My evening with Miles Davis (memoir)

In the early '70s I operated the food concession at the Keystone Corner, a jazz club in San Francisco's North Beach neighborhood. I barely made enough to open the next night, but I heard plenty of great jazz from players like James Moody, Chick Corea"“ two true gentlemen of jazz"“ Pharaoh Saunders, Donald Byrd and my special favorite, the blind saxophonist Rahsaan Roland Kirk.

Rahsaan, as he was known to one and all, was legendary for playing two horns at once, and at one time even considered surgery to make his mouth larger so that he could play three or more saxes together. And he was one of the most gentle, beautiful people I've ever met.

Everybody loved him. On entering the club every night, led by his radiant wife, who was also his manager, Rahsaan would stop and say hello to everyone who worked at the Keystone. His name for me was simply "Food." It was no coincidence that Rahsaan's signature tune was "Bright Moments," because that's what he was.

Then there was Miles Davis.

Hard-hitting drummer

At one point, the drummer Tony Williams came into the club with a truly kicking band called "Lifetime." Williams was the hardest-hitting drummer I've ever heard, and Lifetime was fronted by a beautiful girl singer who went by the name of Tequila, whom Tony Williams later married.

One particular night, Lifetime was steaming along, Tequila singing her bodacious ass off, when who should slink in but Miles Davis himself. Tony Williams had been Miles's drummer when Davis formed one of the first fusion bands, shocking and angering jazz purists, which didn't bother Miles a bit. Miles was the Picasso of jazz, always on the cutting edge, always blazing new musical trails.

This night Davis sported a big floppy black velvet Jeff cap, black bug-eyed sunglasses, a black velvet jump suit and knee-high snakeskin boots. He'd come from a concert in Berkeley to see his old band-mate Williams, and I learned later that his Berkeley gig had consisted of one note on his trumpet. Then, Miles being Miles, he just walked off.

An ounce of cocaine daily

Davis was high as a jackrabbit when he came in the Keystone. At that time, Miles was taking about an ounce of cocaine a day. I knew this because his local supplier was one of my best food customers, a Chinese jeweler in North Beach. The drug dealer wore an amulet around his neck that had a lever that released a blow of coke when you pressed it. He never paid for his favorite avocado and sprouts sandwich; instead he let me hold and use his cocaine necklace while he ate. He was a slow eater, and by the time I gave him back the coke-snorter, I was often so high I was seeing auras around people.

Anyhow, Miles sat himself on the edge of the stage and began fooling around with the indigenous African rhythm instruments that Tony Williams used from time to time. All eyes were on Miles, of course, as the audience recognized him. Damn, Miles Davis!

All of a sudden, Tequila brought her hand sharply down and yelled, "Stop the music!" Then she walked to the edge of the stage, looked down and said, "I don't give a fuck who you are, Miles Davis— get the fuck off my stage!"

A favor for Miles

Miles's head popped up, he put down the instrument, and quietly walked behind the stage and disappeared into the club's office. The band played on, and after the set was over, the kid who owned the Keystone Corner came out of the office and walked over and asked if I would make Miles a platter of food.

I laughed. "You gotta be kidding," I said. "The last he thing he cares about is food."

"Do it for me anyhow, OK?" the kid asked.

"Fine by me," I said and whipped up an avocado and sprouts sandwich and some chips. Then I called Tanya, my waitress, over, and asked her to take it into the office to Miles.

Tanya was a story by herself, a Philadelphia lesbian who'd been teaching elementary school in Delaware County and then fled to San Francisco after the Drug Enforcement Administration had popped her with a pound of pot a girlfriend had sent her from California. The pot had been sent to Tanya's school, which really raised federal hackles, so she took off and was now more or less a fugitive.

Tanya vanishes

I waited for about 15 minutes, but Tanya was still in the office and I had a lot of food that needed delivering to the tables. So I decided to go see what was up. Hell, I could meet Miles, too.

I was about halfway to the office when Tanya came zooming past me and right out the front door. I spent the rest of the night as my own waitress. Miles left through the back door.

I called Tanya later that night and she told me what had happened. She gave Miles my platter and he looked at it and dumped it in the wastebasket. Then he laid out four big rails of cocaine and gave Tanya a rolled up hundred-dollar bill and told her to snort two of them. Tanya had never had coke before, but this was Miles Davis, so she honked the lines up as best she could.

Bizz-bang-reverse, up into the cokasphere went Tanya. Miles just smiled. She just sat there for five minutes, while the coke elevator went all the way to the penthouse. Then Tanya picked up the phone and called her girlfriend.

"Guess who I'm snorting coke with?" she asked.

Before she got an answer, Miles put his hand up her skirt and left a gram of cocaine in her panties.

"I just want you to feel as good as I do," he rasped in that crushed larynx voice.

That's when Tanya took off out of the Keystone Corner like a scalded dog.

And that was the end of my evening with Miles Davis.♦


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