San Francisco has a rich Jazz history with numerous significant clubs and music centers all throughout the 49-square mile city of San Francisco from North Beach to the Tenderloins, and more distinctly, the Fillmore. This bustling and ever-expanding Jazz scene throughout the district from just after the second world war, up until the mid-to-late-60’s, was as many critiques argue, highly representative and symbolic of the golden era of Modern Jazz, as well as the golden era of the Fillmore district as the central gathering place of San Francisco’s Black community. San Francisco Jazz culture truly aims to follow the history of the diverse African American community, and its main goal is none other than continue its progression (Harlem of the West, UCSC).
Before WWII, modern jazz in the swing and bebop varieties was actually doing pretty well in popularity in the Central Avenue portion of LA, but SF was still mainly focused with Dixieland. Through the 1940s, daring new clubs were brought to life in the Tenderloin and North Beach neighborhoods, offering new forms of Jazz to San Franciscans. They got to it voraciously. Time came the mid-1950s, various jazz night clubs were found all throughout the SF neighborhoods (Harlem of the West UCSC).
Carol Chamberland states in her Essay on SF Jazz culture that Drummer Earl Watkins reminisces:
It’s likely you have four clubs in a city block, one on each side of the road. And you bypass several more blocks and then you have another handful of clubs. You’d see the Club Alabam, that was one of your old set up jazz night clubs. It later became club Sullivan. Next door was the brand new, New Orleans Swing club. That they had a type of girls within. The guys got excellent rings. On Fillmore between Sutter and Post, you’d Elsie’s Breakfast club. And later you’d Harold Blackshear’s Cafe World. Then down the stop was the club called The Favor. Next door from that was the Havana club, and when you transpired the next stop, Fillmore between Post and Geary, you’d be at The Long Bar, which acquired Ella Fitzgerald as one of their acts. (Carol Chamberland)
After another handful of blocks and you’d be at The Blue Mirror. Then across from the Blue Mirror, that they had the Ebony Plaza Hotel. Inside the basement, that they had a club. If you travelled up Fillmore to Ellis Block, you’d be at the Booker T. Washington Hotel. And on the ground floor, in their lounge, that they had entertainment. The Fillmore, North Beach, the Tenderloin, the Waterfront. San Francisco was jumping to the challenge of forward jazz music.
During the early on 1950s, even the U.S. participation in the Korean Conflict played a tiny role in attracting musicians to SF. The Bay Area was home to, or went to by, many a musician in armed forces attire. Normally as he could, John Handy went back to SF from his Military base just south of his home, to perform and observe before his redeployment to Korea. Chet Baker was a handsome white guy, with Armstrong trumpet capabilities, and a lot of energy. Over time, much of a nearby community had hit rock bottom, and the SF Redevelopment Agency had chosen it as a location looking for metropolitan renewal. In payment and reparations to the Japanese population that were displaced during WWII, a fresh Japantown was built (Carol Chamberland).
This building led to the closing of all businesses that got occupied the old complexes and the dispersal of the family members who possessed dwelt there. Holidaymakers today will see a massive multiplex theatre, apartment complexes, hotels, and numerous Japanese restaurants dominating the region, with a loan company at the location where Bop City once stood. Buchanan Road has been sealed to vehicular traffic, and there is absolutely no such address as 1690 Post Road (Carol Chamberland).
The Black and African communities in America have been an integral part of SF and the Bay since prior to the Gold Rush. The city’s Black population found its best increase, however, during WWII. Hailing generally from Louisiana and Texas, the newcomers have been recruited to work in Bay Area shipyards. Many resolved into homes in the American Addition just lately vacated by San Franciscans of Japanese descent who was simply forced, under Leader Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Professional Order 9066, to relocate to internment camps (Solnit, 2010)
As the warfare progressed and removing so many Japanese people had occurred, the European Addition became home to a large number of African-Americans who originated from the southern USA to work in SF’s shipyards with other wartime businesses. The city’s existing but small Black inhabitants exploded. The vacant homes remaining in the Fillmore by interned Japanese residents had fascinated African-American workers, music artists, and artists. It had been also at the moment that the Fillmore started out to build up a reputation to be home for some of the world’s best jazz music artists as well as a few of the most popular jazz clubs in SF (Solnit, 2010)
Over the next 2 decades, a noticeable African American existence created its placement and standing in the Western Addition community around the Fillmore Neighborhood. This included a captivating jazz and rhythm-and-blues nightclub world that included such designers such as Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday break, Matter Bassie, Thelonious Monk, and Ella Fitzgerald. When Justin Herman had taken control of the SF Redevelopment Firm in 1959, however, he oversaw the destruction of a lot of the Fillmore and the constructive eviction of Black residents from a nearby, bringing a finish to the Fillmore jazz time. Adam Baldwin’s 1963 documentary, “Take This Hammer,” addresses the fallout (Bloch, 2009).
Originally published 15.10.2019