Features and Reviews
Knocky Parker: Legendary Pianist
Part III
By Bill Mitchell
This is the third installment of an interview with Dr. John "Knocky" Parker, the Texas farm boy who grew up to play first with western string bands and then went on to play ragtime and blues piano both as soloist and band member. He was widely recorded. His day gig was college teaching as a professor of English. The first two installments told of his childhood, his musical education, and pre-World War II experiences with the Light Crust Doughboys.
Bill: Then, after the war, you really got into the jazz area more, didn't you? How did that happen?
Knocky: I don't know how, Zutty Singleton...Oh yes, I do too. On my two weeks holiday, the first year with the Doughboys, I spent in New Orleans and got a job there at the—some hot spot—the "Little Puppy," or something. There was a clarinetist, I think his name was Sid Arodin...
B: Yeah, the one that's credited with "Up a Lazy River..."
K: He was playing and I worked there for two weeks and met lots, and lots, and lots of New Orleans. Oh, just lots of all that New Orleans crowd inside of that two weeks. And then I began going down there on weekends, and renewing friendships and acquaintances and sitting in and being a part of the scene. And I liked to get on the train and go on down there to New Orleans for the weekend, and then go back to Forth Worth, or spend Saturday night and all day Sunday. So that's how Zutty knew of me. I might even have met him down there on some occasions, but all the musicians knew of me. When he first called me in Los Angeles I thought it was somebody pretending to be he. It was hard for me to get it through my head who Zutty Singleton really was. I saw him years later, many, many years later and I'm teaching then in Florida, and going up to New York to interview Beatrice Lily, for whom J. Russell Robinson had first written "Toodle-Oo, Pip-Pip, Goodbye," the song that introduced her on the musical stage there in London, her first big hit. She was a kind of a little-known star before that one number gave her prominence in the full society of London, where she ceased to be a bit performer and was a star ever after then because of that tune. I was interviewing her and happened to go out with two of my friends with whom I'd driven up to New York and we went to a play of James Baldwin and Zutty Singleton was in the audience and yelled out, "Knocky." There was a star of a lifetime, real old, had a cane, was sort of crippled then, but the kids knew the name and their eyes were shining just like a big star in a cartoon. Offstage, seeing Zutty there was a great treat for me. He was a wonderful, wonderful person and no one will ever take his place.
B: Albert Nicholas was in that same group that you mentioned.
K: Yes, he was. Oh, Albert was phenomenal, and I could never decide whether I liked Albert or Omar Simeon better. Which do you like better?
B: I don't like to rate one above the other because they are both so different and I like them both so very much.
K: On one occasion I had recorded some things with Albert Nicholas for E.C. Nunn in Milwaukee and the next week, of all things, Omar Simeon came up. Just before he died—he had lung cancer, I believe, and he was dying then and his memory was failing. And I know Ewing was disappointed in the four tunes we finally recorded. In any event he released them on record without giving Omar Simeon credit for them. What it was, we'd get them both mixed up, Ewing and I, and we'd call him Omar from time to time and then we'd call him Albert, or we'd call Albert Omar, because we couldn't tell them apart. It was a strange state; what we should have done was to record both together, but we didn't have sense enough to do that, and we didn't know they'd go off and we'd never see either one of them again. Strange, but that happens in the world of music—you know this. You leave some good friends and ten years pass and you might or might not see them again.
B: You were mentioning the other day about meeting Lottie Joplin and getting a couple copies of "Treemonisha."
K: Bill Russell in Owensboro, Kentucky. No, it was not Owensboro, it was a school that was in Winchester, Kentucky before it moved. Kentucky Wesleyan, and I was teaching in Winchester, Kentucky, 30 miles away from Lexington. And Bill Russell was visiting his brother who was a chemistry professor in Lexington, Kentucky, and he came down to see me the 30 miles. I met him for the first time and he gave me the address where I could obtain a copy of "Treemonisha" through Lottie Joplin, and I was going to New York in the next week or so. Sure enough, it must have been a month or so, as there was plenty of time for the letters to get back and forth. Bill wrote them that I was coming, and when I landed on the doorstep they knew who I was, and that was the entry, Bill having mentioned me. And Chris Smith opened the door. I knew who he was as soon as I heard. I asked him, "Are you the??" Yes, he is! And he was pleased. Can you imagine his believing no one knew "Ballin' the Jack" or other of his hits? At that time I guess he was just surprised. A beautiful, beautiful person. He was taking care of Lottie; she was very feeble. She had a trunk with his manuscripts, copies primarily of orchestrations. I didn't have too much money, and I was scared to offer to buy too much. I didn't know whether I should be eager or what. I was just scared to death in the first place, being there. The police had seen me in the first place before I went in and ordered me not to go, but I tried to explain that my interest was purely musical. Finally he allowed me entrance and escorted me part of the way, reluctantly, most reluctantly, and when I got there I wasn't afraid at all, went on in. So I got two copies of "Treemonisha" for $5.00 apiece and I bought some others for 35 cents apiece. "Solace" was one, "Pleasant Moments" was one, Pine Apple Rag" was one.
B: These were all his original editions? Colored covers?
K: Yes, they were worn, very worn, but they were first editions, and I played them and I did record them. And they do mean a great deal to me. At that time you must realize how scarce these were, how very, very scarce. Finally from Trebor Tichenor I found out that I could go to the Library of Congress and for (at that time it was $1.00 a page) buy Photostat copies of the pages.
B: So you supplied yourself with a good many numbers that way?
K: When I was working toward my degree, yes, I did my work in Washington, D.C. The Ethnic Music Section where all the people were searching all these unknown rags and they had these marked "Ethnic." They didn't have (and they looked everywhere) for "Guest of Honor," and they had a very hard time finding the Scott Joplin, and they worked very hard for me, I know that. I spent as much money as I could at $1.00 a page, getting Xerox copies.
B: But they didn't have "Guest of Honor" did they?
K: No, they looked and looked and looked.
B: That's the missing one isn't it, no one is supposed to have a copy of it.
K: I had heard that Bob Darch had a copy and somebody else has seen the cover, that's all I know, that Trebor Tichenor has seen the cover of "Guest of Honor."
B: Do you collect sheet music?
K: No, I don't, and I'm sorry to say that I haven't cared for the few first editions that have come my way. I didn't know that...well, I was interested in their musical content, so I worked them up and learned them, then other people learned them too. They meant to me just learning the music, and I still regard just an old Xerox (this is wrong) but the music is there and that is the value of it. I mean, come on, I mean the music is there and there it ceases. It is only music when it is played, when people can play it. Otherwise it is just material. But the second that you put it into a performance it becomes something else again; alive and alert and enduring and profound. I'm saying this poorly, but it means music to me.
B: Well, I agree with you perfectly on that.
K: Get it off the wall, don't frame it, get it down and let some musician Xerox it, and have it and play it and learn it!
B: Collecting is another bag of tricks entirely.
K: Yes, and I know so many collectors who wouldn't let anybody have anything, and I thought this was vicious and evil, and I still think it is, you know. It's bad, there are so few of us. And I've also known critics who've been precious and presumptuous and provincial and narrow...and I think this was what killed the revival of ragtime too, because the critics have their own idea of how a rag is to be performed and anything that doesn't coincide exactly with their idea is therefore worthless because it doesn't coincide with their ideas. And they killed it without acknowledging the rights of the individual. I listened to "Maple Leaf Rag" at this last meeting of the Maple Leaf Club, and everyone who played it was attempting, I'm sure, to play the score exactly, but it was different because each one plays it differently, whether he means to or not. And the difference is valuable and precious and meaningful; and this is fine and as it should be. Why not? Artie Matthews said they changed the keys when they wanted to, and that the editor changed many of the interludes and introductions for his original works. He said that was true. And there are, if you will study these works throughout the different composers, you will notice a similarity in the interludes and introductions among the various composers which would be from learning from one another editorial intrusion by subversive hate. (sic) Charley Thompson said they started to change the key of "Lily Rag," then decided to put it back. So they can change the key? Of course, they can change anything.
B: Don't you think that Artie Matthews had quite a bit to do with the style of—who was it...Hampton? The composer of "Cataract Rag"?
K: I don't know, I hadn't heard that before. I wouldn't be surprised.
B: Play the last strain of "Cataract" and see if it doesn't sound like something out of the "Pastime Rags."
K: That's very, very interesting. Of course they all learned from one another.
