August 2, 2015…I have been lucky enough to have met a lot of the great thinkers and movers of the 20th century..Just out of an insatiable curiosity and the luck of just being there. I met Fidel Castro twice..got to have a good conversation with Muhammad Ali. worked for and got a chance to talk with Malcolm X .. twice got to talk with Yasser Arafat..Known Bobby Seale, worked for Shirley Chisholm and once met astronaut
Scott Carpenter..there are a lot more. But only twice in my life have I been so “star struck” as to be completely unable to even express myself. Once was when I was a journalist covering a Jazz festival and B.B. King introduced me to about a dozen of the greatest musicians of all time …The other time was in 1986.when I was working at the old artist hangout and great “dive” bar “Bacchanal” in Philadelphia ..My Band “Philly Gumbo” played there every Saturday night but twice a week I worked there as the Doorman..One day I walked in and sitting in a corner was James Baldwin himself sitting with “Beat Poet” Allen Ginsberg ..Baldwin had been in Philly all that week and had been to the club a couple of times..Loved the fact that he was able to blend in with the crowd two nights earlier when my band was playing to the usual packed house and nobody bothered him…Baldwin was there that night for a Poetry reading..seemed to enjoy himself..and even with my stumbling over my words ..he was just plain folks.And actually listened..was impressed that I was able to ..”decompress” From my former life as a political radical. And we talked about having both been in Selma in 1965…I still keep the glass Baldwin drank from in a book case in my house …For my money Baldwin is only equaled by Mark Twain as the greatest American writer of all time. James Arthur Baldwin was born this day August 2, 1924 and passed away on December 1, 1987..We are still learning from Baldwin ..both in race relations and matters of sexual preference..This film in the link at the end of this commentary is an excerpt from a Debate between Baldwin and William F. Buckley.. younger readers may want to
goggle the old fascist intellectual Buckley as he has been rotting in Hell for some time..if you have never heard Baldwin speak ..in that wonderful voice you are in for a treat..Happy Birthday James Baldwin.click on this link for the film….https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbkObXxSUus
Follow
