Someone unknown dropped him off there and split. This piece will look at how James dad helped Charles start his career, how James mom defends Charles on social media, and his moms battle with cancer. Others recall more frequent visits. July 2019 You need a website, social mediathe whole package. He toured East Germany wearing an afro wig stuffed full of marijuana and once appeared on stage at Tipitina's in New Orleans wearing a nappy fastened by a huge gold pin. He is quoted saying he "recorded for Leonard Chess I did 'A Heavenly Angel' with Arthur Booker [no relation]. December 2015 Beautiful Things Nature Its Ray Charles on the level of Chopin. In between, Booker's life was an odyssey of brilliance and self-sabotage, a perfect-pitch voice saddled with broken dentures. I played with Huey Smith and Shirley and Lee. So we talked to a lot of people and those conversations led to boxes of old photographs and tapes, video and music libraries in the States and in Europe, and the vaults of television stations, record companies, and museums. October 2021 http://roots.life/new-orleans/james-booker/, https://64parishes.org/entry/james-booker, 12:30pm - 2pm: Booker piano tribute performed by New Orleans piano greats. Booker told Dr John that JFK did it; or, when he was asked about his star-shaped eye patch, Ringo Starr. At the age of nine, he was knocked down by an ambulance and, inhospital, was given morphine to easea badly broken leg. Booker prized - The Spectator World Musician David Torkanowsky recalls the moment: "From behind the nappy, hepulls out a .357 Magnum, puts it to his own head and announces to the audience, 'If somebody doesn't give mesome cocaine right now, I'm going to fucking pull the trigger.'". As to how James Booker lost his eye, nobody knows - a cheap journalistic trick, of course, but one of which Booker would approve. I know how to listen to something like the Neville Brothers or Irma Thomas, but Booker's music I didn't even know how to listen to. Accounts differ as to how often he accompanied the choir at St. Rose de Lima. One night at Tipitinas in the mid 70s, I sat on a neighboring bar stool as he told the guitarist and composer Earl King that FBI-CIA underground took Nixon down. James came out as gay to his parents when he was 12 years old, and they immediately accepted his decision. Bookers sister, Betty Jean, performed regularly as a gospel singer on the New Orleans radio station WMRY, and it was during his visits to the studio with her that the station manager took notice of the young mans prowess at the piano and put Booker on the air as well. He was just an amazing musician. Booker died in 1983, aged 43, ruined by drugs, drink and madness, and attended by legends of delinquency lurid even for a New Orleans piano 'professor'. He was a mythical figure by then, not least because his records were so hard to find. [7] The accident left him with a permanent limp. Vintage-vignette James Booker - Wikipedia BSL P&Z In 1967, at the height of his touring and recording career, Booker lost both his mother, Ora Champagne, and his sister, Betty Jean. Booker plays it straight and steady in the left hand, faithful to the Spanish rhythm and changes. [25], Writing for PopMatters in 2014, George de Stefano said: "And then theres James Booker, whose stature in New Orleans musical history can be gauged by the various nicknames bestowed on the gifted, troubled, openly gay musician: the Bayou Maharajah (the title of a new documentary film about the pianist), the Piano Pope, the Ivory Emperor, the Piano Prince of New Orleans. Body+Mind+Spirit A new documentary captures him right down to his glittering eye patch. We caved. Shelter-stars Yet he focused on the piano and mastered Bach's Inventions and Sinfonias, performing such pieces at a professional level by the age of 12. September 2018 $.getJSON("//www.allaboutjazz.com/includes/ajax_functions/follow_person.php?id="+pid+"&callback=? Perhaps the eye was removed with a spoon during an accounting dispute with a dealer in Harlem, or perhaps in Angola. Parenting ", Reading on mobile? Sometimes cocaine or heroin is referred to as the lady. So hence the sweet rushin woman in the song. On his return home, though, he could not earn a living wage from gigs. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. As to how James Booker lost his eye, nobody knows - a cheap journalistic trick, of course, but one of which Booker would approve. Benjamin Ryan Tillman Jr. (Aug. 11, 1847-July 3, 1918), governor of South Carolina and U.S. senator, was born on August 11, 1847, at Chester, his family's plantation in Edgefield District, South Carolina, the youngest child of Sophia Hancock and Benjamin Ryan Tillman, planters and innkeepers. "It's not actually all this stuff that's sore . The recent documentary Bayou Maharajah recounts the stories. Events The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. At the age of 10, he asked his mother for a trumpet. Keber believes this shift was "devastating" to Booker, as he was aware of his own talent. Multiple albums were released from these recordings on a number of record labels. [3][4], Booker was the son and grandson of Baptist ministers, both of whom played the piano. On the closing-time ballad, If Youre Lonely, he deliberately stumbles his right-hand rhythm against his left, leaning on his impeccably steady trio like a drunk. (Tom McDermott, James Booker, 64 Parishes). According to Booker, it dragged him for 30 feet and broke his leg in eight places, nearly requiring its amputation. A loveable crazy, sometimes, but he was also prone to darkness and unpredictability. Though Booker who died from hard living in1983 at the age of 43 would have undoubtedly approved of the description, it does diminish his musical stature somewhat, while onlyhinting at his flamboyance and talent for self-destruction.