Victory for a Bag Man, A Standoff in the Street

Sporting my harmonica case with a Sonny Boy Williamson II cd

As the night went on I would learn nothing would intimidate Karen, she was a surprisingly scrappy little women.

I overheard Tony say to Jamal (with their backs turned to Richard), we should go back to the car and warm up for a while. They nodded their heads in agreement then turned to Richard and said “We’re going to the car to warm up. Watch our spot and in a little while we’ll come back and you could go to the car to warm up”. Richard didn’t look the type that wanted any confrontation so he just agreed and stayed put. I felt sorry for Richard because it would be a few hours before they would return.

While sitting next to Karen I noticed Becky shivering. She only wore a little denim jacket and a pair of very thin cotton gloves on her hands to keep warm. I tapped her mother on the arm an offered her two pocket warmers to pass to her daughter. I told her to take them out the package and shake them up, slip one in each glove and in a few minutes they would start to generate ample heat. They were very grateful and said thank you. Karen asked me what my audition was and I told her I played a harmonica. She told me Becky was fourteen and sung at her school back in New Jersey. They both thought it would be a good experience to come audition at the Apollo. Karen then reached in her bag and pulled out a book and began to read. I rested my head against the wall and nodded in and out of consciousness for about an hour.

Around 5:00 AM something sort of amazing happened: with the flick of a switch, the marquee lights came on. The lights from the marquee lit up that whole corner of 125^th street. People started cheering and clapping their hands together. It was like the whole line of people suddenly woke up. Congo man started tapping a rhythmical African-like beat on his drum. Several of the dancers and dance acts expressed their uncontrollable liking of this beat by dancing up and down the street. It was very entertaining to watch this young, raw energy ignite. I found myself bobbing my head and tapping my foot to the rhythm of the street. It felt like I was in the movie “Fame”. This was truly an unforgettable moment. I looked up the street and I saw Tony and Jamal heading back, they must have seen the lights come on from their car. The dancing and celebrating went on for several minutes, then all calmed down again. After all, there was still five hours before the doors were due to open.

Throughout the night and morning, lots of people rehearsed their acts on the street. Dancers danced, singers sang, drummers drummed, rappers rapped, comedians told jokes and so on.

Another thing I noticed was it seemed like the marquee light and the hundreds of people in line attracted some local street people. The first one that walked by was this off-the-wall lady carrying a cell phone held closely to her ear. Her hair was dark in color and looked dirty and not brushed or combed for quite some time. She had on many layers of clothing – none of which matched. She walked liked someone who was very drunk or disoriented. As she walked in front of Jamal, Karen and I she suddenly stopped. She started yelling at the top of her lungs into the phone. No one in line believed that anyone was on the other end of the phone or in fact that the phone even worked. Jamal seized the moment to work his comedy. As the women yelled into the phone Jamal would loudly mock her word for word while taking a few steps forward and backward acting like he was drunk as her. Everyone in line was cracking up with laughter. The street lady enjoyed all the attention she was getting with her phony phone call act. She was content to stand in front of us laughing and continued to let Jamal work his comedy. Finally, Jamal got bored with her and chased her off.

As time went on, I started getting hungry and I had already ate all my junk food plus I needed to go to the restroom myself. I asked Karen to watch my spot then I headed off to White Castel. When I got there, the men’s room was out of order so I had to use the ladies room. As most ladies know, there was a long line for the ladies room. Now I know what they go through at the bar restrooms. I thought about going outside but I was in no rush to hurry back out into the cold. I decided to order something to eat and drink while I waited for the restroom line to decline. One thing I did notice while waiting to place my order was how filthy this White Castel was. Never the less hunger makes things look better so I placed my order anyway. I ordered a cheese burger and a coffee. I had never ate at a White Castel before so I had no idea how small their burgers were. When the cashier handed me the bag with the burger in it, I could not help noticing how light the bag was. After taking the burger out the bag and the wrapper I could not help but laughing out loud. This burger was about the size of a credit card cut in half. It only took me two bites to devour this tiny square burger. I must say though, it was a rather tasty little burger! I could of easily ate six of them. I took a couple of sips off the coffee then threw it in the garbage. It was not to my liking at all – I’m a Dunkin Donuts coffee drinker and won’t settle for any old cup of Joe.

I waited for my turn at the restroom then headed back to the Apollo. On my way back I could see many cars starting to double park around and in front of the Apollo. The police periodically rolled up on these illegally parked cars. With their head lights flashing high and low and a chirp of their siren over their loud speaker, they ordered the motorists to move their vehicles. About every thirty minutes the po po would ride through and reinforce the parking rules. The time now was approximately nearing 6:oo AM the sky was beginning to grow light but the streets were still dark. The city was starting to show signs of awakening. I remember when the city buses with their brightly lit interior lights on drove down the street how clearly I could see the passengers. At the same time the passengers were all looking out their windows curiously at us. Two hours was all the time I had left before I would have to move my car for the street sweeper. Karen told me about a 24 hour parking garage a few blocks over that she saw on her way in. She watched my spot for me again while I ran to move my car. The garage was a good deal only charging ten dollars for a half of day. I hustled back to my spot in line and took my ipod out and started listening to my backtracking music. Backtracking music is basically music to replace a live band being with me. This is the music I would use to play in the background of my harmonica and vocal performance. Unlike many others that were able to rehearse their act in the street I could not. It was to risky to put my wet lips on what was surly a frozen harmonica. We all know what happened to that little naïve boy that stuck his tongue on the frozen pole. So with my headset in my ears and my ipod set moderately high I rehearsed by humming my harmonica parts to the beat and singing the lyrics silently in my head occasionally moving my lips to the lyrics without any sound coming from my mouth. I’m sure anyone watching me must have thought I was absolutely crazy. I rehearsed like this the rest of the morning only stopping when I got tired or something exciting, funny or interesting was happening on the street.

Off to my right I could see some of the people in line were gathering, pointing and laughing. I took off my head set and stood up to see what was going on. I immediately heard “Beat It” by Michael Jackson playing boisterously loud in the road. Suddenly emerging from the crowd of people that were blocking my view was this happy-go-lucky bag man. He was wheeling a shopping cart within it what appeared to be all his worldly possessions. On top of the cart rested a large tubular boom box this the source of the boisterously loud music. This was not your ordinary bag man. This bag man brought, how should I say, some very interesting skills to the table. Similar to the earlier street lady, he also wore many layers of clothing. A black cotton skull cap rested on top of his head. His hair that was not concealed by the cap. It was coarse in texture, dark in color, and took on it own life sticking out in all directions from underneath his skull cap. The most remarkable thing about him was he appeared to be the happiest man on earth. He had this great big smile from ear to ear that created two deep dwelling dimples. He never spoke a word then suddenly began to dance like Michael Jackson. I must be honest his dance moves were very impressive – he was pretty good. I was not the only person impressed by his moves. All kinds of people in line were shouting out heartening statements like “check out homeboy – he’s getting down” and things like “work it brother you’re the man”. The street man was eating this all up, he loved all the attention he was getting. He would do a spin move then grab his crotch and go up and down on his tip toes – you know – like Michael Jackson would do. Then he would hold his hands in the air and wait for the people in line to applaud – and they did every time he would do a few new moves. I don’t know why, but he moved his cart and his act to the other side of the street for a few minutes.

The young guy in the Asian dance group wearing the head band took this opportunity to run across the street and showcase his pop locking dance skills by challenging the street man to a dance off. This was some really funny stuff to see like a scene right out of the movie “Zoolander”. The Asian guy got all up in the street man’s face and started doing all kinds of pop locking, moon walking dance moves. Then he would hold his hands in the air and point his fingers vigorously downward toward the man which meant top that. The street man with all his dancing ammo had no problem firing right back at the pop locker. This went on for a few battle moments when it became clear the pop locker was no match for street man. All out of ammo, the pop locker moon walked back to his spot in line where he had to concede to defeat. The street man holding his boom box over his head in victory brought unexplainable inspiration and confidence to my soul. I felt extremely ready for this audition.

It was nearing 7:00 AM and people were mingling throughout the line. Everyone was seemingly having a good time when I heard some loud shouting like a fight was going to start.

Checking Out the Competition

In front of the “pacing time bomb” sat a middle-aged lady.  Nothing really stood out about her other than she sat in a stationary wooden chair that didn’t have the ability to fold close. It resembled a chair you might find in a high school classroom or library. Everyone used their own method for keeping warm. She was snuggled up inside a drab olive-green goose down sleeping bag zipped up to her neck. Up top, she had a fluffy brown wool hat was pulled down over her ears with a matching scarf wrapped around her head covering her nose and mouth. Her occasional movement inside the sleeping bag made me think of a giant caterpillar resting within its cocoon.

There were several people in front of her but I couldn’t get a good look at them because most were sprawled on the ground, sleeping, covered with blankets and things trying to weather the bitter cold Harlem night. I seriously doubted two thousand people would show up in these weather conditions.

About twenty minutes had gone by before anyone would merge in the line behind me. It would be a white lady with her young teen-aged daughter. As they slowly approached me, I noticed a red pop up chair draped over their shoulder.  With the mother confidently leading the way, she marched toward me and claimed their sector of the line. The mother looked at me with a very warm and genuine smile and said “hello” as they took their chairs off their shoulders to set up their spot. They quickly opened their chairs and sat in them. At the time, I still felt warmer standing. The mother started tapping her foot vigorously then abruptly stood up and asked me if I knew where a restroom was. I said “no I don’t”. She went on to state that they had driven up from New Jersey and she needed to use the restroom real bad. With a sense of urgency she uttered to anyone willing to listen, “does anyone know where a restroom is around here?” Jamal replied “yea I do.  Go down to the second street and take a right. There’s a White Castle and they have a restroom”. She ask me if I would watch their spot while they left and I said “sure no problem”.

For the most part, everyone seemed congenially happy and good at heart. While they were gone many people started arriving. First, an Asian hip hop dance group which consisted of four girls and two guys. One of the guys had a head band, maybe three inches wide, wrapped around his head and it had some kind of Asian symbol in the center of it. The girls had on little pink fur hooded phat farm jackets that only came down to their midriffs. On the back of their jackets, in silver rhinestones, was the name of their group. Unfortunately I don’t remember the name, but they were cute. They brought lots of young youthful energy into the line.

After the Asian group, a black man arrived with his laid back cool swagger and a congo drum in hand. Behind the Congo Man was another dance group. This was a pop lock dance group and they were popping and locking the minute they showed up.

Following the pop lockers were three guys that were singing acapella music. From this point on, I lost track of who was in the line – it was growing too fast to keep up with and I stopped paying attention. I was cold and tired and decided to take a load off my feet. With a sigh and causal glance, to my left then right, I pulled up my chair, sat down and started relaxing.

Approximately 20 to 30 minutes went by before the lady and her daughter returned to their empty seats which I had been watching for them. They each held a tall cup of hot chocolate preciously between their hands. Every few seconds sipping from their cups they would let out a sigh of joy. I could tell how much they were totally enjoying the warmth of that hot beverage. I was close enough to smell the aroma of their hot chocolate which made me want one also.

The mother introduced her self to me as Karen and her daughter as Becky. Karen told me on her way back from White Castle that Starbucks had just opened up so they grabbed a cup of hot chocolate. She also introduced herself and Becky to the three comedians.

Jamal started telling us how much he loved comedy and how it changed and turned his life around in a positive way. He looked at Karen and Becky a said: “Back home before I had comedy in my life, I was a stick up man.  If I saw you and your daughter walking down the street I would have stuck you up, robbed you took your money. That’s what I use to do But then I found comedy, I love it so much and I’m good at it. Now all I want to do is make people laugh.” Karen looked at her daughter who at the moment was looking back and forth at her mother and Jamal with a rather astonished expression on her face. Karen then turned back to Jamal and with unnerving ease replied,  “Thank god for comedy”. Then we all started laughing.

The line can grow long at the Apollo, it's best to get there early

Camping Overnight on 125th Street

By the time I parked and walked back to the Apollo, I was the thirty-first person in line. I don’t think I was anymore then fifty feet from the front entrance. As far as I was concerned, this was a great spot to be  – everything was going just as planned.

I curiously looked at the people in line. In front of me were three guys standing with their backs to the wall, two of them white and one black. I could see steam blowing every where from the warm breath they blew into their cold frigid cupped hands – none of them had gloves on. The white guy on the left was tall and thin with straggly light brown hair. He was very pale and wore farmer jeans and a red flannel shirt underneath an old army jacket. The zipper on his jacket was broken and he had to keep pulling it closed every time the wind blew. To me, he looked like one of the Beverley Hillbillies.

Next to him was the other white guy. He stood out because he was dressed like it was summer outside. He looked a little like a young Al Pachino. He wore a very thin black Calvin Klein blazer with the collar popped up. His shirt was gray and made of silk. Around his neck he sported a narrow white playboy bunny tie, from the eighties or something, in addition to the black dress slacks and white Stacy Adams on his feet. Clearly he was freezing his ass off but he looked good.

Next to him was a black guy wearing a dark blue bomber jacket with the hood on his head both hands his black, baggy jean pockets and Tim’s on his feet. He was a stout guy with a round shiny face. He kept his eyes open wide and smiled like a clown without showing his teeth. When I looked at his face something about it made me want to laugh. He was like that kid in high school that could make you laugh without ever saying a word. But at the same time he looked like he would kick your ass if he thought you were laughing at him

Out the corner of my eye I could see them watching me set up my spot. I opened my pop-up chair and placed it near the wall. I also had a small bag.  In the bag were potato chips, cookies, gum and a bottle of Power Aid – just a little something to get me through the night. I tossed the bag in the seat of my chair because I didn’t feel like sitting yet.

I turned to the left and the Al Pachino looking guy extended his arm and hand to introduce himself and his two buddies.

“Hi I’m Tony”, he said.
“Nice to meet you Tony, I’m Ed”.

Tony then introduced the black guy as Jamal and the other white guy as Richard. Jamal quickly took over the conversation.

“Yo man they call me J. The three of us are from Syracuse. We do stand up comedy back home together as an act. But were auditioning today separately to give us a better chance of one of us making it. We gave up a paying gig back home to take the chance we might make it in New York. We just jumped in our car last minute and said screw the gig, let’s do this – it might be our last chance. Now here we are. What do you do?”, J asked.

“I play a harmonica man I play the blues. I come down here to kick some blues around you know what I mean.”

“Oh yeah ? Who can you play?  Stevie Wonder or something? J asked.

“No man I write and play my own music – that’s what I do”.

“I hear that”, Jamal said.  “Where you from Ed?.”

“I’m from Connecticut, man  – West Haven – right outside New Haven, but I’m originally from Brooklyn.” I said.

“Oh right, oh right,” he said then we exchanged some brotherly dap.

In front of the three comedians stood a rather tall light skinned black man. His hair was cut extremely close to his scalp. He had a small brush in his hand and he constantly brushed his hair all night – that would explain the shallow sea of hair waves he groomed on his head. He look very agitated as he paced back and forth and spoke to no one and you could obviously tell he wanted to keep this way. He had a ipod in his pocket and when he wasn’t pacing and brushing his hair he would put his headset in his ears. While listening to his music, he would aggressively flail his arms and hands about his body as the music took control of his inner self. Occasionally he would lean against the wall standing on one leg with the other leg slightly bent up on the wall and glare into the sky. He also had a small black plastic bag next to him that he would sporadically move around the sidewalk with his foot. My impression of him was a walking time bomb waiting to explode. No one would approach him with conversation that night.

Video:  See a typical audition at the Apollo.
(at 00:4 seconds, note the woman with a hat in the printed photos – she is my Aunt – Zora Neale Hurston – an author, Anthropologist, Feminist and literary force who contributed to the Harlem Renaissance).

Rolling into Harlem

That morning it was freezing out side – maybe five or ten degrees. For the most part I was well prepared for the cold elements. My so called “survival cold weather gear” consisted of winter ski socks, Timberland boots, long johns underneath thick denim jeans, a Howard University hoodie underneath a black sports parker, a cold weather face mask and a Pittsburgh Steelers ski hat. On my hands I had a good pair of thinsulated gloves and about eight pack of pocket warmers that I would open and stuff inside my gloves and boots as needed. Each one was good for at lease six hours of good pocket heat.  I also had a nice pop open lawn chair because I was not about to sit on that cold New York sidewalk all night.

Before I left my house I had done a MapQuest for directions to 125^th st. I was making good time getting into the city until I got about five blocks from Second Ave. It was then I made a wrong turn and ended up back on the express way going the wrong direction over a pay toll bridge I had already paid earlier. That sucked and now I was pissed off and losing all the good time I had made leaving early. I got off after paying the toll again and made my way back driving on a street parallel to the expressway. I was not about to pay that toll for a third time.

The street I drove on making my way back was somewhat intimidating. It was now three in the morning and to my surprise many people were still walking about the streets. Some looking at me and my Connecticut license plate as if to ask “what are you looking for?” down in their hood. I approached a red traffic light and stopped. A man wandered toward my car and muttered “yo cous, yo cous”. I don’t know what he wanted but I was ever so happy when the stop light turned green. I slowly drove off making eye-to-eye contact with the grubby, dirty hooded man.

“Finally 125^th Street” I said to my self. As I drove down 125^th I did not see the Apollo. I drove all the way to the end and all I saw was about twenty people all bundled up sleeping on the side of the street. I thought to myself  “look at those homeless people – they must be freezing”. When I got to the end of the road I did a u turn and headed back up 125^th still looking for the Apollo. To my surprise I had drove right past the Apollo earlier not noticing it because the lights on the marquee were turned off. As for those twenty homeless people they were not homeless at all they were contestants that were camping out and I was about to join them. I drove around the block a few times looking for somewhere to legally park so I would not get towed. I found a spot that was good till 8 AM.  After that, I would have to move for the street sweepers. But for now, this would have to do – I would need to claim my spot in line.

Sonny’s

March 14th 2009 was quite an interesting Saturday morning I would experience in Harlem New York. This would be the day I would be auditioning at the Apollo Theater for Amateur Night.

The night before, I got out of work at 6:00 pm. My plan was to go home, eat dinner, get a few hours sleep, wake up about 1:00 AM and head to Harlem. At the time, I was living in West Haven CT.  The auditions were to be held at 10:00 am. I was told that a few thousand people were expected to show up. I decided to go the night before and camp out because they were only accepting the first 300 acts they deemed acceptable. One o’clock am rolled around and I got up after not even sleeping a wink as I was so hyper over the thought of my first audition.

That morning I stopped at Sonny’s – a local bar in my town. I was a regular at Sonny’s. This was a bar where everybody knew everybody by first name. Many of my friends there knew of my audition and wanted to have a drink with me before I left to wish me luck. The bar was jamming pretty good when I walked in.

Andréa was working behind the bar that night…she worked every Friday night.  Andrea was a sight for any mans eyes. She stood about 5’6″ or so and was beautiful.  She had straight black shiny hair – most of the time pulled back from her face – with pretty brown eyes, a smooth light cream complexion and a body with all the right curves to match. She was the total package. When I first met her I thought she was Spanish but later she told me her mother was Irish and her father was West Indian, so you know she had a temper on her.

To the left of the bar sat George. George grew up down south. He was from Waugh, Alabama but had been living up north for some time now. His southern accent wasn’t overwhelming but you could definitely hear it. George always wore a baseball style cap on his head, wire rim eyeglasses, a mustache and had a chocolate complexion When he spoke, he spoke loud and he spoke from his stomach with a lot of vibrato in his tone. I’ll never forget the first day I met George: I came in Sonny’s one night, walked over to the jukebox and played three Sonny Boy Williamson songs – Help Me, Nine Below Zero and Don’t Get Me Talking. When the song began to play, George jumped up and yelled out “Who played Sonny Boy?”. I replied “I did, why?”  He said, “What’s’ a young fellow like you know about Sonny Boy?”  George was about 16 years older than I was. What he didn’t know was that I was not that young myself; I was forty-nine when I first met George but looked about forty. We had a few beers and sung a few Sonny Boy tunes together. I told him that I played a harmonica and Sonny Boy was one of my idols. After that day, every time I would see George he would call me “Sonny Boy”. To tell you the truth, I liked it when he called me Sonny Boy – I took it as an honor.

Next, there was Skinny Willie and his wife Jeannette. They were a happily married couple.  Sometimes Skinny Willie would get to drinking and start talking shit in the bar, but he was harmless and half the time you couldn’t understand what he was saying. But if one took the time to really listen, Willie made much sense and brought great wisdom and knowledge of the important things in life. They were good people, well liked and as much a fixture in the bar as any of the other regulars.

On the other side of the bar we had Fireman Willie. He had been on the fire dept. for many years. He was somewhat of a dark skinned black man. He was a large man. My guess, he tipped the scale at about 250 lbs of solid muscle with biceps about twenty-one inches around and a neck to match. His eyes were big and round like an owl. When I would shake hands with him it was like shaking hands with a grizzly bear. One of his hands felt like it weighed ten pounds. This was clearly a man you wanted to stay on the good side of. Luckily for myself, fireman Willie liked me and whenever I walked in. if he were there, he would always buy me a drink and would not take “no” for an answer.

Next, their was Fannie and Moesha. Most people thought these two were lesbians because of all their public display of kissing and affection but the truth is, Fannie was bi-sexual and as for Moesha, I often saw her kissing her girlfriend but I have no knowledge if she liked men or not. Regardless of what the drunken jealous men in the bar thought of their sexuality which, for the most part was definitely none of their business, they were really two very nice ladies.

I strolled in the bar soon that morning feeling pretty good about myself. I yelled out a round of shots for all of us plus a Heineken for me. “I’m on my way to the Apollo I’ll be camping out tonight. Its going to be a long cold night. Cheers!” I said, then threw back my shot of Capitan Morgan, guzzled my beer and headed for the back door. As I opened the back door to leave I heard George say “Good luck Sonny Boy.” I laughed and keep walking to my car.