Davis was remarkably generous to favorite students. Their work would begin after lunch, interrupted by dinner, after which Mrs. Davis would bid them good-night, only to find them playing the next morning, having continued throughout the night.
He was taken to Jamaica Hospital after another stroke. Grabbing a big of soft fruit (he was toothless by then, without dentures) and borrowed cassette player, I again skipped school. He listened intently to guitar duets by Lonnie Johnson and Eddie Lang, as their elaborate harmonic base and speedy runs seemed to be an expansion of the early Carolina style he was influenced by (Willie Walker especially). Some of Davis' solos allude to Johnson's melodic arcs covering several octaves. He also enjoyed hearing Blind Blake's discs from the 1920's. One hoped that listening to his contemporaries would provide relief from the alienating hospital environment (a worry soon dispelled: he graciously flirted with every nurse within reach, inquiring if they were married, boasting how he could fulfill their wishes).
Davis had a number of Jewish students (as I am): some worried
over his deep religiosity erupting into a castigation for not
accepting the Saviour. Blues buffs refused to view him as anything
but a former bluesman who turned religious and reworked earlier
repertoire into sacred garb. Their vulgar importuning him to "play
some of those low-down blues" could lead to rebukes laced
with biblical references. During our lessons, one merely asked
to learn any work he knew: as it was a musical encounter, Davis
enthusiastically obliged. It became evident that religion was
not a substitution for the blues lifestyle he had renounced. Under
his extraordinarily comfortable armchair Davis tucked a well-read
Braille bible. The symbolism and practical application of the
New Testament stimulated his intellect and spirituality, extending
a musical culture whose boundaries surpassed that of mere entertainers
(for many bluesmen were professional musicians but rarely graced
otherwise). Davis transformed his art and being through a quasi-Biblical
stance: in performing Blow Gabriel, a call to awaken one's soul,
Davis casts himself as a prophet declaiming the truth to disinterested
masses. His spirituality was as immense as his earthiness (one
student glimpsed the lethal knife he kept under his pillow, for
he had often been robbed while singing on the streets), combining
the extremes of existence, balancing them with a concern for fairness
as his modesty and vibrant wit shone amidst pride over his musical
achievements.
I arrived in his world when declining health restricted his Sunday
sermonizing, but heard him relate an episode of his ministerial
tribulations. One woman repeatedly phoned him in desperation:
Davis mockingly bawled in falsetto, "Brother Davis, help
me, I locked myself in the bedroom and my husband is outside with
a gun and wants to kill me." "And what did you say?"
we wondered. "I told her 'Well, if he wants to kill you,
you probably did something to deserve it!' and then I hung up
on her." (Yet another disorienting 'story' from him.) As
much as he pursued women, he also seemed to have had a lifelong
fear of becoming attached to the wrong person, advising me "Don't
get yourself caught in a hole that you like too much and can't
get yourself out of, you understand. No matter how good it gets,
you have to be able to get out."
Amidst the dangers of temptation, perhaps more imaginary than real, Mrs. Davis proved to be his moral pillar, a significant force of propriety who placed the needs of others before her own with a profound piety, highly endowed with common sense, compassion, unstintingly charitable. His LP records were protectively stored under her bed, a pile which shrank as she never refused anyone insisting on having her last copy of a specific recording. Davis had found in Annie the incarnation of his faith, a woman of great devotion and modesty with a sense of justice and self-sacrifice (as she adored him and praised him to her dying day), able to transform herself from a hard worker (she toiled many years as a hired housekeeper) into an artist's wife, coordinating his itinerary, lessons, and the many who sought him. The aroma and expertise of her cooking aroused one's senses. Her cuisine bore a delicate touch and expert sense in seasoning and timing, transformed simple dishes into lifelong culinary memories. Her fried fish and chicken, sweet potato pie, mashed potatoes, collard greens delicately flavored with specks of smoked ham hock defined the height of 'soul' food. Davis ate heartily of her delicacies, a solace for long hours endured singing on Harlem's streets for their survival.
A more severe stroke brought Davis to the New York Hospital. I arrived with fruit, music, and a flute: before a lesson, I played sonata movements by Handel and Hindemith. He listened (with unplugged ears!) and asked to examine the flute. After briefly placing it to his lips and feeling the way it was fingered, he observed "You have a nice silver flute." Despite the severity of this stroke, Davis was soon released. While his physique had once been robust, his suits were now oversized for his shriveled body and gaunt face. A few weeks later, on April 21, 1972, Mrs. Davis permitted me to come for a lesson, urging me not to tire him: it was the final lesson he offered, lasting four hours (I asked several times that we stop but he insisted we continue). His playing had further slowed, allowing one to perceive more details.
Mother Davis (as we called Annie) rang up a few days later with an invitation to a barbecue on April 30th, his 76th birthday: "Roy Bookbinder and Woody Mann will be over." Unfortunately a family obligation arose. Five days later, en route after a flute lesson to dinner with a friend, the clarinetist David Krakauer, I dialed the Davis house from a street phone on an urgent impulse, finding the line busy for quite a while. Nearing his home, I phoned David: "Reverend Davis died today", he said.
Annie recounted how he suddenly felt ill as they were driving
in New Jersey (where they owned a second home). At that moment
a hospital was seen off the highway. He was rushed in, calling
out to Annie: "Sweetheart, I'm leaving you!" She was
not permitted to accompany him inside: five minutes later a nurse
emerged to inform her of his passing.
I grew closer to Annie, visiting weekly after school. She now
worried over her own health: "I'm no good anymore, just trying
to put my best on the outside." She kept active in helping
others and being involved with church life. Boarders were taken
in. Brother Jimmy Kendrick, a devout, gentle blind accordionist
from Florida had come to New York to sing Gospel on the streets
and support his wife and children back home: Annie provided him
with lodging in her basement and cooked for him.
Over the years, the phone would ring:
"Allin, can you come by on the second Sunday next month? I'm having a program at the church and want you to be on it so bring the guitar and do a few numbers of B. Davis'." One was expected at 10 a.m. sharp for a service ending twelve hours later. Annie and her fellow congregants rented storefront churches in Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx with folding chairs, an out of tune upright piano, sometimes an organ, and a roomy kitchen in the back, as many ladies arrived with generous trays of home-cooked roast turkey with stuffing, vegetables, macaroni and cheese, mouthwatering pies, puddings and heavily frosted cakes which sustained the faithful throughout a day of praising and celebrating God. At first I felt awkward as a non-believer, timidly facing the devout to play and sing Davis's music, but in time came to cherish their faith as an act of goodness to others, distinguished by an absence of proselytizing, moralizing or judgmental admonitions; it emerged as families and friends united to strengthen themselves to rise above life's hardships, the most compelling existence of harmony and spirituality one can encounter in any religion.
Impeccably dressed ladies topped with unique hats wailed their sorrows and joys in song, in swaying and pulsating rhythms, clapping and stomping on the floorboards as a young boy trying out R&B riffs on the organ clashed with a lady Bishop's steady hymn tunes on the piano, recalling Charles Ives' overhearing two marching bands coinciding at a New England town commons, as my energy ebbed from the heat, volume, and emotional intensity. Mothers cradled their infants, rocking them in rhythm to the sacred songs, the babies pleased with such embraces amidst joyous hymns. Worshippers receiving the Holy Spirit from the volcanic song and blast-furnace sermons commenced writhing, overcome, lying on the floor, as a seasoned bespectacled lady Bishop in nurse's garb watched over. It was a challenge to last beyond four hours, at which point I would leave with a hasty goodbye to Annie as the enormity of the experience became joyfully draining, leaving one pallid, emotionally spent.
Annie once called with an invitation to the birthday of a friend's daughter. It began as an exchange of commonplaces until the arrival of the short, meek Elder Toogood, head-shaved, sporting thick lenses, a young fledgling minister who seemed too shy for a pulpit, until he sat at the piano, gradually working himself up into a frenzy, electrifying all through song, bold rhythms, ending the music to build a sermon into an ecstatic outpouring (amidst vicious growling whenever one neared a locked bathroom confining the family's German shepherd attack-dog). The birthday girl, in her late teens, sat alone, dejected, withdrawn, indifferent to his apocalyptic preaching. (Years later, Annie mentioned that the daughter had a mental handicap.) All stepped back as Elder Toogood approached her, bidding her to rise, laying his hands on her shoulders as he sang, her head hung downward, drawing forth from her tears and deep sobbing, leading to a trembling, an uncontrollable shaking, as she began rhythmically dipping, swerving low, dropping, wriggling on the carpet, screaming out in tongues. Her possession silently lifted, she calmly found her way to her feet and managed to seat herself, her relieved expression hinting at a smile.
Up until her 100th year, Annie regularly attended church, sustained by her communion with God amongst fellow worshippers. By then she had outlived her three children (from an earlier marriage they died in their 60's and 70's) and would soon hold her first great-great grandchild. Annie moved several times in her late nineties until an apartment became available at a senior citizens center in Brooklyn. Diabetes provoked the amputation of a leg at age 101, which kept her home-bound although social life continued unabated and I was often enlisted to write and mail her correspondence. One day Prophet Shoeshine reappeared. The enigmatic clash of her name and permanent shoelessness was solved when she stated it was Shushan and that the Lord had ordered her to venture forth barefoot and she complied, never succumbing to cold or illness during frigid New York winters and rains. She also lectured Annie and anyone within listening range on the importance of diet, stressing how one must only eat pure, organic food.
Annie's mind and spirit remained firm despite worsening diabetes, failing eyesight and poor hearing. One day in December 1997 while on a rare trip to visit a nearby relative, she grew weak and asked to be brought to a hospital, passing away hours later, two months before her 103rd birthday.
What is one to do with Davis' heritage, his way of playing? Many pupils incorporated his techniques into other styles. His music always impressed as being so complete that any changes would seem either in poor taste or the result of inability. One ought to study his variants and use them according to context, in response to the tempo and structure, the way one applies strategy while playing chess, to retain his style and language as a living museum.
Months after B. Davis' passing, layered electronic sounds began invading, pulling at me like an undertow. I tried approximating them on paper, studying composition, musicology, finding my 'style' within the classical tradition. Yet the example of his art and teaching remained as one's aesthetic and technical base in all musical forms. How else can one offer gratitude for Davis' guidance and encouragement but to ask all to explore the recordings of a being whom Mother Davis marvelled over: "You'll never find someone like B. Davis again, there's only one in a century like him."
Here ends my tale, written thirty-one years later, amidst concern
over having forgotten something worthy of relating. Every moment
is still vivid, thanks to him my fingers still dance on their
own, the right hand seeking to draw out his sounds; all has settled
in and is resolved.
All but the last moment. When our final lesson ended, he challenged
me to arm-wrestle; he was weak but enjoyed the struggle (to my
delight I noticed our hands were the same size.) I placed Miss
Gibson in the living room closet as he teased Annie, grumbling:
"You don't want me, do you?! You don't care about me . .
." Moments later Davis suddenly turned to me, uttering words
echoing some African language (years earlier I heard spoken Sutu
and Zulu).
"B. Davis, what did you say??"
"The unknown tongue. That's a language above an ordinary person's speaking, you understand. And it takes you to be able to edify that. Paul said it would be better for you to speak one word and the church be edified by it than to speak four or five words and you wouldn't be edified by that. You can't take a one-grade person and speak a ten-grade language. You've got to be able to master that. That's when you'd go in a store and ask the man what did he have to sell and he said he has some henfruit. I wasn't sure what he called henfruit. Do you know what henfruit is Sister Dee-Ray?" [she had just arrived: "Eggs."] "That's what it is. Last thing I asked what he had, he said 'galeña'. Do you know what that is? It's a chicken."
Would he repeat the words he had earlier described as a 'Hallelujah', again in the tongue? "You ask me to say 'hallelujah'; that's a praise to God!" [He obliged.] "You're all filled with joy, and you're above your own understanding without speaking."
Thanking him for so kindly offering his time despite such weakness, I headed home filled with gratitude and awe, unaware that I would never see him again.
Where are you Prophet Shushan? You, who may hold the key to
Brother Davis' reminder of a dimension beyond the empirical: nothing
since has had the resonance of that moment, this glimpse of an
inner life, resonating like an archaic rite surviving from Africa,
like the forbidding stares of initiates inhabiting the frescoes
in the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii. (I can hear those who
knew him laughing: "he was just talking in tongues.")
No. This was not a Sunday service glossolalia: something else
lay within. The door he opened remains to be explored, by someone
able to enter into his faith and mysticism, to fully experience
and reveal the tongue. Someone must also uncover the origins of
all the music he offered. A phenomenon, Davis deserves nothing
less.
--Allan Evans ©2002