by George Edwards, aka “Professor Swing”
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After a lifetime of playing with countless jazz, rock, and country groups in Chicago and Los Angeles, George Edwards took a teaching job in Japan in 2003. His unusual 46-year journey as a professional freelance drummer and now teacher will be of interest to drummers everywhere. (See my introductory post to this article, “Email Chats with a Jazz Drummer in Japan.”) – Editor
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SINCE MOVING TO JAPAN IN 2003, I have been teaching drums to fifty students a week at the American Drum School in Niigata, a small town about five hours north of Tokyo. I am now 60 years old, and this is the first and only regular steady job I’ve ever had.
I moved here because I inherited this full-time teaching gig from my best drummer friend, Anthony Stein. (His uncle is Irv Cottler, Sinatra’s drummer. His godfather is Lee Young, Lester Young’s brother and Nat King Cole’s drummer.) Mike Dubin, Maurie Lishon’s grandson, turned it down. Tony inherited the gig from friend Neil Slauson. We are ALL Freddie Gruber “disciples,” and Freddie’s name carries a lot of weight in Japan. Most Japanese drummers can’t swing from the end of a rope, so they thought we could help. Actually, we’re just a marketing novelty/prestige — “Americans who studied with Freddie.” Nobody here really wants to learn anything.
Much of my teaching gig is actually a drag because most of my students are once-a-week hobbyists who never pick up a pair of sticks between lessons. They’re just “killing time” (their own words). It is very common in Japanese (non)culture for people to take a lot of lessons — music, English, cooking, flower arranging, etc. — with absolutely no desire to learn or master a skill.
Very few people here are into music or speak English; most do nothing but drink. Unlike some of my “coworkers,” I always play without the aid of chemical or alcoholic enhancements. You may find it hard to believe, but I’ve had Japanese businessmen students come to their lessons drunk. A couple weeks later, they’re in the hospital. Then they blame their lack of drumming progress on the fact that I don’t speak Japanese, switch to another teacher, then quit him shortly thereafter.
A Drummer’s Journey from Chicago to L.A. to Japan
I played in the Chicago area from 1965 to 1975, mostly teen clubs (in the 60s) and church dances, night clubs, and the Gaslight Club with “Joe Kelly Dixieland 4+1″; Pierre’s Show Lounge with Reno Tondelli (WGN Radio Staff); Wise Fool’s Pub on Lincoln Ave. with “Graced Lightening” Prog. Rock, R & B band; “Spot & the Blotters” (a failed audition because I was underage, only 16 yrs old at the time); “Jumbo” (an 18- piece rock big band with Bunky Green); “McIan-Forrest Stage Group” (22-piece rock orchestra with strings); “Sludge” (hard rock trio with Brian Reiner from England’s “Robin Hoods” 1965-1972; “Tony Marconi & the Continental Strings” (gypsy violin group at supper clubs); and countless forgettable parties, weddings, etc. at the Drake Hotel.
I never played any professional classical gigs, aside from those in college. Actually, the most musically valid experiences were any and all of the student ensembles at Northwestern University, the Wind Ensemble with John P. Paynter, Dir., the Stage Band with Rufus Reid, Dir., concert bands, symphony orchestra, and the Percussion and Marimba Ensemble. I studied marimba while in college and could play part of the Goldenberg book, a few violin pieces, and finally, the Creston Concertina. That was it. I quit mallets after I finished college and moved to L.A. This was in 1976, and I was 25 years old.
I have absolutely no family, except my older sister in L.A. (We are very close and I miss her a lot, but we stay in touch by phone.) For twenty years, I was manager of a 16-room Craftsman style mansion — a boarding house that rented rooms near MacArthur Park, downtown L.A., so I never had to pay rent. All that time, I lived in a no-heat no-windows garage where I could practice drums and blast my Audiophile Hi-Fi. And that’s how I could afford to play music.
DURING MY YEARS IN L.A., I played all styles of jazz, from 1920s-30s traditional, 40s-50s big band swing and bebop, to 60s avant-garde a la late period Coltrane, Sun Ra, Cecil Taylor. When I was younger, I also loved and played original hard rock a la Cream, Jimi Hendrix, Deep Purple. For several years, I took lessons with “Vanilla Fudge” drummer Carmine Appice and also Frank Zappa’s drummer, Terry Bozzio. I was also with Freddie Gruber for seven years.
Did a lot of trad/classic jazz festivals such as the “Sweet & Hot” in L.A., three big band cruises, one with Jimmy Dorsey’s orchestra. To make money, I also played weddings, Elk’s clubs, backed up lots of Sinatra-style singers, played Country & Western, ballroom swing dances, concerts in the park, authentic German polka bands (but never any top 40, thank goodness).
Recording with Various Jazz Groups
I did very little studio work in those years, although I did about twenty CDs with various bands I belonged to. The “Crazy Rhythm Hot Society Orchestra” was a very good twelve-piece pre-swing era band that I made six CDs with. We worked a lot. I loved that band! Worked with Bing Crosby-style crooner Jeff Gilbert, one of the best popular music singers ever.
I also often worked in L.A. with 20s-30s bandleader/crooner Johnnie Crawford. (He was an original Mickey Mouse Club child TV star who played Chuck Conner’s son in the “Rifleman.”) Also worked with Janet Kline and her Parlor Boys, a Bettie Boop, Boswell sisters-type singer. I played washboard in her many different combos. Did about five CDs with her; even did the Fuji Rock Festival in Tokyo with her (in 2005, I think).
Jobbing Opportunities and Musician’s Pay in Japan
In the U.S., I always worked three to six gigs a week, but I did only eight gigs all last year. Finding a gig here now is like trying to get work as a gay male prostitute in Luxembourg, Mississippi.
For several years in Niigata, I played three to five gigs per month, but all good jazz–no “Helen Keller style don’t-really-swing” Bar Mitzva/Elks club gigs. However, now many clubs have closed for one reason or another — a death in the family, or the owner retires and the space becomes an office or maybe a Karaoke bar. (There has been no switch to canned music here.)
There is only one big band in Niigata, almost all amateurs. They can barely play high school level stocks, and then usually “tempo di tortoise” with many clams. They play only twice a year. I don’t really wanna put anybody down, but I do get irritated when they won’t even try, and refuse to practice, to study, and then complain “I can’t, it’s too difficult.” (Again, same with English school students.)
THERE ARE VERY FEW AMERICANS in Niigata. Most foreigners are from England, Australia, New Zealand, and Russia, with a number of blacks from Nigeria. Most foreigners are male. Japanese women love us; the men don’t. We actually keep much to ourselves. This ain’t no melting pot! Most foreigners don’t really like it here, they just like the slightly better jobs/money. Most are English teachers, like my wife, Emi.
When I do get a gig, everybody is Japanese except me and an Italian guitarist, the only foreigner I play with and even know. The quartet pictured above was taken at an outdoor concert at a shopping center slightly out of town somewhere. We shared the bill with an all-girls junior high school small concert band that was actually pretty good, by Japanese standards. At least they were sincerely trying, reading music, and playing real musical instruments, not J-Pop. This was one of the good paying gigs, $250.
The colorful trio picture below is again Italian Fabio on guitar, Japanese Satoshi Azuma on bass. This gig paid well: $60 each for a two-hour Sunday afternoon concert in a underground shopping plaza. The place was sponsored by the city government, but only for a short time.
This picture on the street is with “The Apollons,” my Japanese boss’s C&W band. (He plays fiddle.) This was a free gig on the street, a benefit for tsunami victims. If paid, we would have gotten only $50 each.
Private parties in hotels pay from $100 to $300. But these gigs are very, very rare; I do only a couple a year at most.
In area jazz clubs, customers pay a cover charge of $10 to $30, sometimes more if a special jazz group from Tokyo/Osaka/USA plays (rare). Musicians get a percentage of this, which is usually the same, $10 to $30, or maybe $40, each. Twice, I actually made $100. Audiences are quite small, usually four to ten, twenty at most; and these are mostly heavy drinking businessmen. There were about six clubs when I came, but only two or three now, and these are mostly small family joints running just for the love of it.
Why I’m Putting My Sticks Down Now
Even though I’m still at the top of my game, playing better than ever, I have recently put down my sticks. I never practice anymore because I’ve got no gigs! This feels strange, yet after a year of little or no work, I find I don’t really miss it. I just feel a bit guilty, a bit sad, thinking “Oh, what a waste.”
After Barbara prompted me to write about my life, I delayed sending my writing because it seemed as though my life has been just too far out, too weird, too strange, especially the parts about my former life in L.A. (“You Did WHAT?” would be an appropiate title for a GE autobiography, followed by a sequel simply entitled “WHY?”) Yet, I couldn’t figure a way to tame down my writing without losing its original shocking spark, without being like Charles Bukowski trying to write like Walt Disney. You see, I had some “pretty high friends in some very low places,” my association with whom may greatly attribute to why I am where I am today in Japan instead of touring the world and selling records with a top-notch creative jazz band. Even though I have usually been the straight man, I’ve wasted far too much time surrounded by negative loser types and far too many “Oh well, at least I’m working” types of gigs.
I recently did a gig with one of Niigata’s most lame pianists. (If he were to wear boxing gloves when he plays, he might actually sound better.) Oh, but at least it’s a gig. (Opps, there I go again.) I rode a bicycle to this job, only five blocks away, with old Turkish K cymbals in my backpack and a vintage ’36 Slingerland Radio King snare drum (w/calf heads) in my bike basket.
With so little work outside my teaching, I’ve had plenty of time to veg around on my new toy, my first computer. In the beginning, I took lessons and studied four or five hours a day. Emi and I often don’t both get home til 9 or 10 p.m. We’ll eat dinner at midnite and play with our computers before going to sleep.
With the computer, I don’t need a bass player, don’t have to carry and set up drums, and the pay and audience is about the same: zero. Now, after this inactivity as a performer, the thought of hustling up gigs and taking $200 train rides to Tokyo, Osaka, etc. and renting a hotel doesn’t appeal to me. I’m older and getting very lazy now, but at the same time I feel like I’m dying with my music still in me.
I’m too young and in too good a shape to “retire” now, but life is very peaceful and easy here. I’m not happy with my teaching job, but I’m happy not to have to drive two hours in rush-hour traffic to a musically meaningless bread-and-butter gig just so I can buy a new carburetor for a broken down car, buy insurance, AAA auto club, etc. Everything I need is within a four-block bike ride. Streets are clean and safe, even the police are friendly, and I can jaywalk all I want.
After reading Barbara’s book about Harry, I think he would understand how I feel now. I met him only once, had just one marimba lesson with him while I was at Northwestern, but I later heard Chicago Symphony concerts and saw him collecting the music as part of his librarian duties for the Orchestra in the sixties. The reason why I dig Harry so much is that he never quit until he physically had to stop drumming. Even then, with his incredible urge to succeed, his courage, wisdom, and zest for life, he went on to do well and be quite creative in other areas.
What other books are there about a (mostly) classical percussionist? Has anybody written about Vic Firth? Morris Goldenberg? Billy Gladstone? Charlie Wilcoxon? George Lawrence Stone? No, we only have books about Harry Brabec and Sam Denov — that’s all. We have lots of writing on jazz and rock drummers, but almost nothing on legit players. Sonny Payne, my favorite Basie drummer, said “Why not? These symphony musicians are the absolute best we’ve got!”
ENJOYED reading these interesting comments! I lived in Japan in 1973-74 as an International Christian University exchange student in Mitaka/Tokyo, and taught English to individuals and small groups of adults and children in late afternoons, Saturdays and evenings.
Even back then I saw that after-work hours were drinking times for ‘networking’ by groups of businessmen who socialized together in hopes of getting better positions in their corporations in the future. Every one of them seemed to have a common goal and thought this would help “to become our corporate president some day”. (The wife and a child or two remained at home after their own after-school lessons: English, math, a sport or a musical instrument were most commonly taken and evolved into regular “club” attendance starting with the preschool ages).
I’m not a drummer but learned to appreciate “all that jazz”. My former ICU college roommate, “Yumi” Kudo, is now a freelancer who writes exclusively about jazz musicians in Japan.
“Masa” Mensink Oskvig (formerly of Minnesota; now in Iowa)