Editors note: Phil Murphy passed away Feb. 13, 2022 at the age of 92. Many people, including me, owe this man a lot.
Hangin’ with Ella, Benny, and Nat
Retired London Hall of Famer’s gig as a 21-year-old meant up-close and personal moments with the biggest names in jazz
by Andy Sparling, Nov. 2021
Hangin’ with Ella, Benny, and Nat
Retired London Hall of Famer’s gig as a 21-year-old meant up-close and personal moments with the biggest names in jazz
by Andy Sparling, Nov. 2021
Seventy-one years ago, 21-year-old Phil Murphy from Windsor, Ontario was sharing stages with jazz legends Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole, Sarah Vaughan and Frances Langford. And Benny Goodman raked him over the coals, too. Now 92, Murphy spent much of his life as a music teacher in London, Ontario, where he’s a member of that city’s Music Hall of Fame.
He was my first music teacher, whose impressive credentials accrued because of his considerable accomplishments as an educator, conductor, performer, mentor, and adjudicator. And, I will add, for the infectious joy he shared with beginners like me. As much as I have always admired Phil for all of those things, it’s the time in his early 20s that just makes you shake your head in wonder.
He was my first music teacher, whose impressive credentials accrued because of his considerable accomplishments as an educator, conductor, performer, mentor, and adjudicator. And, I will add, for the infectious joy he shared with beginners like me. As much as I have always admired Phil for all of those things, it’s the time in his early 20s that just makes you shake your head in wonder.
The barely-out-of-his-teens kid from Windsor hit the road for Ottawa in 1948, after a short stint playing an ice show tour featuring Barbara Ann Scott, the 1948 Olympic figure skating gold medalist. One day, after he’d taken a job dressing windows for a tobacco company, he got on the wrong streetcar and ran into a musician acquaintance, who told him they were auditioning sax players at the Standish Hall Hotel in Hull, Quebec. The Standish was an iconic club where the very top jazz musicians in North American regularly played.
Library of Canada Michael Berens Collection
They didn’t need sax players, but – “can you play clarinet?” The answer was a resounding yes, and Murphy was hired to play in the Standish Hall’s house band six nights a week. And what a job it was. The Standish booked top American jazz acts from time to time - Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, to name just a few. Most nights, the big acts would play two shows a night, and the house band did three dance sets. Sometimes, the local musicians got the night or the week off. “We got paid $50 a week, whether we played or not. Good money, when you could live on $30 or $35.”
“Trouble is,” he laughs, “I was drinking three quarts of beer a night.”
It was the start of many personal encounters with music’s biggest stars.
Ella Fitzgerald – “She’d just got divorced from Ray Brown when she came to the Standish. She invited me to sit down with her at a table as she was waiting to go on one night. She told me after the gig she was going to see Ray and Oscar (Peterson) at the Gatineau Club, a 10-minute cab ride. Ella asked me to go along. And there’s Ray working with Oscar Peterson. Ella introduced me to both of them.”
Nat King Cole - “He was really shy. I went up to talk to him. He was friendly, but he only answered questions. A couple of years later, I worked with him again. Twice. I asked him if he remembered me, and he said, ‘yeah, you were one of the guys who actually spoke to me.”
They didn’t need sax players, but – “can you play clarinet?” The answer was a resounding yes, and Murphy was hired to play in the Standish Hall’s house band six nights a week. And what a job it was. The Standish booked top American jazz acts from time to time - Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, to name just a few. Most nights, the big acts would play two shows a night, and the house band did three dance sets. Sometimes, the local musicians got the night or the week off. “We got paid $50 a week, whether we played or not. Good money, when you could live on $30 or $35.”
“Trouble is,” he laughs, “I was drinking three quarts of beer a night.”
It was the start of many personal encounters with music’s biggest stars.
Ella Fitzgerald – “She’d just got divorced from Ray Brown when she came to the Standish. She invited me to sit down with her at a table as she was waiting to go on one night. She told me after the gig she was going to see Ray and Oscar (Peterson) at the Gatineau Club, a 10-minute cab ride. Ella asked me to go along. And there’s Ray working with Oscar Peterson. Ella introduced me to both of them.”
Nat King Cole - “He was really shy. I went up to talk to him. He was friendly, but he only answered questions. A couple of years later, I worked with him again. Twice. I asked him if he remembered me, and he said, ‘yeah, you were one of the guys who actually spoke to me.”
Sarah Vaughan, Hank Jones – “Hank Jones was accompanying Sarah Vaughan at the Standish. She was very friendly. And I actually became pretty good friends with Hank. He asked me if I knew harmony. I said yeah, I’d studied it at the Conservatory. He said, ‘no, I mean JAZZ harmony.’ So, he sat me down at the piano and had me play Come to Me My Melancholy Baby – his way. Later I saw him play in New York at a place called the Band Box, right beside Birdland. He remembered me and came over. ‘Got your horn?’, he asked. I didn’t have it. I was there with my fiancé, and I said, “Hank, I just got engaged. He says, ‘that’s OK, we can probably find you one.’ He was very kind.”
Sarah Vaughan & friends Library of Canada Michael Berens Collection
“In those days, my experience was that the better the musician, the more approachable and willing to help you they were.”
Tommy Dorsey - “I actually watched Dorsey fire his whole band as he counted a tune in. He went ‘One, two - I forgot to tell you you’re all on two weeks’ notice.’ - three, four.’ His way of cutting costs before the band went back to New York, I guess. His musicians didn’t like him very much. He made them all wear shoestring bow ties they had to tie themselves. Then he’d go around and undo their tie, and then give ‘em hell for having their tie undone.”
Jack Teagarden, Earl "Fatha" Hines – “Jack came in playing trombone with Louis Armstrong’s band (Aug. 1951). In addition to Jack and Louis, that band had Barney Bigard (clarinet), Cozy Cole (drums), and Earl “Fatha” Hines (piano). Mrs. Teagarden introduced me to Jack, and he says to me, ‘I heard you play. You need a lesson? We’ll get together after the gig tomorrow night.’
“So I show up and he’s made up some cardboard chord charts which, when you moved them this way or that, displayed the relationship between all the different jazz chords. He went through it all with me. My second harmony lesson from a big-timer.”
“One Sunday morning my landlady in Ottawa tells me the Standish Hall just burned down. So, I grabbed a cab and got over there right away. First two guys I see are Earl Hines and Cozy Cole. They’re standing there with straw hats on, no shirts, and suspenders. They’d just gotten out of the burning building. Those two guys had gone to our band room, gathered up our instruments and music, got a ladder from the fire department, and slid it all down the ladder to safety. Those two jazz superstars saved the house band’s instruments and music. Unbelievable.”
Benny Goodman-The most cringeworthy story is the time the young
saxophonist/clarinetist was introduced to the occasionally nasty King of Swing – Benny Goodman, whose band was booked for a week at the Standish. Murphy had been asked by the Standish Hall manager to usher four members of the Goodman band through a round of golf, and later, dinner.
Tommy Dorsey - “I actually watched Dorsey fire his whole band as he counted a tune in. He went ‘One, two - I forgot to tell you you’re all on two weeks’ notice.’ - three, four.’ His way of cutting costs before the band went back to New York, I guess. His musicians didn’t like him very much. He made them all wear shoestring bow ties they had to tie themselves. Then he’d go around and undo their tie, and then give ‘em hell for having their tie undone.”
Jack Teagarden, Earl "Fatha" Hines – “Jack came in playing trombone with Louis Armstrong’s band (Aug. 1951). In addition to Jack and Louis, that band had Barney Bigard (clarinet), Cozy Cole (drums), and Earl “Fatha” Hines (piano). Mrs. Teagarden introduced me to Jack, and he says to me, ‘I heard you play. You need a lesson? We’ll get together after the gig tomorrow night.’
“So I show up and he’s made up some cardboard chord charts which, when you moved them this way or that, displayed the relationship between all the different jazz chords. He went through it all with me. My second harmony lesson from a big-timer.”
“One Sunday morning my landlady in Ottawa tells me the Standish Hall just burned down. So, I grabbed a cab and got over there right away. First two guys I see are Earl Hines and Cozy Cole. They’re standing there with straw hats on, no shirts, and suspenders. They’d just gotten out of the burning building. Those two guys had gone to our band room, gathered up our instruments and music, got a ladder from the fire department, and slid it all down the ladder to safety. Those two jazz superstars saved the house band’s instruments and music. Unbelievable.”
Benny Goodman-The most cringeworthy story is the time the young
saxophonist/clarinetist was introduced to the occasionally nasty King of Swing – Benny Goodman, whose band was booked for a week at the Standish. Murphy had been asked by the Standish Hall manager to usher four members of the Goodman band through a round of golf, and later, dinner.
While they’re waiting for cabs to take them to the restaurant, Goodman happens by and addresses Murphy, who recounts the conversation this way:
‘Hi Stuff,” Goodman says. ‘I’ve been listening to you play. You stink.’
“Terry Gibbs (vibraphonist) says, ‘C’mon Benny, leave the kid alone. He didn’t do anything to you.’
“I get into the car that Benny’s not in, I really don’t want to ride with him. He gets out of his car, and then gets into the car that I’m in, and he gives it to me all the way to the restaurant. Stuff like, ‘you never studied…you don’t know how to finger…your mouthpiece is lousy.’
“The next night I go to the Standish to eat supper, and Goodman sees me and he comes over, grabs me by the hand, and says ‘how ya doin’, Stuff? Good to see you. You didn’t pay any attention to me the other night, did you?’
“I said, ‘it’s OK Mr. Goodman.’ He says, ‘Well, I’m really glad to see you.”
“So then a little later I see the other guys, and I said to them, ‘Goodman’s out of his mind. He treated me like the Prodigal Son. And they all started to laugh.”
“Terry Gibbs says, ‘we were out for dinner with Benny, and Paul Smith (piano) took out a newspaper, laid it on the table and said, ‘hey, did you guys hear what happened to that young tenor player? He killed himself this morning. They found him dead on the bathroom floor.’
“And they let Goodman believe that. I guess two or three of them lit into Benny … ‘we told you so, that one of these days…. and that’s why he was so glad to see you the other night!’
‘Hi Stuff,” Goodman says. ‘I’ve been listening to you play. You stink.’
“Terry Gibbs (vibraphonist) says, ‘C’mon Benny, leave the kid alone. He didn’t do anything to you.’
“I get into the car that Benny’s not in, I really don’t want to ride with him. He gets out of his car, and then gets into the car that I’m in, and he gives it to me all the way to the restaurant. Stuff like, ‘you never studied…you don’t know how to finger…your mouthpiece is lousy.’
“The next night I go to the Standish to eat supper, and Goodman sees me and he comes over, grabs me by the hand, and says ‘how ya doin’, Stuff? Good to see you. You didn’t pay any attention to me the other night, did you?’
“I said, ‘it’s OK Mr. Goodman.’ He says, ‘Well, I’m really glad to see you.”
“So then a little later I see the other guys, and I said to them, ‘Goodman’s out of his mind. He treated me like the Prodigal Son. And they all started to laugh.”
“Terry Gibbs says, ‘we were out for dinner with Benny, and Paul Smith (piano) took out a newspaper, laid it on the table and said, ‘hey, did you guys hear what happened to that young tenor player? He killed himself this morning. They found him dead on the bathroom floor.’
“And they let Goodman believe that. I guess two or three of them lit into Benny … ‘we told you so, that one of these days…. and that’s why he was so glad to see you the other night!’
Benny Goodman & friends Library of Canada Michael Berens Collection
“Seriously. I can’t make this stuff up. But what he said to me was absolutely accurate. I couldn’t play then. But I never really had the perception that I couldn’t play well. Fifty years later, I was a very good clarinet player. I improved all the time. I could play anywhere, with anyone.”
Ray Brown and Oscar Peterson (again) - “I met Ray a couple of times after the Standish. Years later, when I was teaching in London, Oscar, Ed Thigpen, and Ray were playing at Campbell’s Restaurant. I went down to see them, and Ray says, “what are you doin’ after? He invited me to Oscar’s rehearsal for the trio. So after the job, we had a sandwich and a coffee, and I went off to see Oscar rehearse those guys. Ray told me to make sure I didn’t make a sound. I didn’t. I left at three because I had an eight o’clock class the next morning.”
Frances Langford – The house band backed mega-star Frances Langford (singer and star of radio and film, well-known for her participation in Bob Hope’s troop entertainment shows). Her then-husband and co-star was Jon Hall, a well-known Hollywood adventure actor and matinee idol.
Cliff Edwards - Murphy didn’t even know that he’d met actor Cliff Edwards (aka “Ukelele” Ike), who was the voice of Walt Disney’s Jiminy Cricket in Pinocchio. It was only after Murphy heard Edwards sing When You Wish Upon a Star, the beloved Disney tune that Edwards himself had introduced in 1940, that he realized whom he’d been talking to.
Jimmy Cleveland – “He came into the Standish with Lionel Hampton’s band. We went out for a coffee. He said to me, ‘you OK doin’ this with me?’ And I realized he couldn’t do it in the States very much…have a coffee with a white guy. He was surprised that nobody cared. Five guys actually quit Hampton’s band then and there, and stayed in Ottawa, because they liked that about Canada. But they didn’t stay too long, because it took them too long to get their full-time playing cards.”
“Seriously. I can’t make this stuff up. But what he said to me was absolutely accurate. I couldn’t play then. But I never really had the perception that I couldn’t play well. Fifty years later, I was a very good clarinet player. I improved all the time. I could play anywhere, with anyone.”
Ray Brown and Oscar Peterson (again) - “I met Ray a couple of times after the Standish. Years later, when I was teaching in London, Oscar, Ed Thigpen, and Ray were playing at Campbell’s Restaurant. I went down to see them, and Ray says, “what are you doin’ after? He invited me to Oscar’s rehearsal for the trio. So after the job, we had a sandwich and a coffee, and I went off to see Oscar rehearse those guys. Ray told me to make sure I didn’t make a sound. I didn’t. I left at three because I had an eight o’clock class the next morning.”
Frances Langford – The house band backed mega-star Frances Langford (singer and star of radio and film, well-known for her participation in Bob Hope’s troop entertainment shows). Her then-husband and co-star was Jon Hall, a well-known Hollywood adventure actor and matinee idol.
Cliff Edwards - Murphy didn’t even know that he’d met actor Cliff Edwards (aka “Ukelele” Ike), who was the voice of Walt Disney’s Jiminy Cricket in Pinocchio. It was only after Murphy heard Edwards sing When You Wish Upon a Star, the beloved Disney tune that Edwards himself had introduced in 1940, that he realized whom he’d been talking to.
Jimmy Cleveland – “He came into the Standish with Lionel Hampton’s band. We went out for a coffee. He said to me, ‘you OK doin’ this with me?’ And I realized he couldn’t do it in the States very much…have a coffee with a white guy. He was surprised that nobody cared. Five guys actually quit Hampton’s band then and there, and stayed in Ottawa, because they liked that about Canada. But they didn’t stay too long, because it took them too long to get their full-time playing cards.”
On Second Thought ... “I had offers to play in some name American bands south of the border in 1950 – Blue Barron, Johnny Long, Shep Fields. They needed new players because some of their guys were getting drafted for the Korean War.”
“Paul Martin Sr., who was also from Windsor (and a heavyweight cabinet minister in the governments of Louis St. Laurent, Lester Pearson, and Pierre Trudeau), called the American embassy for me, and managed to get me across the border. I came face-to-face with an American marine sergeant, who asked if I’d like to sign up. I said no, I’m a musician. He told me it didn’t matter that I was Canadian - I’d have to register for the draft within 24 hours. Two of my Windsor friends were drafted that way, and ended up getting killed. Me, I went home.”
Murphy was still playing sax and clarinet in public right up until the pandemic began. While Parkinsons is presenting some challenges, there’s still the fun in his voice I first noticed as he fitted me with my first trombone fifty-six years ago. Phil Murphy’s joy of music burns hotter than ever.
“Paul Martin Sr., who was also from Windsor (and a heavyweight cabinet minister in the governments of Louis St. Laurent, Lester Pearson, and Pierre Trudeau), called the American embassy for me, and managed to get me across the border. I came face-to-face with an American marine sergeant, who asked if I’d like to sign up. I said no, I’m a musician. He told me it didn’t matter that I was Canadian - I’d have to register for the draft within 24 hours. Two of my Windsor friends were drafted that way, and ended up getting killed. Me, I went home.”
Murphy was still playing sax and clarinet in public right up until the pandemic began. While Parkinsons is presenting some challenges, there’s still the fun in his voice I first noticed as he fitted me with my first trombone fifty-six years ago. Phil Murphy’s joy of music burns hotter than ever.
Reflections on music learning - Andy Sparling
I apologize to Doreen Pike, my first piano teacher.
I was seven when Mom signed me up for lessons. I hated them. I had to be threatened into practising with no end of disappearing privileges. Miss Pike, a fastidious “wrists up, back straight” instructor, tried her very best in the face of this frustrating ball of obstinate boyhood. We all gave up when, according to Mom, I sped up at a recital in a deliberate act of sabotage. I can’t remember; I guess I blocked that out. George Bernard Shaw foretold my arrival on a piano bench when he said “youth is wasted on the young.”
After my interview with Phil Murphy, I got thinking about the role of music education, both in my own experience, and because it’s a big part of the mission of the Prince Edward County Jazz Festival.
No one would mistake me for a musician capable of playing on the main stage at that festival. But I’ve had an ocean of satisfaction and joy (not to mention a not-insignificant second source of income) in a part-time horn-blowing career. I now attribute a large part of my life’s richness to “Mr. Murphy.”
A couple of years after the keyboard catastrophe, my dad took me on the road with Lionel Thornton and the Casa Royal Orchestra. Every Friday night in the summer, I’d ride with the musicians in this Lombardo-esque dance band to Moon Mullins’ Dance Pavilion in Kincardine on the shore of Lake Huron, where I’d help set the band up, and then watch the show (9pm – 1am} from an unused balcony as 400 couples, dressed to the nines, danced the night away. Step One on my road of musical rehabilitation.
In Grade 7, I signed up for a new elementary school band. I’d decided I wanted to play the trombone, surprisingly impressed by the Casa Royal trombonist’s solo on I’m Getting Sentimental Over You. Rehearsals were held at London Central Secondary School, where Phil Murphy was the Music Department head. He was the organizer and conductor, and he did it all after school on his own time. He thought it was important to his own developing high school program to have a “feeder” band made up of kids who would come to his music program two years later. The idea was they’d be “junior-band-ready.”
I remember the first day clearly. Assigning instruments to us, Murphy took my right “slide” arm and eyeballed the distance between my wrist and my shoulder. The verdict - “Well, you won’t reach seventh position for awhile, but that’ll come.” I was SO proud to take that school-issued trombone home that night.
Once-a-week for two years, we rehearsed. Okay - “rehearsal” is pushing it - we made a lot of noise figuring out how to operate the hardware, read the notes, and play in tune (yeah, right!) without driving the amiable “Mr. Murphy” completely around the bend. It was so much fun, especially with a teacher whose personality was a perfect fit for beginners. By the time we hit Grade 9, we were automatically in the school junior band, which of course was the “feeder” for the senior band. We wondered how we would ever be good enough to play there; it was reserved for students in Grades 11, 12, and 13.
But, by the end of Grade 10, we had progressed to the point where some of us were promoted in time for a band trip to the East Coast. First time my horn had taken me out of town! From then on, it was an elite-level high school experience performing in concert bands, a stage band, chamber groups, and pit orchestras. In fact, it was a 16-piece, all-student pit band, playing from REAL Broadway music “books,” that performed in productions of The Boyfriend and Guys and Dolls. Our senior concert band won the “march” class at the Toronto Kiwanis Music Festival in 1971. Three of us actually sat in one Saturday night on a real “gig” with one of London’s two leading dance bands. The music program led by Phil Murphy and Don Clarke had clearly done something right.
It wasn’t till years later that I realized just HOW strong that program had been. I didn’t go on in music - I didn’t have enough piano credentials. (!) I got into another line of work that left no time for music for fifteen years. Then one day, I changed jobs, and I got playing again. I started practising like crazy. Thirty years later, I can look back on highlights like leading a successful big swing band for ten years, going “on the road” for a brief period with the 60s supergroup The Temptations, leading a busy jazz and swing trio, and playing in nearly a dozen musical theatre productions. That beginning under Phil Murphy set me up for all of that.
Some of his students, like bassoonist Rifka Eisenstat, DID go into music at university. She attributes the success of her career, and the role of seemingly innocuous events in its unfolding to Murphy as well.
“I played flute in Grades 7 & 8 after school at Central as well. Because I was already playing flute, I was a little bored when I got to Grade 9. Mr. Murphy (hard to call him Phil) asked if I’d like to try a different instrument and suggested bassoon because there were no bassoonists in the school. If I hadn’t switched to bassoon I probably wouldn’t have ended up in the Faculty of Music at Western (they also needed bassoonists). And if I didn’t get a degree in music, I probably wouldn’t have gotten a job as a teacher (in ‘77 there were only music and French jobs). My whole life trajectory was established by playing flute in Grades 7 & 8 after school at Central.”
These are the characteristics of effective learning and teaching: dedicated, professionally-invested teaching and mentoring, and challenging performance opportunities in secure environments. They guided Phil Murphy, and they’re the cornerstones of the music education programs offered by the Prince Edward County Jazz Festival.
Phil Murphy bio notes
1959 - he was the first wind player to graduate from the University of Western Ontario with a music degree. As a teacher, thirty years in the London public and separate school systems, 17 years part-time faculty member at Western, and 16 years teaching a jazz course at Fanshawe College. As a performer/conductor/adjudicator: RCR Band, principal clarinet of the London Symphony for 19 years, and musical director at London’s Grand Theatre; music “manager” for the visit of the Queen in 1973. Saxophone and clarinet performer/conductor in many concert and big bands, leader of his own jazz trio and Klezmer band. Music festival adjudicator across Canada.
Andy Sparling is a somewhat-retired teacher, broadcaster, author and journalist with an obsession for the trombone. He led the Commodores Orchestra for ten years, and his own jazz & swing trio for eight. He’s also a proud volunteer for the Prince Edward County Jazz Festival.
1959 - he was the first wind player to graduate from the University of Western Ontario with a music degree. As a teacher, thirty years in the London public and separate school systems, 17 years part-time faculty member at Western, and 16 years teaching a jazz course at Fanshawe College. As a performer/conductor/adjudicator: RCR Band, principal clarinet of the London Symphony for 19 years, and musical director at London’s Grand Theatre; music “manager” for the visit of the Queen in 1973. Saxophone and clarinet performer/conductor in many concert and big bands, leader of his own jazz trio and Klezmer band. Music festival adjudicator across Canada.
Andy Sparling is a somewhat-retired teacher, broadcaster, author and journalist with an obsession for the trombone. He led the Commodores Orchestra for ten years, and his own jazz & swing trio for eight. He’s also a proud volunteer for the Prince Edward County Jazz Festival.
