry out Stevie Wonder‘s “My Cherie Amour,” which one of the show’s expertise coordinators had heard Kirk play and enthused about.
Kirk agreed and assembled a band for the event. But it was no unusual group. It was a nine-piece ensemble that included three jazz superstars in its ranks; bassist/composer Charles Mingus (who, like Kirk, was a vociferous political firebrand), the avant-garde tenor saxophonist Archie Shepp, and the sensible drummer Roy Haynes, who had been augmented by a second bassist – Henry “Pete” Pearson – together with two trombonists (Charles McGhee and Dick Griffin), pianist Sonelius Smith and percussionists Joe Texidor and Maurice McKinley.
Kirk started his efficiency by saying that “True Black music will be heard tonight …” earlier than turning and shouting “katumba!” to McKinley, who responded with a conga roll main into the two-horn intro to Kirk’s traditional tune, “The Inflated Tear.” Surprisingly, Kirk then stopped the tune in its tracks to announce the band, starting with drummer Haynes; he then swapped his saxophone for a flute, earlier than briefly snorting on a tiny nostril flute, which elicited confused chuckles from the studio viewers. Kirk then launched Archie Shepp earlier than indulging in a short musical dialogue with Charles Mingus. Their transient sparring was the cue for the band to launch into an uproarious model of the bassist’s pugnacious “Haitian Fight Song,” which was rendered with a wild depth that will surely have startled a lot of Sullivan’s viewers. (It appears that Kirk had “forgotten” his settlement to play the extra accessible “My Cherie Amour.”)
“That was wonderful, wonderful, wonderful! Let’s hear it for Ramsam (sic) Roland Kirk!,” enthused Sullivan, after the band climaxed with a deafening seismic chord, however he was barely in a position to conceal his shock at what he’d simply seen and heard.
Rahsaan Roland Kirk was the final jazz musician to look on The Ed Sullivan Show, which ran for under weeks afterward. Some individuals believed that Kirk’s riotous efficiency had been partly chargeable for the present’s demise, however the saxophonist strenuously denied that was the case: “Don’t blame me ‘cause he went off the TV, it wasn’t my fault,” he stated. It virtually actually wasn’t Kirk’s fault: With the present’s host reaching his seventieth birthday and TV tastes altering, CBS was pulling the plug on quite a few long-running exhibits at the moment.
The eminent jazz author and critic Leonard Feather referred to as Kirk’s look on The Ed Sullivan Show “a unique night in the history of jazz on the small screen,” and although it appeared a candy victory for the J&MP, some within the jazz world had been dismayed by what that they had seen and heard that January night time, with even Kirk’s good friend and producer, Joel Dorn, viewing it as a “wasted opportunity.” Nonetheless, Kirk’s notoriety introduced him additional tv publicity; not lengthy after the Sullivan efficiency, he was given a 30-minute slot on The Today Show, the place he was in a position to discuss concerning the J&MP whereas additionally introducing the broader American public to lesser-known members of Count Basie’s band.
In fact, although, the fallout from his Sullivan efficiency had disillusioned the multi-instrumentalist, as his good friend Mark Davis instructed John Kruth: “After The Ed Sullivan Show, Rahsaan’s heart was broken,” he revealed. By 1972, the J&MP had run out of steam, and Kirk grew to become a lone crusader, persevering with to unfold the jazz message by way of his live shows and albums. Kirk died from a stroke in December 1977 on the age of 42, however in his ultimate interview, mirrored again on his time main the J&MP. “I knew it was something that couldn’t last,” he defined, “but it was something to show that the musician … does more than put needles in his arm or smoke pot.” He added, with a way of pleasure: “That really showed people that we cared about what we were into.”