 Hello and welcome to the drum history podcast. I am your host Bart van der Zee and today I am joined by Brooks Tagler This is an episode all about Gene Krupa. Brooks, how are you man? Doing great. Doing great. Awesome. You too. Thank you for being here. I'm I'm excited to talk about Gene Krupa today because he has such a huge role in The evolution of the drum set and I think a lot of people know that but there's plenty of people who don't know about what his Impact is on what we have today. So Yeah, why don't we just start off by Picking it up at the beginning of Gene's life and I'll let you take it away. Well, I think you could probably find Much of Gene's early life is is I would say nearly impossible to learn Born in 1909 in Chicago One of the family that started out with nine children But nine children whose father had passed away very very Early on as far as their lives. So, you know, the The work ethic was very strong in that family including with Gene So, you know, he started His jobs he started his working career that's what would they call a chore boy At a music store where his older brother was working Which of course also, you know piqued his interest as far as playing a musical instrument and He jokingly says several times in interviews Drums were the cheapest thing in the catalog that he could order He didn't care what instrument it was as long as it was a musical instrument Of course, he was 11 years old the time so You know, yeah, I'm sure like many young drummers, you know, they they caught some picture of some Snazzy looking drum set in a catalog and absolutely had to have it. Well as far as how that drum set actually came to be his Even Gene's memory is not totally reliable because at points. He talks about his brother buying it for him At other points he talks about buying it himself, etc. He described it once as a, you know, a cheap Japanese drum set That was and the price and what he paid is also varied between 16 and 20 bucks Anyway, the point was those are the real beginnings Later on in school he learned to play saxophone which most people don't know but by that time in high school He was you know drums were going to take precedence over everything else including actually, you know Deferring to a request by his mother And I believe I've read I've read also a Catholic tradition that the youngest son Is expected or hoped to go into the priesthood Interesting they were they were a very very Catholic family And I think that was the idea was that at that point I don't know I think Jean at that one point they had he had a younger brother who I believe passed away again all sketchy You know because we're basically talking about a a period of Unrecorded history relying strictly on Jean's memory From 1909 until roughly 27. I mean you don't really start learning about Jean's past until he comes on to the music scene with the help of people like Dave tough and Eddie Condon Jimmy McPartlin folks like that So his early life. It's very sketchy as far as what we know But it's it's looking like he started drums at age 11 Correct that would be kind of his that's the year I started kind of moment Yeah, I think so. I mean he started emotionally. He started by seeing the drums in the catalog and working at the music store Probably Yeah, I think you could safely say that by 11 or 12 years old His decision had already been made about being a drummer. Cool Yeah, so Didn't we all yeah, exactly you see a drum set and you like you completely fall in love. It's funny that that goes That's just such a universal thing Yeah, absolutely. I mean I have the Heavy advantage of my father was also a drummer. So That was instilled in me, you know as long as I can remember So with Jean and with that period of history You know that was probably not considered a good idea by most people by society in general, especially where Jean wound up hanging out You know places like the tree deuces in Chicago were not what the You know most worried Catholic mothers were going to be accepting is where their son was hanging out Yeah, especially if they wanted to be a priest. That's basically the opposite of that And to his credit he gave it a good try and learned a lot about music because of one of his teachers father ill the fonts rap Who taught him a great deal about music and he always very quickly was very quick to credit rap With instilling a lot of a lot of his early sense of what was important about music So, you know, the the the short period he spent in seminary school was not wasted as far as later becoming a musician So, you know, we're and you know, we all benefit from that stuff as well. Yeah, absolutely all approach to music in general How he played the drums Jean is probably the most musical drummer you will hear Because, you know stylistically It was a matter of keeping what he played solo in in the context of where he was You know, you know Clearly important to Jean was to be a part of the conversation And not step away from the conversation and just stand there talking to yourself Which most drummers unfortunately either want to do our or are Even encouraged to do, you know, you notice what happens with extended drum solos. They're up there all by themselves Yeah, that's a good point So he's he's kind of bringing drums to the right in the mix versus everyone else can take a break And there's gonna be a little drum solo now While you guys go hang out. So it's mid song. It's kind of the new the new thing. He's bringing to the table and now I do believe that was something that was it was in mindset that excuse me whether it was rat or Who it was that that helped him to make that a massive underpinning of his whole approach to drums and they've been Dave tough Who knows because Dave tough was quite influential early on too It became essential You know understanding what jazz has always supposedly been about It's about a conversation If you were fell from the conversation, you're just talking to yourself If you're not Conversing in the same way that you would if you were talking then you're just talking over each other. Yeah, really and so, you know, he always tried to keep it contextual and You know, it was it was a structure that whatever if it was I got rhythm With or without the four bar tag Jean would be right there and you knew where he was musically you know and lyrically he liked that kind of Structure I guess you'd have to say Keeping it in context, you know, yeah And so this is kind of an early because Jean's obviously kind of a revolutionary guy So this would maybe be considered kind of his first contribution is that like not being separate but just really being a part of everything and just Kind of changing the sound of drums really at that point and what the role the drummer has has played in it Most definitely. I mean there are so many things that Jean should get credit for that. He does That being a really critical one The precedents that Jean said we're all his own People work very hard with trying to pin what Jean did on some other influence and What that has always done has basically You know minimized his real genuine personal contribution You know people who will just very quickly go over what Jean Jean was just doing his version of baby dots and and Judy Singleton, which was baloney Yeah, he and they would be the first ones to say this guy is an original You know match ropes once said that He was a he was not only a devotee of African-American music. He was a contributor That's quite a claim. Yeah, somebody like coach, you know, yeah, really. Wow, and The Jean's contribution was just nothing short of massive But he's also been the victim of a lot of eggheads and self-proclaimed Experts who will do whatever they can and have since the 40s To to diminish his importance Because of their own musical politics, you know, because of who they want to advance in that world of jazz But the funny thing is and I say this in my book He keeps coming back through He keeps, you know, I mean what the hell a diamond is a diamond regardless of how many blankets you put over Wow, that's a good point. Yeah, you can't hold him down Like it's just the cream keeps rising to the to the top Absolutely, and it's something that will continue to be discovered and rediscovered over and over again And I guess it's part of my mission to make sure that when things do get rediscovered they get rediscovered with the right information and Not the mythology because he's always been surrounded by a lot of idiotic rumor and mythology Because of some other, you know politics, whatever There's so much about this guy That people couldn't learn from if they actually knew what it was You know and innovations in drums innovations in playing whole outlook on life, etc. Etc You know, yeah, he'll just keep popping through all the time Well, so on that note, so where we kind of left off timeline was was in 1927 When he started to kind of to become the the drummer like a little bit more of a known drummer You want to just take it from there I think he's starting to get some some recognition as as being a prolific drummer of the time Well, he was getting recognition all through the the midst of late 20s excuse me primarily in Chicago and The earliest recordings of Gene are said to be 27 And that was with red McKinsey and Eddie Condon, etc That was the first time that people in places like other than Chicago started recognizing the value of this guy Really, that was the beginning of his professional career Gene wanted to work and he would take gigs You know whoever offered him gigs he would take them. He finally in Condon finally went to New York Because that was developing as the place to be Truth be told What he brought to New York as far as things like the drum set Was kind of new in New York drum sets in New York by guys like George Beebe and Chauncey Morehouse and all of those folks Were these elaborate show drum sets? Mm-hmm Here shows up gene group of with the most basic drum set you could imagine because he doesn't need all that extra junk and As he put it once he was You know in Chicago, they were jazz drummers and things were pretty raw He brought that mindset with him and clearly It worked there and people started noticing that they didn't need 4,000 temple blocks and 18 Tom Tom's and Most of the time it was just there just in case they needed it. Why not just get rid of it? So, you know, and you look at the early pictures of what are supposed to be Gene's drums He's working with now Halit's orchestra and in Atlantic City and steel pier And it is literally the absolute basic drum set snare drum bass drum sock cymbal hi-hat What do two cymbals mounted on the bass drum and that's all Something to sit on which in those days was a trap case and He didn't need anything else and and Halit's orchestra was a big orchestra So, you know, yeah, he brought he brought a certain wrongness to it That was common in Chicago kind of uncommon in New York Yeah, so he's the first person to bring that to the attention of the world because you see the earlier I mean before 27 literally at 27 was when that that kind of trap drummer went away where they needed all these little bells and whistles to fill in and You don't need that anymore. So it's talking about ahead of his time What whether he was the absolute first is up for debate. Yeah, but what he did and this is a lot of it was the fact that he became so popular Became so much in demand by band leaders and orchestra leaders even composers the reason is you know, he He did the job, but he did it with his own original flair and You know, it may have been that the There were people who had similar drum sets in Chicago, but Gene was the one who got recognized for it and Spread that information to a massive audience Which of course once he joined Benny Goodman Became worldwide audience not just local to Chicago, New York or Kansas City. It was all across the globe So he can be credited for bringing those Priorities to a much bigger audience So that's his big break. So joining Benny Goodman's band in 34 is that's when everything kind of that's the breakthrough moment there, right? No question about it. It didn't happen immediately at the end of 34 when he joined the band But within a year. Yes, it was It was quite an event and much of that because as we know the accident of Radio transcription broadcasting and the timing difference between East and West Coast Then he was building an audience on the West Coast. He didn't even know existed That included gene because as Benny often said gene worked harder than Benny did for that band And you know, he was an absolute workhorse of making that band work So, yeah by the time 35 rolls around The end of 35. Holy cow. These guys are like, you know, big stars Now just to clarify what do you mean by like the accident of the timing there like with the time zone differences? Like what what is that? The the let's dance broadcasts that were done in New York We're being heard three hours earlier in California and So that three hours earlier meant a much younger audience was awake So by the time they got to California, he had already built a following that he didn't even know was there Wow, okay. Yeah, that's awesome. Stuff like that happens all the time. Mommy Python was shocked In 1972 about the audience they had in the States. They had no idea But the fact that their records and their their television shows had already been broadcast over here When they went to do the Hollywood Bowl in California, it was the place was sold out. They didn't mix them So same idea But by the time they started adding back east At the end of 35 It wasn't all easy going frankly. I mean they still had to make that trip back There were still venue managers and owners who were highly skeptical of this band Uh, because the band was not doing what they really wanted them to do necessarily But by that time it was too late and all of a sudden the same people that would be skeptical about hiring the Benny Goodman Orchestra one year Just would fall all over themselves to get the band back And you know, there are plenty of people whose careers You know stood or fell On whether they made the decision to hire Goodman or not And early on a few of them fell So And gene was a massive contributor to that No one had ever seen or heard a drummer play like gene So it was a big deal which of course works Worked towards gene eventually of course starting his own band several years later, but Well, and it's it's it's noted that and I mean this is probably relatively common knowledge, but uh, that the uh, The tom tom interlude on sing sing sing Was kind of a big deal. Um, and obviously I'm not as familiar with this generation of music from the 30s But I've heard that song and I didn't realize that that was such a groundbreaking moment Well, it was it uh, frankly it was sing sing sing didn't actually come around until 37 What gene was doing was playing drums that most drummers didn't even pay any attention to A lot of that also had to do with gene's innovations as far as the equipment. Yeah And he turned tomtoms from a novelty into a musical instrument And of course he was doing that all through his time with benny and probably probably before but The time with benny like the like everything else success brings with it further recognition further attention And there were millions and millions of people all around the world who were all of a sudden hearing these things The gene was creating himself and a lot of that had to do with his study of african drum recordings Because he'd been He'd been hit to those early on before he actually started playing with benny They were as old as cylinder recordings. They weren't even disc recordings They were Mostly a lot tootsie tribe. They were just recordings, you know, like you'd see with folk ways doing Recordings of some blues guy in mississippi. These were just, you know scientific musical studies more than anything else but he just immediately Glommed on to these things and pulled from them whatever he possibly could That became the foundation for something that was strictly Gene's period which was what to do with with store toms and mounted town toms and how to make music with You know, and yeah, he he owned that stuff and did until the day he died Uh, the unfortunate thing frankly was that sing sing sing Uh as beautiful as it was There was so much more that gene was doing That was completely eclipsed by that thing But gene us his heart he played that tune until the day he died almost literally And he played it with the same energy and same love that he did the first time you heard him play Well, that's like the old, uh, you know, you get the band who has their one big song and they have to play it at every show And if you know, what do you what do you do? That's why people are there To see it right. Yeah And he was gene if nothing else gene was a pro And he understood it, you know, he understood why people came to hear him He understood that early on. I mean that was one of the impetus for him to start his own band in in 1938 I mean truth be told he actually started that process at the end of 37 He was actually rehearsing a new band before leaving benny Yeah, so so picking it up there then he's he's done with benny 37 38. He's out on his own There's a lot of substantial stuff that took place in that period between 35 and 38 As far as the equipment innovations in the equipment Gene style being Solidified and streamlined and the drum set itself as what was referred to as a trap set Um that being Made essentially the standard And you look at buddy riches drum set in when he was with tommy dorsi and already Shaw and it's identical to gene Um, so yeah a lot of stuff happened in the drumming world in the jazz drumming world because in those days It was still jazz. Yeah, it made danceable, but it was still jazz. So Many things happening gene was making a lot of stuff happen Sometimes on purpose sometimes the accident same with cymbal Gene was responsible for a very close relationship and a deep friendship with avidist zilgin pronounced avidist not avidist and he Did an awful lot to help zilgin do what zilgin wanted to do which was to find out directly from the drummers What they needed what they wanted And gene's suggestion about possibly going away from the You know centuries old tradition of making these thick clangy cymbal and start making them thinner and smaller and even bigger at time So yeah, a lot of that was gene too. So much was going on By the time he had his debut with his own big band in april of 1938 Uh by that time he'd been pretty much, you know, solidly established as the guy the drummer that everybody wanted to go here or see And of course he established slingerland drums As the company, you know as the one to to use And you know that they sold thousands and thousands of drum sets just because of gene Yeah, and he was on most Covers of their catalog correct up until like the the 60s. Isn't that right? It was on every catalog cover from the 1936 37 catalogs Which has oftentimes been erroneously just referred to as the 36 catalog. It really wasn't Most of the slinger catalogs of that period were actually not published until the end of the copyright year Because you know, you look at the cover of the classic 36 slingerland catalog with gene on the front Sitting behind the brand new set of radio cane drums. Those pictures weren't even taken until august of 36 So it's really the 36 37 catalog He was on that edition and everyone all the way up until the 67 68 edition And even that photograph 10 years older than the catalog. Wow. So they're using back backlog photos Well, they had to because by 67 68 gene actually retired first in 68 He was feeling terrible He looked bad. Yeah, and I guess Figure the best thing to do would be to put an older shot on there For that catalog cover and probably in deference to him So So, yeah, you're looking at a catalog picture that's covered picture. That's actually 10 years older than the catalog itself Well, that's interesting. I didn't know that but uh, all right. So rewinding here So he's then at this point establishing slingerland. He's helping revolutionize zilgen symbols by making them thinner working directly with avidis to get what actually what drummers want versus what Uh, they'd been, you know, the turkish style of creating symbols from obviously from hundreds of years before Um, so now we are up to about the is this the early 40s Yeah, I think probably the greatest band that gene put together Um, although they were all great another thing that unfortunately critics seem to Minimize the importance of all of gene's band But they all were innovative. They were all interesting Probably the most successful commercially Was the band that had been built up since until 19, you know at 1941 Because that's when the inclusion of both Roy Eldridge and Anita O'Day solidified the band as a big hit band And you know, it was sort of typically one big hit after another It was also important the relationship that gene had with Benny which stayed As a good friendship their entire lives That developed first in 1935 36 with Benny putting together a trio Which included teddy wilson one piano um a black musician And unfortunately even in those days he could not say that teddy wilson was a regular member of the band Wow, you always had you had to Showcase wilson as a feature artist Uh, and then of course later in 36 limo hanton shows up. Yeah That whole thing Carried over deeply as far as gene was concerned And he literally had to fight and argue And ultimately insist That the Roy Eldridge would be a regular member of the band Not a featured artist even though of course he was featured all the time One of my favorite pictures is a beautiful shot backstage of gene and roy had in the midst of a handshake That is just wonderful in 1943 and unfortunately it was right before gene got busted, but yeah We'll get there. They were So gene did so much Without even realizing it for that whole situation And so yeah 41 from 41 until 43 That was a top flight band full of top flight equipment Slingerland radio kings were all over that bandstand every night And slingerland and zilgin were firmly behind gene with whatever you wanted to do And that's why of course the the band fronts that they used from the beginnings in 38 All the way until uh The break in 43 there were little 6 by 10 radio king tomtoms mounted on every music stand in the band And they played them. Wow. Yeah, that's that's a cool image to see Then they're great little drums. I own two of them. Wow damn So in in 41 Now because gene is also in movies at like he is just He is everywhere. He is a international Star, how did that happen? In clearly hollywood at that point One of the sell movies They also realized that musicians hugely popular musicians because of the music industry Could make them they could sell a lot of movie tickets And that had been going on since benny's first film which was called the big broadcast of 1937 Was actually filmed in 1936 And these are young guys. I mean you think about how old gene and benny were in 1936. They were the same age Um, and here these are guys were you know national film stars all of a sudden Yeah At that every year 36 37 Then he did a film the second one in 37. It was hollywood hotel. You know A film was going to be seen by many many millions of people over a course of time That further solidified gene's worldwide reputation Uh, and so of course in 38 When when hollywood saw that they had the opportunity to even double their profits by By having gene as a band leader in a film That's when the movie some like it hot appeared And that was actually recorded early in 38 I mean sorry late in 38 early in 39 So it was yeah gene was a film star. He was good-looking, of course, you know Interesting to watch etc etc Uh gene's only complaint was the only wish he could act But he didn't really have to all he had to do is just be himself. Yeah, so yeah doing feature length films From you know his time beginning with benny and straight on true 41 was uh ball of fire with barbie stanwick, you know, we all know the list of the films that gene appeared in. Yeah. Yeah That's awesome. It's just it it's funny because he's he's just everywhere I mean he was a sensation and you don't I mean this this period you don't really see many other I mean obviously buddy rich and john bonham and these guys who were like kind of like The household names of drummers, but you still you just don't really see Movie star drummers besides this this period as far as I know There were a few jackie cooper was a tremendous drummer Absolutely idolized gene And managed to get Drumming into film more often than not freda stare was a tremendous drummer. So has been crossy Uh freda stare has at least two films where he's you know dancing with drums One of my favorite buddy quotes is he doesn't play the drums. He dances them, but he was a tremendous dancer So yeah, the the two were deeply intertwined film and music all the time in those days And you know that started to separate by the late 40s in the end of world war two But for that period of time Uh if you were really successful that means you were working at least once a year in hollywood doing a film Uh, and you know clearly both gene benny a lot other people were yeah, I mean we're talking about a jack of all trades Yeah, absolutely, but again, they were much in demand by the industry All they had to do was answer the phone You know, yeah, and then play themselves basically just be themselves on camera and play the drums and Exactly, you're right. I mean 42 film that gene was in syncopation He's always going to be going by his own name Yeah And yeah, he was quite busy and of course that that again itself did a lot of Musical across pollination because all of a sudden these guys were going back and forth across the country And playing with musicians in california And then all of a sudden they're playing with musicians in you know, you name it the Omaha, Nebraska on their way back through But in those days they had long standing gigs When when benny's band finished their stint in california And had finished filming the big broadcast in 36. They went directly to chicago And wound up having an overextended stay in chicago that lasted six months. Oh my gosh. Wow Yeah, I mean those were the days all I could reminisce about is being able to keep my drums set up for two days fried, you know a friday night and a saturday night these guys And it was that was particularly great because it was in benny and gene's hometown of chicago So yeah, they were busy and very much in demand and they all had big agents and You know, it was all It was all a big deal and they were all there, you know miller Charlie Barnett and all these cats are, you know, just riding that wave Beautifully and pumping out some truly marvelous music Now is he married at this point or uh, still a single young single guy? Well, remember this was it's this was a straight ahead young catholic guy And he and condon moved from chicago to new york and stayed in those days You could actually rent the hotel room as your apartment And they rented a room shared a room and gene would talk to the switchboard operator every morning Who was a girl named ethyl maguire? He wound up marrying her before he joined benny's band Because he was so much in demand. He was making good money And he thought okay, it's time for ethyl and i to get married So they did they were married in 34 and they stayed married until a divorce in Uh, whatever that was 42 So they were married for eight years and then divorced and then married each other again Wow in 46 and were together and until she passed away in 55 Gosh and she was a switchboard operator. So he just met her by Talking to the operator. Oh my god Ha ha. Yeah Um So and she was also from new england interestingly enough both of gene's wives were from new england And I never realized this until later, but the one of gene's biggest hits was a tune called massachusetts And I never made that connection in the past but a lot of genes Influences were in places like boston Jill gin was in massachusetts. Yep, both of the wives a lot of his life Um Because of course he was all over the country Um, so yeah, um In he and that's all we're married. He was already a married guy Okay, that's to the billions of young teenage girls. Yeah, but that's good to know It kind of paints the picture of kind of what uh, because now everything feels a little different for a 25 year old 26 year old guy and but so he's a you know young catholic guy married Um, so now I guess we're up to as we said before that kind of 1943 period where gene got in a little bit of trouble He got in a little bit of trouble without actually doing anything wrong This was you know, this was again in the days when the the g men Were out to set examples gene unfortunately became a scapegoat for the you know the the feds To make some statement about drug use Uh, and he got hit with it because What gene physically did naturally? Many interpreted as him just being influenced by drugs. He had to have been a drug addict, which of course absolutely false And basically yeah, he was framed he was set up And bless his heart Uh, he you know, perhaps if he'd gotten a different lawyer than a guy named earlick Things may have been different but earlick decided he needed to make some kind of plea bargain Which ultimately wound gene up in jail not prison as many wrongly have said Gene went into the local san francisco jail And spent three months in there for something he never did Well, let's so what's the let's give give the listeners. So what is the like, you know the the brief like what's the story? Like what actually happened? Well, basically what happened was that first of all Credit where credits do guy named denis brown is a marvelous marvelous Treatise on this whole thing. He did incredible research Gene was basically set up His band boy had been drafted His band boy wanted to give gene something Uh as a gift as a token of his esteem, etc And that wound up being a few joints Which gene, you know, thank him for gene did not smoke plot gene was not a user But he thanked the guy it was, you know, he was uh, he thought it was a nice gesture never gave it a thought put them in his His bathrobe is dressing gown And you know there they sat. Well, the fact is the whole thing had been set up And it was a guy named john potato's Who was in on the deal and the feds sent him To go and you know gene and said holy cow somebody warned them They you know the guys in the band knew when the narcs were around And they but he said gene the narcs are here tonight Uh, you know just so you're warned and he sent john potato's his new band boy Back to the dressing room to take those things out told him to flush him down the toilet Of course that was not going to happen because potato's was in on the deal Put them in his pocket. There was this, you know Fabricated nonsense that the feds nabbed him on the way out Asked him where he got the stuff and he said mr. Krupa And you know the rest is history. He was framed Uh on he never actually was was charged with possession. That's the interesting thing They had to go for something more substantial than that So they went after the contributing to the delinquency of a minor charge And that was first the local charge in san francisco and then was was exploded into a federal charge So he then had two trials to deal with There were two charges literally against and he had to deal with each one separately He spent three months in jail for the first one And you know was told come back for the hearings and the trials that were going to go on to the federal charge of the same thing And at that point it took a year For the guy to feel guilty enough john potatoes To come back and recant his entire testimony God By that time gene's career had almost been destroyed Um, he went back home. He went back east and just laid low Wow, it really is hard, you know the embarrassment the frustration You know that he probably was thinking about things like what would his mother have thought had she still been alive, etc It was a massive blow to gene personally Uh, he also attributes the whole experience ultimately towards helping him Uh for the rest of his career, but it never did Every time the issue of drugs came up Anything around the ban You know he went and had to go relive the whole thing Um over and over again all the way into the even the the late 50s Um or early 50s, I should say so. Yeah, the whole thing was a horrible thing that he you know he suffered from it, but Not so you'd ever know and you know Two of his dear friends, namely Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey were determined to bring this guy back and knew they could But it took a lot of convincing by both of them Uh, because you know, you can imagine how gun shy gene was at that point to sit in front of an audience These are the people who immediately turned on him When the headlines started showing up Yeah, I mean people people like to see the biggest celebrities fall I mean, that's like god talk about something that is extremely relevant today. People love to see the you know Just yeah, yeah, I can't This very sick desire to see other people fail because it makes me feel good um and unfortunately It was even worse back then. I mean, this is a period when they had films like reefer madness, you know And you know, there was such such an ignorance about that stuff So gene paid And continued to occasionally pay through the rest of his entire career But he did it with integrity You know, I mean, this was a guy who was being hit from all sides professionally personally Uh, you know critics were were all too quick to trash him and you know, especially in the late 40s early 50s And gene's response once was well, even critics have to eat You know, that's that's the kind of guy he was just to like take the high road kind of guy and that's I mean Just a true gentleman is is just what it keeps kind of popping up in my head is just not just such a good guy Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, you know gene, of course, he was not a saint. He was not an angel He made his his share of bad choices you know, uh inaccurate stupid decisions I mean, basically the reason that he an ethyl split up was because of you know, you can imagine what it was like for her to be at home And and look at the the newspapers and the trading magazines and see pictures of gene on the cover of downbeat Having some intimate conversation with dinosaur. Yeah, you know That's gonna take its toll on any marriage after a while And you know, as gene said in those days, he he was a big shot. He thought of himself as a big shot, you know Traveled with multiple steamer trunks full of clothing and you know, blah, blah, blah It it went ahead. I mean, you know, he later on he realized that had he done things differently Everything might have been different He was a high profile figure. So And the irony is that you know who bailed him out Oh Fine got him out of jail was his ex-wife ethyl. Hmm. Wow. They Do a cash settlement when they divorced She's put that in the bank and when he had when there was, you know Bail money involved. That's where it came from So yeah, well, she clearly knew that he was a good guy and he didn't you know, he's got his issues, but he's not buying weed off of miners and Doing that kind of stuff. So that's You read if if anybody wants to learn about gene group of the man Read a beautifully written piece by one of his piano players bobby scott Um Guy it's called the world is not enough. It is such an in-depth Treatise on who gene was as a guy I have to read that And it will remind you of people that you've learned of later in life Guy with just impeccable integrity Straight up guy, you know, it's it's a wonderful article. It's probably the best thing ever written written about gene ever Um Well, that's great. I'll try to share that on my uh, share a link to it when I when I uh post this If I can if I can find it if you have a link and you can send it to me. I'll I'll share it, but um I do and I can certainly send it when we're done, but Perfect It's it's worth reading because it's a real window into who gene actually was And not all the baloney not all the hype not all the nonsense gene was not a drug addict Uh, as much as people in 1943 wanted to believe he was he was Uh gene likes to drink he likes scotch But you know, no he was not a drug user at all Gotcha. Yeah all right, so After that after all the stuff that happened with the scandal Gene's down for a while and then he was you were saying he kind of he starts to make a comeback through his friends, right? Well, basically benny said, you know, come on up to connecticut and bed benny's house Come on up and just play some And you know, eventually he talked gene into doing that it felt good But it was you know, it was not playing in front of an audience. It was just playing music which gene frankly was meant to do It felt good benny said, how about we book some dates where you play in the band and you can imagine gene was really really nervous about that Well, the point is he was instantly accepted people had stuck with him Drew out and were right there when he needed them And so he played with benny for several months in 43 But when benny decided he had you know, he had a he was booked on a west coast trip Well, that was a country that was a part of the country that gene had no interest in going back to So at that point tommy dorsi stepped in and said away, you know Dave not Dave, but he's been drafted He has to go off to be in the marines. How about you play with my band? Well, the fact is it wasn't even quite that casual in tommy's mind Dorsi's idea was that he was going to make damn sure that gene got back up on that precipice that he had been on before And you know, I write in the book a lot of the details Of what went into this determination that dorsi had And it made a huge difference so yeah, I mean he was He was back on the scene He was back in the saddle and he felt great. So at that point When that stint was over, he said, okay, it's time to put together a new band, which he did Unfortunately the first idea didn't really fly very well But the band was great. The musicians were great But the fans just were not interested in seeing gene krupa's orchestra with a string section So that didn't last very long, but it didn't take more than a year For the band to re-establish itself as being important People came back came and went Anita was back for a little while Roy came back for a little while Roy actually took over leadership of the band in 43 when gene had to go And tried to keep the band together, but it just didn't work. Yeah, it's missing its key. It's like it's missing the uh The kind of wow factor I guess at that point Well true and also the fact that Then you so all of a sudden were you know highly skittish about you know what we do about hiring this gene krupa band So, you know, the business was was going to determine what happened You know regardless of what cats like Roy and Ray beyond they wanted to do You know, it was really going to boil down to who was going to hire them So the band just kind of fell apart for a while when gene came back together 44 45 And came back roren. I mean he came back with all kinds of you know new things playing timpani um And of course in those days all of these band leaders were obliged to play shows in all the big theaters So, you know, most people don't realize that you know the band playing a theater like the Paramount Involved them also backing up any number of horrible other acts Dancers animal acts you name it they had to do all that too. Wow. Yeah, you gotta you gotta work Right, but by the time that world war two was ending The whole concept of what jazz was about was changing And thanks to benny goodman's work in 1938 at carney hall Jazz had been hugely legitimized by that time. So you could literally go somewhere and then and draw an entire audience Who were interested in dancing and listening to the music and paying attention Something you don't see anymore And that was it and you didn't have to have you know ball twirling steels and you know, so I'll get yeah So by the time he he put that band together in 44 45 It was a huge operation. Of course. Guess what happened? He goes right back to hollywood and films in george white scandals And so, you know, he's back in the saddle in every way. He's doing film. He's doing concert tours the The booking office is busy busy It stayed that way from that point All the way up until he finally gave up in 51 But much going on of course during that period Slingerland had you know, because of their Because of the war production boards edict l 37 Uh had to change all of their rules as far as what they could actually sell what they could build And it wasn't really until 48 49 The gene shows up with new Style equipment from slingerland. That's a big deal. Everybody's got to go out and get You know the latest slinger and set with the new 561 beaver tail lug casings Yeah, yeah, he's he's there. He's their showman. That's for sure Clearly he was their greatest salesman ever Nobody matched even buddy knew that you know Buddy knew that he was never going to be a slingerland endorser In anything other than the second position as long as team with it So yeah, I mean everything started to kick back into a high gear in the mid 40s and stayed that way Until uh the whole industry decided to just throw these guys in the trash can And go for a different kind of music that they could sell to a younger audience Um, you know, all of those all those people who were not old enough To go into world war two not quite You know by the time 1950 rolled around You know, these were the record buying public. So, you know, okay, let's dump all these these big lumbering dance bands and all of this introspective boring jazz stuff And you know and go for Elvis Presley and And doo-wop bands and keep it small and you know, et cetera, et cetera So Everything was gene was also still getting hit With this stuff about drugs You know cops would approach a side man a couple of side men and gene fans And they'd get busted for heroin and they'd ask Where'd you get this stuff and these guys would say mr. Krupa. Oh my god I mean it plagued him his entire life To the point where he in this, you know Towards the end of his life He was actually doing lecture tours about why it's not a good idea to use that stuff So even then the guy had a backbone to say, okay, I'm going to try to turn this into something positive So and he did a lot of that part of the issue I think with gene and ethyl was the fact that it was determined that gene could not father children But then gene loved kids. He loved kids So him being able to stand up there and talk to guys talk to kids About, you know, warning them about things they probably shouldn't get involved with I think was partially cathartic for him, you know, he could be a father without actually being a father Yeah, and trying to clear his his rap a little bit and Be positive Yeah, and he in his second wife had he did adopt two children Um and as far as I know I'm still learning about this but as far as I know his adopted son Michael Who also was gene jr It's still alive And probably my age by this time, I guess 50s. Um, maybe Uh was also severely severely handicapped um and so Gene adopted kids with patty Even that turned into a disaster. I I'm sorry to say because for whatever reason They split up Married in 54 and 68. She took the kids. Wow So he was in visitation for that Again, a reference to bobby scott's piece Gene talked to him about that, you know at times the the frustration that this happened So Gene was you know Frustrated his whole life by certain things that were just unchangeable And not being able to father children was a big one Yeah, what a poor guy, you know, he's he's on top of the world, but like everyone has An issue even if you're the biggest drummer in the world. There's everyone's got something going on, you know You bet you bet and he had a lot for all of the beautiful stuff that happened with gene's life He was just not going to talk about it. You know, he was not going to whine about it to some Some magazine article. He was just going to keep things up And you know again, you'll never read anybody Say anything bad about gene Because that's the way he wanted it, you know, um always differential self-deprecating polite respectful Even to young idiot musicians, you know Even to these guys who thought they knew everything uh, you know birds hugely to a new generation of guys like red rodney and jerry mulligan musically And gave them a platform to do what they did to establish their foothold um, and Those guys to a man Had nothing but beautiful things to say about the old man namely gene He's a role model. I mean, that's uh, I think the key of everything is he just became a role model for everyone And can still be a role model for people. Um, just how to act and yeah Essential that he you know that people get that lesson too, but they've got to know about it You know, there have been a few books done about gene That really, you know, frankly A couple of them were really just sort of Picture book compilations that really don't get into gene biography at all Uh, the first one was, you know, somewhat more biographical, but pretty much all the same stuff that we've all heard Um, the definitive gene group of biography has never frankly been done In my opinion never can because gene was a pretty private guy So and all of the people that would know are dead You know researching a definitive biography about gene krupa is going to be near impossible Yeah, because all of them I mean, obviously, you know a ton and you are putting together a book But what you can't figure out what's impossible to know like about him when he was a kid and all this stuff, but Um, yeah, just as far as basic research Uh, the things about who gene was as a human being were just not really in print They were not done until much later that the scott article being a huge one Everything else was Anecdotal everything else was Word of mouth it was here say it was not provable stuff Even gene memory was not completely reliable. But the fact is he kept to himself He dearly loved the house that he designed and built in yonkers in 1940 Love that house he loved that house to the extent that the address was the what was Engraved on the bracelet that he wore on his left wrist his whole career Numbers Drive Yeah, that house meant everything to him. How about the tragedy of his last year of life? The house catches on fire and nearly is completely right. God, you know Right So, yeah As far as being a role model absolutely Absolutely and you look at what he did with guys like when he was on all of the tours of jazz the philharmonic Those guys loved gene. They you know, he was a He was just a great person and people need to know that, you know In my opinion, so I my book is the primary focus of my book is really on his equipment But there's plenty of biographical observations in there as well There have to be because the two are so intertwined Yeah, I mean he is his he and his equipment are both extremely revolutionary and important Well, and I think you're helping to bring bring this all All to to a new generation and I think that's what the whole goal of this podcast is but um Why don't we take it real quick before kind of wrapping up? Let's just run through the last kind of remaining years of gene's life like what happened I know you said his house burned down And I know it didn't fully burn down he he lived in it in the parts that he could but um Yeah, so how did how did the end of his his his life? What did that look like? Well, the actually the fire occurred in the last year of his life anyway early in the spring april or march It's been credited to april eight and you're right. It was not the house is not destroyed by any me It was just a portion of the house. It was quickly rebuilt And sold and the same family that bought it from the estate now still live in it But that period from 51 when he shut down the big band Started playing strictly with small groups including his own trio and quartets Started traveling much much more overseas than he ever had as a band leader He was the first jazz group as a band leader To bring jazz to the shores of japan in 1952 Um He took his jazz trio petty napoli and charlie ventura over to japan They were the first americans over there playing jazz in 1952 since the end of world war two Well, I didn't know that he He already had a huge following when he got there um of the young japanese hip cats Um, so he there was much of that international travel jatp jazz the philharmonic tours all over the world sweden england europe you name it south america um In in my opinion and that's only what it is my opinion He was doing much more at that point of what he truly loved doing That he had been up to that point Um, he was a star he could Bring a massive audience in any auditorium to their feet By playing a 16 bar drum solo Um, so I believe that was probably The last high point of gene's life was between between probably 53 And 1962 or three Um He was really going strong as a jazz musician Not as a personality, but as a player. Yeah Now that was critically important to gene. He never forgot his roots were in jazz not in showbiz So, you know, that was a great period of time for him. Yeah back to doing all what he loves Absolutely and doing it with people that he loved You know the fact that he could go from doing a concert with eddie condon at town hall in 44 45 And then wind up, you know only a few years later on the same stage as oscar peters and herb ellison ray brown With the same effect Yeah, he was he was much more deeply Into what in my opinion he was all about which was to be a jazz drummer to be a creative voice In any conversation and to do it beautifully, you know and with style Um time next was putting on television jazz shows other tv stations were doing so he was riding pretty high And then the next thing that started slowing him down was his own health Um, he had been uh, he was a lifelong smoker Um, and of course because of that He was starting to have complications with breathing and stamina and Etc. Etc. And you know, of course had emphysema and later on You know the other health issues developed He had a heart attack in 1960 He as he by his own admission by 1967 68 He felt like crap and he thought he was playing that way So he he officially retired Wow He came back out of retirement in 1970 because of course he had to play So but you know 1970 to 73 he played from 70 until the day almost the day he died So, you know, I mean this guy was absolutely Through the core a jazz musician And you know, he was getting blood transfusions on the way to concerts Benny Goodman quartet reunion concerts You know, yeah a drummer through and through. I mean my god, I didn't know he was getting the blood transfusions and stuff. I mean, yeah I mean the classic sad bitter sweet story is The third to the last performance that he did with Benny Lionel Petty and they had added slam steward on bass was at Carnegie Hall in uh, 1973 And it was the third to last reunion of the quartet By the time that concert was over Jean was so exhausted. He literally could not get up And you see a picture of Benny standing behind him With all of these people on stage just you know showing their absolute love and devotion for this guy and you can see he's so frail That he literally was too weak to stand up So he sat there and then he stood right behind him And you know, which I think it's just a beautiful picture. Yeah, it's symbolic of just how much people care about him and how much What an impact he had on everyone. Um God, well What an amazing life and I mean just the influence he has today I think people can now hopefully take this And realize a little bit more about the the impact on everything from tunable toms to thinner cymbals to a smaller drum set to Everything it's just unbelievable. Um In only hope Yeah, well brooks now is a good time for you to tell people now that we've gone through the whole history of gene's life Where they can find you and I know you're working on a book if you want to talk about that real quick before we wrap up here Well, oddly enough that my life parallels genes in quite a few different ways Um, and so I'm not working as much as I used to Uh, I've I've maintained a regular sunday gig here in the washington area of the place called the irish anticle and echo it This is will I'm going on I think 30 years of running that gig nice And still collecting slingerland drums still restoring still rebuilding them Just not as many because they're much more expensive now than what he's Yeah And the book i'm still working on i'm uh just Just about up to 300 pages And there's still so much more to add But it's been referred to by a number of people including mark cooper as a pretty dense book There's there's a lot of data in there But you know my my examples for that kind of approach were Uh guys like the great john hancock who wrote the definitive book on the goodman carney all concert Anybody who wants to read about that concert or wants to know about it has to have that book It's really it's really one that being more of a textbook than anything else Because I get into nuts and bolts all the way through it Because it's never been done. I feel it's a book that needs to be written. Absolutely have felt Fine And i'm really hoping if I ever find a publisher who's interested or figure out how to publish it myself Um That it will be The books that people will open when they have a question about a particular drum or a particular set Because truth be told there is still a lot of gene stuff out there Um, you know, it's hard to find sometimes but It's there and the history it's all based on photographs. It's you know, I'm I will Honestly say if it's something that I'm guessing at But pictures can tell so much and there's a lot of data just in the photographs from the very beginning My biggest frustration, of course, is there are very few photographs of everything prior to the 1934 Um, because you know, nobody thought we got to take pictures of gene krupa's drums here Yeah Yeah, he wasn't the superstar before then so why you know, that's a good point Well, I think it's important to get the right information out there. So that's kind of you know, the impetus of the book is Based on years and years of hearing people talk about the wrong stuff So, you know, if nothing else at least they'll know now And I've made some wonderful discoveries along the way about slingerland About their history about gene, etc. So it's been a wonderful trip all the way through Um, being a slingerland radio king collector I have a bit of an edge because I've had my hands on this stuff. I've built it. I've worked on it. I've fixed it So, you know, that makes a difference too, but yeah, well, you are the guy and you have come extremely Highly recommended from multiple different people. So, um On that note, I'll share your information. Um, in the bio for this episode and people can find you I found you on facebook just through friending and then we um, Obviously started talking and uh, and here we are today. So Brooks, I mean, I can't tell you how awesome it has been to hear all of this I've never heard or read a more complete, um History of gene's life. So I think I think that's a good place to wrap it up Well, I greatly appreciate the opportunity to do that, you know, I mean, I'm glad that you're doing what you're doing I appreciate it because It's gonna get to a lot more people And in my opinion, you know, it's gonna get to a lot of people who really Need it and appreciate it because of where they are in their lives right now You know, uh A lot of us now are looking back at my age It's beautiful to have something like your podcast for people who are still looking forward And you know, so hopefully someday And they all of the, you know, all of this important information will be common knowledge, but right now It isn't, you know, I mean, yes, the name gene krupa and the word drums are absolutely synonymous. Yeah Vice versa interestingly enough I can think of one other person in music that gets that credit And when you say trumpet people say louis armstrong exactly. Yeah, that's a good call And there are so many parallels between louis and gene that I've come up with Um, you know The level of his importance is Just beyond belief in my opinion. I think pioneer pioneer is a good word. Um to describe him. So Absolutely, I agree totally agree. So yeah, and thank goodness for your things like your podcast going on Because it would all just be relegated to some book on the shelf somewhere otherwise Well, hey, and I mean nowadays you want to listen to it And I am obviously in that in that world of I love to listen to things and get knowledge It's all it's it's all learning, which I think is great. So, um, Well, Brooks, I really appreciate you being on the show, man I think uh, if when the book gets done, let me know and I'll share it with our listeners and we'll, um We'll get it get them the link and find out a way for them to buy it from you Okay, well, I appreciate it. I thank you for the opportunity All right, thanks Brooks All right, bye-bye If you like this podcast find me on social media at drum history And please share rate and leave a review and let me know topics that you would like to learn about in the future Until next time keep on learning This is a Gwyn sound podcast