HENRY GRIMES with JANE BUNNETT and ANDREW CYRILLE at Gallery 345 (345 Sorauren), Monday (September 13), 8 pm. $25, stu $10. 416-822-9781.
Philadelphia-born bassist Henry Grimes has a thought or two about how the jazz scene’s changed over the last few decades.
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“The different races of musicians who take part all seem to be coming together and starting to get along,” observes Grimes over the phone from a tour stop in Chicago.
He’s got plenty of first-hand experience to back that up. After all, in the 50s and 60s Grimes built himself a career most musicians would envy, playing and recording alongside Thelonious Monk, Anita O’Day, Benny Goodman and Sonny Rollins, and, later, burning brightly with free-jazz giants Cecil Taylor, Albert Ayler, Don Cherry and countless others.
But then his story gets weird. In the late 60s, he mysteriously disappeared, as if the earth had swallowed him whole. For 35 years, nothing was heard from him, and many assumed he had died. In 2002, social worker and jazz fan Marshall Marrotte found a nearly destitute Grimes in L.A. living in a tiny apartment and doing odd jobs to stay alive. The bass hadn’t been part of his life for decades he’d channelled his creativity into poetry and drawing.
With help, Grimes re-emerged, and when word spread, master bassist William Parker gave him a new bass, colleagues and fans from all over the world began calling, and offers to play rolled in.
Since then, Grimes hasn’t wasted a minute. At 75, he finds himself playing, recording and touring in Europe, North America and Japan. Now living in New York, he’s also a recently published poet, and his amazing story has been documented in the New York Times and on NPR.
“It’s been fantastic. Joyfully fun,” Grimes says of his return to music. “I can just delve into myself and the bass, and what’s released is something new.
“It feels like I never left.”
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