The In Crowd

You know how it is: You're in a place with music coming through the ceiling, and you don't really notice it--until the music rings one of your bells. And then ...

Happened to me this morning.

At the coffee shop I was working away--reading, taking notes on an Ian McEwan novel (The Black Dogs, 1992). And then I noticed the music. So familiar. The kind of music that is transporting--a vessel that carries you back. And in this case, it was a long way back.

It was jazz pianist Ramsey Lewis playing "The In Crowd," 1965, a live recording at the Bohemian Caverns in Washington, D. C. Eldee Young on bass, Redd Holt on drums. Part of a live album--The In Crowd. I once owned that album. Played it to death. Had a cassette tape, too, which is probably still lying around in my mess of a study.

In 1965 I was about to start my senior year at Hiram College, and Ramsey Lewis would be a big part of that year for me.

I should back up a moment ...

I knew virtually nothing about jazz in my boyhood. I knew about Louis Armstrong (a little)--and had actually seen him perform at Hiram College when I was in junior high. With the aid of a friend, Johnny Kelker, I got to sit in the front row.

But when I got to college, I became friends with Claude Steele, who'd grown up on Chicago's South Side and was a huge jazz fan. In the evenings I would lie on a bed in his room and listen to all the wonders I'd never even known existed, courtesy of his extensive record collection. I paged through his copies of Down Beat, a magazine devoted to the art form--and to which I would later subscribe myself.

I just checked: Down Beat first appeared in 1934 and is still publishing.

Ramsey Lewis was one of Claude's favorites, and so I heard a lot of and about him--and would later buy his records when they came out. I still listen each year to his Christmas album (his trio on one side, full orchestration on the other).

In December 1969 Claude was an usher at our wedding.

Claude is 2nd from the right

Claude and I have remained friends for many decades--despite the huge geographical distance between us. For a while he taught in Seattle, and my 14-year-old son and I stayed with him one night in the summer of 1986 when we were on our way to Skagway, Alaska, to do some Jack London research--and some Dyer family research.

Later, Claude was teaching at Stanford (psych department), and I stayed with him several times when I was out in the Bay Area researching my various Jack London projects.

I would also see his wonderful wife, Dorothy (a Hiram College classmate), now and then when she would come back to Hiram College (she was a trustee). She, too, had a Ph.D. and was one of the most remarkable human beings I've ever known.

I hated typing the word was in that previous sentence. Dorothy has passed away, and such a loss--to Claude, to her son and daughter, to her friends, to the world--is inexpressible.

It seems far more than appropriate that Benny Steele, their son, is now a jazz drummer and producer of recordings in his own studio. (Link to his website.) And their daughter, Jory, is the Associate Dean of Student Affairs at Stanford Law School.

So Claude & Dorothy have conferred upon the world a stunning legacy. Whenever I was with them, I felt as if I, too, were a member of the In Crowd.

And all of this came swirling back to me this morning at Open Door Coffee Co. Thank you, Ramsey Lewis. Thank you, Claude and Dorothy.

Link to Ramsey Lewis performing "The In Crowd."

NOTE: The song was first sung by Dobie Gray and released in Nov. 1964. Link to video of his version.