Transcript of unpublished interview with Charles "Buddy" Bolden,
conducted by Clarence Hayes III at Bolden's place of residence, the
Louisiana State Asylum for the Insane in Jackson, Louisiana, recorded
and transcribed by Benjamin Price on January 13, 1923  
  

Hayes: Mr. Bolden, I appreciate you giving me your time this morning.

Bolden: Don't see many white folk in this place. 'Ceptin' the doctors.

Hayes: Mr. Bolden, do you feel all right -- I mean, do you feel up for this interview?

Bolden: Whatcha mean do I feel all right? 'Course I'm all right. Do I look like I
ain't all right?

Hayes: No, no, of course not. I mean, you look fine. It's just that...

Bolden: .. Just that since I'm in a place for crazies must mean I'm crazy, and so
maybe I ain't all right. Crazy folk scare you, mister?

Hayes: Well, no...

Bolden: Don't lie. I kin tell if ya lie. Us crazies got a sense for such things.

Hayes: Yes, all right. This place makes me very ill at ease if you must know.

Bolden: (smiling) Well, if you must know; kinda makes me ill at ease too. Thought
I'd get used to it, but I ain't yet. Been a coupla years too.

Hayes: It's been sixteen years, Mr. Bolden.

Bolden: That long? Really? Shee-it. I guess time flies when yer havin' fun. (laughs)
Well, my sense of passin' time done got messed up long ago. Call me Buddy,
mister. You are white, ain't ya? Makes me nervous when white people start
callin' me Mr. Bolden. White folks start callin' a niggra "mister," usually means
something bad gonna happen.

Hayes: All right, Buddy.

Bolden: Doc says you from the newspaper.

Hayes: That's right. I'm from the Times-Picayune.

Bolden: Must be a slow news day, you comin' all the way out to the crazy farm
just to talk to an old beaten nigger like me. If you come to hang somethin' on me,
I sure hope it's somethin' ta get hung for. Dyin's all I got left 'bout now, and I
don't see much point  in waitin' around.

Hayes: What I came to talk to you about... (long pause)

Bolden: Take yer time, mister. Got plenty of time, me. Don't get much company,
neither.

Hayes: Well, jazz, of course.

Bolden: Don't sound like yer too sure about that. Why'd anyone from the news
wanna talk about fuck-music? Don't make no sense. Maybe you crazy, too.
(laughs) Well, if you are, you come to the right place. Make yerself ta home,
Mr. Reporter.

Hayes: Mr... I mean Buddy, I get the feeling you're unaware of just how big
jazz music has become in the last few years. Storyville closed down permanently
six years ago, but the music of those halls has become a national phenomenon.
International, in fact. It's become quite the sensation in England and France.

Bolden: You shittin' me?

Hayes: No, I'm not.

Bolden: Well, I'll be damned. How'd such a thing come about exactly?

Hayes: The first record was made in New York City in 1917. The sound became
popular very quickly after that. Many thought it a fad and predicted its popularity
would fade, but it actually gets more popular every year.

Bolden: Some New York boys made a record of it?

Hayes: No, a New Orleans outfit. Dominick Carolla and the Jim Jam Jump
Orchestra. Theirs was the first big success, but they're already considered passe'.
The new big star is a man called Jelly Roll Morton. Colored man. Creole, I think.

Bolden: I remember that kid. Name of Ferd, but insisted everyone cal him Jelly
Roll. Cocky little piss. But he could play all right.

Hayes: Buddy, do you remember Dominick Carolla? Or, did you know him at all?

Bolden: Yeah, I remember that punk just fine. Stole my horn, that kid. Well, I
guess technically he bought it  -- I mean, he left some money after he hit me over
the head with the damn thing and  run off. I did spend the money on a pricey
hooker, but I didn't actually consent to the sale of that horn. I loved that horn.
Wanted to leave it for my son. Guess it don't matter much since West died,
though. Died so young. I wasn't much of a daddy to that boy, sorry to say.
Woulda been nice to leave him that horn, though. Only thing I ever had what
meant anything. (tears visible in Bolden's eyes)

Hayes: I'm sorry about your son.

Bolden. Nuffa that. Why'd you come here?

Hayes: Well, there's great interest in the jazz phenomenon and a lot of rumors
about its true origins. A good many of the older musicians who had played in the
tenderloin say it was you who originated the sound. But others take credit for it.

Bolden: By "others" you mean Jim Jam Jump, I suppose.

Hayes: Yes. Him and a few more.

Bolden: Well, he can have the credit. I don't want it. Thass just fine with me. Sure
would like that horn back, though.

Hayes: Don't you think, I mean, for the sake of historical accuracy, that the
record should be set strai --

Bolden: Historical accuracy? (laughing loudly) Sonny, I'm about to bust a gut
here on that one. Who in their right mind would give hang about the historical
accuracy of "Fonky Butt"?

Hayes: Well, the commercialized version of the music has lost some of its original
vulgarity. But its sound is unique -- and it's struck an emotional chord with a lot
of people.

Bolden: (becoming more serious) Ya keep calling it a sound, but that ain't quite
right, y' know. I wouldn't call it a sound at all. More lika feelin'.

Hayes: A feeling?

Bolden: A feelin'. And ain't nobody can take credit for a feelin'. Feelin' is
something -- well, either you got it or you don't. Can't invent no feelin'.

Hayes: Well, I suppose you can invent a way to express a feeling. Jazz might be
just that;  a new method of expressing --

Bolden: No. The method don't matter. Listen, this jass thing -- it mighta passed
through me its first time round, but that don't make it mine. Or nobody else's
neither. It just is. Passed through me -- what good it doin' me now? Passed
through Jim Jam Jump -- you say he's already near forgotten. Now it's passin'
through Ferd Morton -- his time with it'll be over soon enough. Next in line --
who knows? Only thing fer sure; if it caught on real big like you say, don't matter
how it got started. A butterfly might flap his little wings in China, that little bit
o'wind travelin' all the way round the world, wind up a hurricane in Galveston.
Think anyone in Galveston give two shits about which butterfly wrecked their city?

Hayes: I suppose not.

Bolden: Course not. That'd be a trivial curiosity, nothing more.

Hayes: Some people say it's a matter of heritage. They say the white musicians
are trying to take credit for something that belongs to the coloreds.

Bolden: I say let 'em have it. With no problem. They want the credit? They got
the credit. I'm the easiest credit man in town. I say, I say, I say, I say! That
won't change what's true -- and the truth have a way of revealing itself over the
long run, anyhow. Hell, white folk deserve some recognition -- it was white
people what made it popular in the sportin' houses in the first place. You think
we was playing for the benefit of negroes in them days? No, sir. No indeed.

Hayes: Interesting point.

Bolden: Look, Mister Reporter, I guess you could say jass enriched my life in
some ways; lotsa fine women looking after me, and some pretty good money
from time to time -- but also it brought me low; brought me to a place like this.
And maybe I was meant to end up in this place, just as jass mighta been meant
to be a music from black folk but for white folk. 'Course, it won't sound the
same nor as good if black folks ain't playin' it, but possession is nine tenths of
the law they say - and it's the white folks got money to do the possessin'. One
thing fer certain; that jass music can mess with a man's spirit, and if they ain't
careful, could be some white folk end up in a place like this, too. Along with
possessin' come responsibility, y'see -- and with responsibility come risk. And
sometimes that risk can fall down hard on a man's soul. Y'see, most white folk
think black folk is weak of mind and spirit, and this belief makes 'em feel
superior. That superior feelin' can keep a man from being cautious, can cause
a man to slip, to fall.

Hayes: I see.

Bolden: No, I don't think you do see. No matter, though. I don't want no
damn credit for this "phenomenon," as you call it. Too much damn responsibility.
I do miss the ladies, though. Jass was definitely good for that. (smiling)

Hayes: About Dominick Carolla --

Bolden: Jim Jam Jump, you mean. (scowling)

Hayes: Yes, Jim Jam Jump.

Bolden: Damn punk stole my horn.

Hayes: Stole more than that, if you ask me. But I was wondering what memories
you may have of him personally. Any significant interactions between the two of
you that you can recall?

Bolden: (pausing to think) Nah, I don't wanna get on this. Why don't we change
the subject, sonny?

Hayes: Soon -- but I do have a question about a particular instance, if you don't
mind...

Bolden: (sighing) All right, then. Out with it.

Hayes: In 1891 when you were just fourteen years old -- you were questioned
as a witness to a homicide --

Bolden: (Surprised expression) Man, you sure done yer homework. I'll give
you that.

Hayes: A man called Morningstar, a preacher, was killed that night. And a man
named Marshall Trumbo was there -- a white man.

Bolden: Newspaper man. Like you.

Hayes: That's right. And Caro -- I mean, Jim Jam Jump was also there. But he
was only a baby.

Bolden: (far away look) I seen some things that night.

Hayes: What can you tell me about that night?

Bolden: I was just a kid. Old man now. Can't remember much of it.

Hayes: Mr. Bolden, please...

Bolden: (angry) Goddamn it, I told you not to call me that!

Hayes:  I'm sorry, it slipped --

Bolden: What's this about? Why you here really? Shoulda damn known it had
nothin' to do with no fuck-music. You been playin' me, aintcha, Mister Reporter?

Hayes: No, no -- not at all. It's just that I had heard some things and I wanted to
see if there was any connection --

Bolden: Well, I don't remember nothin' bout that night. Nothing, you hear? You
want to know about all that crazy stuff, why dontcha go talk to the gravedigger?
That fool nigger loves to flap his gums.

Hayes: What gravedigger?

Bolden: You know -- Marcus. From Girod Street Cemetery. Ugly son of a bitch
with no nose.

Hayes: Marcus James?

Bolden: Nobody Special.

Hayes: Excuse me?

Bolden: I don't know his real last name. Everybody call him Marcus Nobody
Special. That's all I know. Go talk to him. He remembers everything. Or so he
pretends. I think we're done here, sonny. (Getting up to leave) Thanks for the
company. I got a busy day of being crazy to tend to now, if you don't mind.

Hayes: One more question if you don't mind. Please? Buddy?

Bolden: (Stops with back turned to Hayes) I might not answer, but go ahead.

Hayes: Marshall Trumbo is -- well, he lives here too. He's been here since
before you.

Bolden: Yeah, so what of it?

Hayes: I was wondering if you ever had occasion to speak with him. I mean,
since you've been here.

Bolden: That man is white, sonny. I never been over to the white end of this
place. Didn't even know there was a white end. If there is, I imagine it's pretty
posh. Not like here. But no, I ain't never seen him since that night. Hope never
ta see him or anyone else from that night ever again, neither. Now, if you'll
excuse me.

Hayes: Thank you for your time, Buddy.

Bolden: Shit. (walks away quickly through main corridor)