We Knew What We Had: The Greatest Jazz Story Never Told

has been provided by the Richard King Mellon Foundation, The Heinz Endowments, the McCune Foundation, The Pittsburgh Foundation, UPMC, and BNY Mellon Foundation of Southwestern Penssylvania.

(crickets chirping) (mellow jazz music) - I was born in the Hill District of Pittsburgh.

People call it a ghetto.

Ghetto?

I thought it was paradise.

- I can remember as a kid hearing my dad talk about Wylie Avenue, which was the main boulevard through The Hill.

I wasn't old enough to really know what he was getting at, but my dad said, "There's Wylie Avenue," and his eyes got big.

Then he said, "And then there's deep Wylie."

- The early part of my life it wrapped around that one square mile.

Everything that I built my concepts on happened in that area.

- That's where the cradle was, the cradle of the cultural expression of that music, and those little dives in the Hill District, that's where you go the real thing.

- You had 30 nightspots in The Hill.

That was the place to be if you wanna hear some jazz.

- My brother and I, we used to roam around there all night long.

Two in the morning, three in the morning, going from club to club.

- When you talk about Pittsburgh, you're talking about a vast number of talented individuals.

Earl Hines.

Kenny Clarke.

Billy Strayhorn.

Billy Eckstine.

You have the extraordinary bassist, Ray Brown.

Stanley Turrentine.

You have George Benson.

- These were incredible artists.

Whether that be Erroll Garner, Ahmad Jamal, or Mary Lou Williams, that torch gets passed.

- I was of the generation that had direct access to the innovators, the people who made this music.

They were up close and personal to us.

- [Musician] Billy Eckstine and Kenny Clarke both told me regarding the value of jazz music in Pittsburgh, "We knew what we had."

Shoo, man.

(upbeat jazz music) (mellow jazz music) - In the heyday, everybody that was anybody would play in Pittsburgh.

All the groups that were the leading jazz groups of the day along with all the great R&B bands and all the great soul bands.

- Pittsburgh was this other place.

And first of all, I knew that this is where some of my greatest music heroes came from.

I remember coming here and it was, like, kinda friendly, you know.

When I heard that I was gonna play up on The Hill, even that sound friendly.

- It was always a fun city.

I just think of good things from Pittsburgh.

All up and through that whole area, in fact.

You know, Butler and Aliquippa, you name it.

Every tank town in Pennsylvania.

- Pittsburgh was the central part of the whole jazz circuit because of its proximity to New York.

It's like you couldn't go out and tour and not do Pittsburgh.

- A lot of Pittsburgh musicians emerged as being the leaders in the field because they had that exposure to the best.

For a city its size, Pittsburgh has produced more jazz innovators than any other city.

- The entire city of Pittsburgh had things happening.

There were bands in the North Side.

There were bands in Oakland.

There were bands all over.

And there were venues throughout.

Jazz music has become the thing.

And all types of people were involved in this.

- I'm puttin' it together.

There's somethin' in the water in this town, you know?

Pittsburgh seemed to be producing people that were unique.

(upbeat ragtime music) - Pittsburgh is a very interesting and unique place in terms of the development of the black community.

You had a very early black migration.

It started really in the early 1800s.

The Hill District at that time was an upper class neighborhood.

It was really the suburbs, if you will.

Well, that's also where blacks moved in.

They worked for whites in their homes, but they also had jobs downtown.

These black migrants were from the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia primarily.

It was a very rich and prosperous area.

And so, the blacks who lived there had an access to a life that was different from those who were from the plantation areas.

Winchester, Virginia was settled by Germans from eastern Pennsylvania and they brought classical music with them into that valley.

And so these black migrants who are coming up are bringing that music with them.

(violin music) (explosions boom) In World War I you have a break point in black history, nationally as well as locally.

This is when the mines and mills and factories for the first time open to black labor because World War I cuts off European immigrant labor.

Now, the black labor that came up for these jobs was different from the Virginians.

These guys came from mainly Alabama and Georgia.

That's plantation culture.

That's the blues.

(bluesy guitar music) In terms of music, you get this classical tradition now blending with the blues that comes up and it produces jazz.

And I think it's one reason why Pittsburgh early on was such an important jazz city.

(upbeat jazz music) The other reason that Pittsburgh becomes so jazz oriented goes back to this classical training that many black Pittsburghers had.

The National Negro Opera Company was begun in Pittsburgh, 1941 by Mary Cardwell Dawson.

She comes out of that earlier pre-World War I group.

- She was my teacher, Mary Cardwell Dawson.

She was responsible for putting the early Afro Americans in the Metropolitan Opera.

That was a no-no then.

She broke that barrier.

- She's just one of the examples from that time period of really teaching African Americans appreciation for music and they later go on to become great jazz musicians.

- The Pittsburgh schools desegregated in the 1870s, but because of the hills you had so many separate neighborhoods that they could not build one or two large schools to house the students.

This exposed black pupils to classical music because that's what was taught in the schools.

(upbeat jazz music) - I believe Westinghouse had the first jazz band in a high school.

In the '50s jazz was discouraged in all the schools, but my dad encouraged it.

- His name was Carl McVicker and we all called him Mac.

He selected the people that performed with the K-dets.

He selected all the music.

- He was always very positive no matter what your skill level was.

He made you feel special.

- It was amazing how many musicians who were key in the business came out of Westinghouse.

(jazz piano music) - Earl Hines is the first major jazz musician to come from Pittsburgh.

- Earl Fatha Hines, one of the great innovators.

He wrote the book stylistically and what a great pianist he was.

(jazz piano music) - He was from Duquesne, Pennsylvania, just across the river from Pittsburgh.

A mill town, but he went to a school where they studied classical music.

He brought that classical training and sensitivity to his interpretation of the blues and this produced a very early form of jazz music in his case.

(jazz piano music) - Just about all of the musicians that I remember, they had classical teachers.

They never shied away from classical music, so that standard of perfection of the instrument is always there.

- You can see it in people like, say, a Billy Strayhorn, who went to an integrated high school.

He played in the school orchestra, classical music, and he, in fact, wanted to be a classical musician but gave it up because he couldn't get a job, he realized, in a symphony orchestra at that time.

And he was exposed to, at the same time, jazz and blues.

And so, Strayhorn is a perfect example of bringing these two music streams together.

- People kept saying to my uncle, you oughta go to one of the big bands, meet some of the people who come through here, let us introduce you to them.

My uncle would always decline.

He didn't think that he was perhaps able to do that kind of thing.

As I understand it, Gus Greenlee said, "When Ellington's band comes to town, "I'm gonna take you back stage "so you can meet Mr.

Ellington."

When Duke came, Billy sat down and played an Ellington piece a la Strayhorn.

Duke knew, I think, with the first meeting that he was gifted and wanted to find some way to incorporate him into his operation.

(upbeat jazz music) - Billy Strayhorn is our encore.

(jazz piano music) - He was a good piano player, more of an arranger, though, and more of a composer because when he was 16 years old he wrote Lush Life.

My goodness, it's such a classic, mature piece of music.

I used to visit all the very gay places Those come what may places Where one relaxes on the axis of the wheel of life To get the feel of life from jazz and cocktails - He had great taste.

He would have a way of putting a little humor in a song, a bit of sadness in a song.

He was what you would call a genius.

(upbeat jazz music) - We who live in Pittsburgh or grew up there sometimes forget Pittsburgh is not a big city as the world goes, and yet look what it's produced.

Producing is part of the Pittsburgh way.

It's not just turning out steel or glass or aluminum, it's turning out talent of all kinds.

(Dixieland jazz music) The Dixieland centers, New Orleans, Kansas City, St. Louis, New York, Pittsburgh, were all river towns.

People are coming and going so it isn't isolated, locked in.

It's in communication with the rest of the world.

- The music moved with the people.

Fate Marable, who was the calliope player and the band leader on the (mumbles) steamboat line that came from New Orleans and wound up in Pittsburgh.

That's where he met Fatha Hines and people like that.

And he was so taken by the music in Pittsburgh that he moved his family here.

Well stop And listen A what my God said to me He said if you wanna make it in the kingdom You gotta fall on your bended knee - The other thing is you can't leave out the black church.

A lot of musicians really learn how to play in the church.

(lively trumpet music) This was taking place around the country.

If you ever wanna listen to some great music, go to a black church on Sunday morning and you will see it and hear it.

(upbeat Dixieland music) - We get the sound of jazz, and the churchgoers, a lot of them were actually jazz musicians.

They'd been up all night and they go right (chuckles) from the juke house to the church.

But the music remained the same.

(upbeat Dixieland music) (mellow jazz music) - There was a very clear high point socially, economically, and culturally for black Pittsburgh and that was definitely the 1940s.

Those were the golden years.

You had full employment.

Anybody with a good back and a desire to work could work.

This was during the war, so these jobs that were available made a huge difference.

The mills here ran around the clock, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Guys had money in their pockets like they'd never had before, and they could use that money to support black businesses, nightclubs, entertainment.

- You've got a city where people work hard.

They work in industries and places where at night you really wanted to lubricate your throat and have a personal communication with friends, so you went to a good bar and there was music.

(upbeat jazz music) - The first time I came to Pittsburgh we played a place called Crawford's Grill.

And I was impressed with how people were into the music.

They were middle class people.

Most of 'em didn't know anything about the history of jazz, where it came from.

They just knew they wanted to have a good time and listen to jazz.

- People came to the Crawford Grill to party, to hear good jazz music.

If you had a date and you wanted to impress your date, you took them to the Crawford Grill.

- They was well-dressed.

The booze that they ordered was top shelf and that's where you meet the stars.

All the rest of the places just on one level, but that Crawford Grill?

If you wanna be the top of the barrel, that's where you go.

- Earl Hines, Erroll Garner, Billy Strayhorn, Mary Lee Williams, Art Blakey, all of those greats were coming up in that period, which was amazing.

Pittsburgh was creating absolute models of the music, meaning when they came along and played, the music was changed forever.

- These are giants of jazz, people who helped invent this music and who helped develop it and who creatively powered it.

One of the most central elements that came out of Pittsburgh is Billy Eckstine himself, and what he did for our music.

- Billy Eckstine started doing amateur night here in Pittsburgh.

One of the contests ended up with Earl Fatha Hines.

He was a featured vocalist and he had a very, very intriguing quality about him, which was the accentuation of the English language.

His sister was a Spanish teacher and she had told him, "Say it so people understand "what you are saying."

When he decided to say something he would say it in a way that enunciated each vowel.

It sounds stunted, but when you put the music to it, he had it.

I love the rhythm in the riff When the music jumps I get a lift (scatting) Anything to make it swing I love the music on trombone Blend it with a mellow saxophone (scatting) What a lot of kicks it brings When that rhythm's in ya The blues don't have a chance Find that groove, oh, will ya Make ya never think about romance Jump, jump your rhythm with the riff Any kind of music gets a lift (scatting) Anything to make (mellow jazz music) - Frank West was playing at the Keystone Korner in San Francisco with a band called The New York Jazz Quartet, and Billy was listening to the band.

Frank told me that night in my club with Billy right there in the room, Billy Eckstine was the greatest living singer of the 20th century without a doubt.

And right before he died he told me, "Todd you gotta remind people over and over again "that Billy Eckstine had the first great "bebop band of all time."

Sarah Vaughan, Charlie Parker, Gene Ammons, Fats Navaro, Dexter Gordon.

All of 'em came out of that one band.

Almost the whole history of jazz.

There was no greater person in all of jazz history.

Gee, but I'm lonesome Feel like I wanna cry Gee, but I'm lonesome Feel like I wanna cry I miss my baby I will 'til the day I die (upbeat big band music) (audience applauds) (piano music) - Pittsburghers were consumers of jazz music.

They knew and understood the music.

They participated in producing the music.

The jazz musicians crawled all over this city.

Mary Lou Williams was one.

Her mother was a piano player.

- Mary Lou Williams was in her own category.

(jazz piano music) She had a touch.

She had her own sound.

- Mary Lou Williams had such an articulate approach to how to create melody, very complex rhythms, very complex harmonic ideas.

(jazz piano music) Her left hand was amazing.

In order to play that way you have to know where everything is on the instrument.

So, she would know where these notes were with the left hand and then been able to maintain this level of independence and virtuosity with the right.

(jazz piano music) She transcended eras and she remained modern throughout her career as a player.

It's really hard to imagine the power that that takes to be this young woman who really knew herself and understood her worth at a very young age and was able to achieve her goals as an artist, and she established this place that women would be able to find a part in this music.

(jazz piano music) (audience applauds) (mellow jazz music) - I was discovered by my Uncle Lawrence who was playing the piano in my mother's home.

I'm talkin' about three years old.

You don't make any conscious decisions at three years old.

Decisions are made for you.

So, my uncle made the decision to ask me could I play what he was playing.

The rest is history.

(jazz music) I started professionally when I was 14 years old.

I worked the Washington Club and I worked a lot in the valley, Aliquippa and Uniontown, and I was with all the great band leaders around.

Joe Westray, William Hitchcock, Jerry Elliot.

That's where I give up a lot of my orchestral concepts.

(upbeat jazz music) Honey Boy Minor and Leroy Brown, those were our mentors.

Those were the people that handed down so many valuable secrets as well as the first five dollar bill I ever made in my laugh.

(laughs) (upbeat jazz music) The foundation that I got in Pittsburgh was responsible for my growth.

Because I'm probably the only one that put out a CD called Pittsburgh, dedicated to my mother, who is responsible for me being here, and my hometown.

I still love this place.

(audience applauds) Erroll Garner started playing in three-two.

Earl was an orchestra in himself and he was perhaps my biggest influence.

(jazz piano music) - When you heard Erroll Garner playing you heard a complete orchestra.

He was Ravel.

He was the Count Basie horn section.

(jazz piano music) - If you notice the left hand, there's a driving, constant, rhythmic beat.

He really would literally run over drummers and bass players because that driving force in the left hand was so strong.

(jazz piano music) - He didn't read music.

He was self-trained.

That was so amazing.

A lot of piano players that are self-trained are not taught the scales and arpeggios, so you can kinda tell because they play it safe.

But Erroll Garner was everywhere.

They call him, what, the poet of the piano?

He was.

- He could play in any key.

One time he played Misty in E flat.

(piano music) Another time it would be A flat.

(piano music) It didn't matter to him.

He played what he felt.

(soft piano music) - And of course Misty became a big pop hit and other people recorded it.

It sold millions of copies and Erroll Garner, a jazz musician, ended up a multi-millionaire, which was so good.

- There's this thing about what makes Pittsburgh great.

These people find their own unique personality and Erroll Garner was one of them.

(dramatic piano music) (audience applauds) (drum music) - I saw it time after time.

Dizzy would come in.

He's gonna do a record with the Double Sixes.

He would say, "Get me Kenny Clarke."

Stan Getz would come in and he said, "Get me Kenny Clarke."

- Kenny Clarke, Pittsburgh.

Totally unique.

Biggest influence on drummers.

Oh man, he had a symbol beat that would change the world.

(drum music) - He changed from keeping the main time on the sock cymbal to the ride cymbal, which is the bigger cymbal.

He wasn't ting ting ting ta ting ting ta ting, but he would go ting ta-ting ting ting ting ta-ting ting ting.

(drum music) So, they give him credit with starting the way drums are played today in jazz.

(drum music) - Move forward to Art Blakey.

When Art Blakey played you heard thunder and fierce power coming from the drum set and this personality of a man guiding his troops.

We're gonna burn this house down, guys, and there was Blakey back there, (grunts) "Let's get it."

And he came with a force that was unreal.

(dramatic drum music) - One of the first bands I discovered was Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers and I loved those early records that he made.

You could go through any who's who of jazz musicians and you would find that probably a third of them spent some time in Art Blakey's band at one time or another.

- Art Blakey was one of the most powerful and cyclonic forces in our music.

Nobody swung any harder in the history of jazz.

(dramatic drum music) And that's part of what made him one of the most important jazz players of all time.

(dramatic jazz music finale) (audience applauds) (drum music) - Roger Humphries.

Doo wop doo wop doo wop - I'm from the North Side.

When I came right out of high school I met Stanley Turrentine and Shirley Scott at the Hurricane Bar and I sat in with them.

So, when I graduated from high school in June, I went on the road with them in July.

(jazz guitar music) - When you play with Roger, he kinda makes the momentum grow.

He's right with you and he builds with you.

(jazz guitar music) It's just a wonderful feeling to be with him.

- Yeah, Roger's a great drummer.

He's been all over the world traveling with them.

He could probably do it now if he wanted to.

(rhythmic drumming) But he stays in Pittsburgh and he's very helpful to that community.

(rhythmic drumming) - When you get a chance to travel, you get a taste of other places, and many places are wonderful for someone else to live in.

In New York City I made up my mind.

I said I wanna go back to Pittsburgh because one of the most important things for me is my family.

I'm gonna take the New York vibe that I have and take it back to Pittsburgh and make it like my own.

(drum music) (dramatic jazz music finale) - [Ahmad] There's many people still in Pittsburgh that have talent commensurate to those who have left.

- Roger Humphries.

(audience applauds) - Johnny Costa was one.

Phenomenal pianist.

You listen to Mr. Rogers to listen to Johnny Costa play piano.

(chuckles) (Mr. Roger's Neighborhood theme song) It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood A beautiful day for a neighbor Would you be mine Could you be mine - Every year Johnny Costa would take two weeks off from his Pittsburgh duties and go to New York and play in The Embers Club.

I can't remember the critic, but he referred to Costa as the white Art Tatum.

(fast paced jazz music) - I remember thinking, "My goodness, he is so good!"

And it's so effortless.

And that was Johnny Costa.

The notes just poured out of his fingers like pearls.

(jazz piano music) - John became the top piano artist for Decca and Coral Records, which in the '50s was a big thing.

He was their main artist, but this required him to leave Pittsburgh and travel on the road.

His trio at that time was Chuck Spatafore on drums and Jimmy de Julio from Pittsburgh.

It was at Thanksgiving time and they were homesick.

They were sittin' there eatin' at the restaurant having Thanksgiving dinner and said what are we doin' here?

So that was the end of it.

They got off the road and came back to Pittsburgh.

By John doing this, he gave up the fame.

Now he's a piano player workin' in Pittsburgh, but Joe Negri did the same thing.

(mellow jazz music) - When I was 13, 14 I was playin' pretty good.

I could play a lot of fancy solos and all of a sudden at about 15 I guess it clicked in.

By the time I was 16 I took an audition with Shep Fields and his new orchestra and I went on the road.

We played all the big cities.

I didn't like the road so I come back here and I decided I was just gonna lay low for a while.

That's when I started playin' the clubs.

We still had it in our head that we were gonna go to New York, and I thought, "Why not?

"Maybe I'll go up there and see if I can get a job "in the studios."

When I got there and I saw the lifestyle, they were livin' kinda loose lives and drinkin' too much.

Joni and I, my wife, looked at each other and we said, (clicks tongue) "Let's go home."

We went back to Pittsburgh.

(mellow jazz music) - This is the real bonus of Pittsburgh.

You have a lot of world class musicians that decided to come here and stay.

(mellow jazz music) So, therefore, the musicianship is very high.

So to play local, for me, is a blessing.

(bass guitar music) The other thing that makes Pittsburgh great is you got a knowledgeable audience.

They've heard better than you.

Dwayne Dolphin, not special.

There's a guy before you name of Ray Brown.

(mellow jazz bass music) - When Ray started to walkin' I thought the room was gonna fall apart.

Gotta bam boom bam!

And I said, "Jesus Christ!"

(laughs) (mellow jazz bass music) (audience applauds) - You hear notes coming out of that instrument that were so fluid and so powerful and to me what bass meant.

(jazz bass music) - Ray Brown was one of the greatest bass players that ever lived and he played with one of the greatest piano players that ever lived, and to keep up with Oscar Peterson you had to know what you were doin'.

(jazz music) - He helped so many people musically and business wise.

He wanted you to understand the business 'cause that's how we all exist.

- That's one of the common virtues and characteristics of a lot of the people out of Pittsburgh.

So many of 'em have had great organizational abilities as well as being great artists.

Ray Brown being a paradigm of that model.

(jazz music) (audience applauds) (mellow jazz music) - I should slap myself for having not mentioned some other guys that came out of Pittsburgh that are so unique.

Once again unique and lightin' the fire of good feelings.

(mellow jazz music) Stanley Turrentine, bad as they come.

- You hear two notes you know that's Stanley because he had a tone, you know, nobody else had.

(mellow jazz music) Stanley and his family was nice.

He had a sister and he had brother Tommy.

Tommy, he was a little wilder than Stanley.

You had to watch him day and night.

- Stanley played jazz that swung.

People could understand it.

Tommy played the hard bebop that unless you were a musician or an aficionado, you didn't understand what he was doing.

- Tommy, he was a very good arranger and Stanley needed new tunes for his little combo to be arranged, so he would get Tommy to do it.

Tommy was jealous of Stanley because Tommy was the oldest.

I'd try to tell Tommy he's wrong.

And Stanley, he just rose to the top.

(mellow jazz music) (audience applauds) (audience cheers) (upbeat jazz music) - The Hill had a certain mystique about it.

It was full of life.

- There were blacks.

There were Jews.

There were Italian.

There were Eastern Europeans and they got along famously.

- Then came the tragedy of urban redevelopment.

(somber jazz music) The city in the '50s turned its attention to redeveloping The Hill.

Now, the problem was what the city meant by redevelopment was tear it all down and build something new in its place.

- My grandmother, aunts and uncles and cousines still lived there until literally the ball hit their house to build the Civic Arena.

(somber jazz music) - It was a pleasure and a privilege for me to meet and befriend Frank Bolden.

Frank was on the staff of the Pittsburgh Courier and I remember him saying, "Bill, have you heard "the term urban renewal?"

He said, "That really means Negro removal."

And I knew exactly what he was saying, that the Civic Arena just put a barrier between The Hill District and the downtown.

- The Crawford Grill, Musicians Club, Derby Dad's, Harlem Bar, all of these places were gone with that urban redevelopment.

- They sent all our people from my district up to the public housing.

It was better than the housing that we had, but it was very different.

My neighborhood was gone.

(somber jazz music) - Black folks were driven out of The Hill.

The city turned their back on 'em.

- Some people were moved to the upper part of The Hill to public housing.

Others were told that housing would be found for them and for some people, yes, it was, but for a majority, that didn't come to fruition.

Businesses that were located in the lower Hill, if they weren't able to relocate, they disappeared.

Some of the jazz clubs were part of that disappearance.

So what happens is that you begin to lose that culture and what you are left with are the memories.

(somber jazz music) (upbeat jazz music) Before 1960, jazz was not pop music, but it was the popular American music.

What happened in Pittsburgh is the same thing that happened everywhere.

R&B and rock 'n roll become the predominant sound.

Now, jazz didn't go away.

It just continued to evolve.

So, you begin to see musicians that come out of the Hill District sticking to their jazz roots, but also learning and integrating some of this other sound into their music.

- A musician that came out of Pittsburgh that is so beyond description is George Benson.

He gets on the stage and lights up the room.

(mellow jazz music) - He was a little kid.

He was workin' on the street, playin' the guitar and singin' for money.

That's how he started.

- Little Georgie Benson became my nickname.

I walked down Wylie Avenue and I noticed that people were just happy all the time.

The music I could hear coming out of a club that was down that street called Bernie's Hurricane.

During the summers I took my (mumbles) corners on the weekends and made a lot of money.

One day a man, I remember his name.

His name was Cephus Ford.

He said, "Little Georgie," he said, "Where do you live?"

I said, "Well, I live on Bedford Avenue."

He said, "Can you take me?

"I wanna meet your mother and your father."

So, I took him around and he asked them if they would allow me to work in his nightclub, and my mother immediately said, "No, he can't work in a nightclub.

"He's only seven years old."

(chuckles) Then he offered her $40 a night.

That was it, brother.

We ended up working at a place called Little Paris.

It was on Wylie Avenue.

Do do do do - Everybody knew about George and at first they said, "There's a cat playin' the guitar, "he's like he's comin' outta West Montgomery "but he's his own man."

Deep down in a secret place, George was probably saying, boy I'd sure like to have a vocal hit record like Sam Cooke or like Jackie Wilson.

- I think he always wanted to sing.

When it caught on, it was one of the best things that ever happened to jazz.

Are you really happy here With this lonely game we play Looking for words to say Searching but not finding understanding anywhere We're lost in a Masquerade - He picked two numbers that were known and he made 'em soulful and the people understood it and bought it.

- What took George Benson into the stratosphere as a pop artist was his singing, but because he was such a lyrical guitar player, his star just kept growing, growing, growing.

And now, of course, he's one of the biggest stars ever.

Do do do dee do do Duh do do dee do do Do dee Duh-duh doo, duh-duh doo doo duh doo Doo dee duh duh Dip da da dee da da doo Dee da da dee doo da da dee da doh Dee da da dee da doo doo Doo da doo da doo Dinga da do doo dow doo dow - What Benson did was great for George Benson, but also great for jazz musicians of his era because he brought in audiences who probably never would've come to jazz.

He went to the pop arena and brought those audiences back.

Doo do do do dee dum Do da da dee da Da da dee dow day dow Dee dow doo doo doo doo Boo dow dow dow dow doo doo doo doo da doodle dee Doo da da doo Doo doo da-doo doo Ba doodle dee dow duh dow dow For your love, girl A masquerade (audience applauds) (audience cheers) (jazz music) - Sometimes people say The Hill was destroyed by urban redevelopment in the '50s.

When those buildings were torn down and those businesses were lost in the lower Hill, a lot of those businesses relocated to Center Avenue, and Center Avenue, which had formerly been a Jewish commercial district, became increasingly a black commercial district, and there was lots of life on Center Avenue.

There was still a lot of jazz.

Crawford Grill number two replaced the old Crawford Grill which had been torn down.

That tends to get forgotten because people say, "Oh, it all ended with urban renewal."

Well, it didn't all end.

What ended it then in the late '60s was the assassination of Martin Luther King and the riots that hit Center Avenue burned down much of that commercial corridor, and that's the one the Hill never recovered from.

Those businesses never reopened.

(somber jazz music) - We used to hang out on The Hill.

There was no hassle, but after Martin Luther King, that kinda killed The Hill.

- White folks were afraid to come to The Hill.

They were told that we all hated them, which wasn't true.

- Whites had been a big part of the jazz scene in the '50s and '60s.

When Walt Harper used to play at the Crawford Grill, report is about half the audience there was white.

After the riots that audience isn't coming.

- The businesses that were dependent upon them just died.

Crawford Grill sits there unoccupied and before it was jumping every day, every night of the week.

Ooh ooh ooh - We were so frustrated that we actually started burning down our own neighborhood.

That was just a bad situation all around.

Ooh ooh ooh (upbeat jazz music) - [Musician] Looking back, the artistic integrity and the ability of people here is just as strong as anywhere in the world.

- [Musician] No music swung anymore than the music that came outta Pittsburgh.

- [Musician] We at one time were the jazz mecca of the world.

- [Sam] It's really a great phenomenon how that legacy is in this 21st century.

The Hill District is naming buildings after jazz musicians who hail from Pittsburgh.

Future generations may see the names on those buildings and have no idea who Blakey was, where the Crawford Grill was located and what its significance was, but they can look it up.

- People who still present jazz in Pittsburgh are very especially indispensable people because we have to carry this on to another generation.

(upbeat jazz music) - Musicians really want to share this music with the young people that are coming up.

- This next generation is what has me so thrilled.

(upbeat jazz music) (audience cheers) - I know where I come from.

I know what this place is about, and the jazz tradition still lives here.

(upbeat jazz music) (audience cheers) (audience applauds) (mellow jazz music) - [Announcer] Learn more about this program at mcgjazz.org.

Funding for this program has been provided by the Richard King Mellon Foundation, The Heinz Endowments, the McCune Foundation, The Pittsburgh Foundation, UPMC, and BNY Mellon Foundation of Southwestern Pennsylvania.

To order a dvd of this program, please visit MCGJAZZ.org (upbeat music)