Charlie Parker & Wallace Berman

Sunday, September 12, 2021

There are vital personalities that are tied to my father, the artist Wallace Berman. Charlie Parker, as a music figure, is number one in my dad's life. As a teenager, he saw Charlie Parker at various music clubs in South Central Los Angeles during the post-war years. As a zoot-suiting jazz lovin' swing dancer, he couldn't get enough of the Bird sound. His music and playing had a profound presence in Wallace's life. Oddly enough, Wallace rarely played old music from his youth on the turntable, but he would return to Parker again and again. The Bird's music was that extra charge he needed, and I believed his thoughts were not that far from thinking of Charlie Parker or his music.

 

My dad's first job (and still a teenageded, and I believed his thoughts were not that far from thinking of Charlie Parker or his music.er) as a professional artist was to do the album cover for Dial Records' anthology of the then-current jazz music. Specifically, be-bop, in which the Bird was the aural poet of its medium. Be-Bop Jazz came out in two 78 rpm volumes in 1948. One with a yellow background, and the other volume is a turquoise-colored background. My father and his friend Bob Alexander were actually in the studio when Parker recorded "Lover Man" on July 29, 1946. Not in the best spirit in body or mind, it seems according to Bob that the Bird went out of the studio, running down Sunset Boulevard. 

The strange occurrence that happened yesterday was when I met my friend Andrew at Tompkins Square Park. He offered to take us to Charlie Parker's residence on Avenue B. I'm one of those people who is deeply impressed with people's homes that I admire greatly. I get starstruck just knowing that someone of great importance went through the entranceway or exit. Although they are gone from the house, I still feel their presence was somewhere between the walls or in the actual rooms. A great soul like Charlie Parker would not physically disappear. There has to be some trace of this magnificent artist in his residence. I would be expecting not precisely a ghost-like existence but an inspiration of their genius somehow rubbing off the apartment's floor or structure. We took pictures of the plaque that announced that this was indeed Charlie Parker's residence from 1950 to 1954, the year of my birth. That, of course, I thought was very interesting.

We are in New York City because my late father is having an exhibition at TOTAH on the lower east side of Manhattan. The owner of TOTAH is David, and we share certain aspects, such as both of us were singular children in a home, and we share odd fears of vertigo. David invited my wife and me to his house for dinner later this week. Some time ago, he purchased a work by Wallace, and I know it's displayed prominently on his wall in the living room. He showed me photographs of the interior, and not only Wallace's work, but he has a very selective and well-tasted art in his home. At this time, I was very much looking forward to visiting his apartment, even though I didn't know where David lived at the time. 

As Andrew, Lun*na, and I were dishing about Charlie Parker at the front of his once-home, David shows up with his dog. I was surprised to run into David here in this neighborhood, and he told me he lives here. At first, I thought David meant he lives in the East Village. But no, he says he lives here, pointing to the Charlie Parker residence. What is the coincidence for such a chance meeting in front of Parker's home, which is also David's home? He invited us in, and there we saw Wallace's artwork displayed wonderfully in David's (and at one time, Charlie Parker's) home. It dawned on me suddenly that since Wallace loved Parker's music, what are the odds in that decades later, his artwork would be in the once-home of the great Charlie Parker? Then I thought how beautiful Wallace's art is now in the iconic jazz great musician's spiritual spot. This can't be a coincidence.