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(return
to part 1)
My daddy had made up his mind he wasn't gonna
farm anymore, but he didn't say nothin' to nobody. He wouldn't
get paid much, but over a period of time he come up with some
money. He went to Atlanta and found us a house. He came back
down and told Mr. Davidson, say, "I'm gonna settle up now."
Mr. Davidson say, "All right, Henry." So, he took out
a lotta papers to get this settlin' up thing together. Finally,
he say, "Henry, you didn't make no money this year but you
don't owe a dime."
My daddy, he was lookin' for them words anyway.
He'd heard 'em so many times.
But before we got away from Hampton, Mr. Davidson went all over
town wantin' to know if Henry Perryman owe anybody anything,
he was runnin' off. But papa wasn't runnin' off, he was just
tired of workin' for nothin'.
FATLANTA 1917
I had a brother named Rufus who was old enough
to work. Him and daddy found a job at a place called the Miracle
Machine Shop. Rufus was an albino, like myself, and couldn't
do nothin' but certain types of work because he was nearsighted
like me, but they had some work for him.
We'd been in Atlanta about a year when my
mama said, "I wish I could get a piano for all you kids.
Some way y'all might learn to play like your brother Rufus."
Rufus turned out to be Speckled Red. He was playin' the piano
when I was a little boy. Rufus learned to play on a church pump
pedal organ. He had left his job at the machine shop and was
playin' around house parties and Saturday-night fish fries. I
don't know whether they was payin' him or not. He had a place
to stay, and that's all that mattered to him. He'd be gone two,
three days. Sometimes we didn't see him for a week.
Mama said, "The first time somebody come
by here talkin' about a piano I'm gonna see if I can't buy one
for you kids." The man come through there one day, he tol'
her, says, "You only pay a dollar down and a dollar a week."
Mama cooked and washed and ironed for people and she got that
piano. The man tol' her, "If things get tough for you, pay
just fifty cents a week." Mama thanked him to the highest.
I never will forget that piano. It was a Gainesborough
upright, probably not a new one but it was a good 'un. That was
the greatest thing that ever happened. We had a piano in the
house.
Rufus decided he was gonna go up North. He
left Atlanta in 1921 for Detroit, and the next I heard of him
he had recorded "Dirty Dozen." He never did come back
until 1960. He wouldn't have come back then if I hadn't reached
him through the Musicians Union. They told him I was lookin'
for him and he called me that night. 'Course, Rufus always called
collect. A month from then he come down and stayed one month.
I had started ping-pongin' around on the piano,
just bangin'. Mama didn't care how much we banged on the piano.
It was perfectly all right. And I learned just a little bit every
time. Next thing you know, I'm beginnin' to learn different songs.
I started out playin' for a dollar at daytime
parties. I was still goin' to school. We'd get a three-room shotgun-style
house and take the furniture out of the livin' room, put it on
the back porch. There'd be just empty rooms and a piano. Slide
and dance. Play the blues and let 'em hug around each other and
drag across the floor. Too many people for fast numbers. Back
in them days the troubadour guitarists were popular in Atlanta:
Willie McTell, Barbecue Bob, Charlie Hicks, Buddy Moss, Curley
Weaver. They played street corners until someone invited them
inside. I played with 'em for nickels and dimes.
Went up on Peachtree Street, and that meant
I was gonna go play for white people. This was before integration.
Got an invitation from a white man in a bread truck. He told
people we had "a different atmosphere on 'em, a unique style
that nobody could copy." We played intermissions for a country
band. Made more money in 10 minutes than I had three or four
nights where I'd been playin'. Ten dollars. Ten was like a hundred
to me. That was some big money, believe me. It was then I knew
I was on my way to success.
(continue
to part 3)
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