Lessons from the mouth of a Rolling Stone

Part 3

by: John Miller

2.  Put yourself in the right place at the right time, i.e. pick up the phone when Miles Davis calls.

Following the events described above, Darryl began an extremely successful run of performing both in Chicago and on the road with any number of jazz, blues, and rhythm and blues bands, particularly focusing on the jazz scene.  He told me that he remembered the night that the Rolling Stones sat in with Muddy Waters on the southside of Chicago (now available on DVD or streaming) at Buddy Guy’s old club The Checkerboard, because he was trying to get to a gig and had no idea why all the traffic was backed up.  While he was gigging around, he became friends with a young man who was the nephew of jazz legend Miles Davis.  

Although Darryl had achieved some success, he told me that he was still living at home with his parents. One day while he was doing the dishes, the phone rang, and he picked it up. The voice on the other end of the line said (and here Darryl imitated the raspy voice of Miles): this is Miles Davis can I speak to Darryl. Darryl immediately believed it was one of his friends pranking him and said so. If I recall correctly, he said that he even took the precaution of calling Miles back, remember long distance was expensive at the time for a budding musician, to make sure that it wasn't a practical joke.  Miles asked him to go get his bass and play into the telephone. Darryl did so and Miles asked Darryl how soon he could be in New York for a truer audition.  Darryl said to me that he was trying to play cool and he said he could be there in about two weeks. Miles said “what, are you going to walk?" Darryl then decided that he could be there in two days and flew out to New York.

The audition with Miles Davis was just Miles and Darryl, and Darryl was to play along with a recording of Miles group playing live at a recent concert. Just before Darryl started to play, Miles said to him "now if I don't hire you, it doesn't mean you can't play, it just means it's not what I'm looking for right now." Darryl told me this gave him a lot of freedom and confidence.