Let Love Rule - Lenny Kravitz Page 0,33

so well, he’d been bitten by the showbiz bug. He kept his day job but used his contacts to try to make his own mark. And he saw an opening in pop R&B, where singers like Phyllis Hyman and Angela Bofill were having hits. Soon Dad discovered a good vocalist, Phyliss Bailey, an attractive boom operator on The Jeffersons, whom he was sure he could make a star.

Dad had taste. After finding a dozen good tunes, he hired the best sidemen in the city; the best arranger, Barry White’s main man, Gene Page; and two great producers, Charlie Colello, who’d worked with Sinatra and Springsteen, and Leslie Drayton, Marvin Gaye’s musical director. Dad paid for Phyliss to do a series of showcases at Tom Rolla’s Gardenia Restaurant and Lounge, a little club on Santa Monica Boulevard where he cultivated the press. We were there every time Phyliss appeared.

Phyliss got a little press and some good reviews, but her career never took off. Dad was crushed—yet tenacious. His next move was a clothing line. He started one based on fabrics and designs worn by racehorse jockeys. Dad was a gambler, and gambling on a bold concept for men’s wear seemed a sure thing. It wasn’t. The line went bust.

His next move was to buy a racehorse that never finished first. After that, I lost count of his projects. No matter how many failed, he was always working on a new one, meeting with investors and planning something spectacular. While Mom prospered, Dad’s projects stalled. In fact, Mom’s earnings paid for Dad’s failed ventures.

But man, did he hustle. He was relentless. Like Grandpa, Dad worked every day of his life. He showed me that even when things fail, you keep going. You never stop until you reach your dream. Tragically, I don’t think Dad ever reached his.

But there were good times that almost always had a musical soundtrack. Mom and Dad kept up the tradition they’d started in New York, with Bobby Short, of taking me to clubs. We went to the Parisian Room, on Washington and La Brea, to hear Kenny Burrell, the brilliant bop blues guitarist. That’s also where we heard Arthur Prysock, a baritone jazz singer who’d sung with Basie. Mom loved her some Arthur Prysock! And then there was a club where we used to go to see Gil Askey and his orchestra. Gil was famous for his arrangements for Diana Ross and the Supremes, the Temptations, and the Four Tops.

My parents and I were regulars at the Playboy Jazz Festival, at the Hollywood Bowl. Our hookup was Mom’s close friend Sylvia O’Gilvie, a script assistant to the director of The Jeffersons. Sylvia worked at the festival and scored us a box. It felt like Old Home Week because Bill Cosby, a jazz lover himself, was the permanent emcee. Cosby and Mom were both part of the close-knit community of Black actors working in TV then.

The Playboy Jazz Festival provided an entire day and late into the evening when I could sit next to my dad, not say a word, and enjoy the feeling. He loved the music as much as I did. Playboy was the first venue where I saw Miles Davis live, a major figure in my young adult life. Miles had impeccable style as a musician and a man. He had the courage to break through genres. He broke the mold of the jazz musician and dressed like a rock star. Seeing Miles was always an event.

Then there was the great reunion with his sixties group: Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Ron Carter, and Tony Williams. I loved how Miles turned his back to the audience. It was part of his I-don’t-give-a-fuck mystique. I also saw it as a way to bring attention to someone he had groomed into a star: drummer Tony Williams, whose hands were moving in six different directions at once.

My folks and I also saw Miles when he was was covering Michael Jackson’s “Human Nature” and Cyndi Lauper’s “Time after Time.” Those songs were a lot tamer than his earlier fusion jams that had such a huge impact on me. That’s when Miles threw everything into the mix, including rock guitar and funk grooves. But even the more commercial Miles had charm. Miles never lost his aura. He wore his wraparound shades and his Kohshin Satoh silver suit like a god. He was a bad motherfucker.

My family got close to Miles when he married Godmother Cicely Tyson. We got to hang out.