Extracts From My Book – The Last Note Book By Sharon McMahan
I Have No Choice
Detroit was fully engaged as a music town. It housed some of the greatest jazz musician in the word.
It is a known fact that most of all the so-called Funk Brothers who were used by Berry Gordy at Motown, originally were jazz musicians and played at Bakers Keyboard Lounge and other jazz venues in Detroit.
My Aunt Brent who live upstairs, had learned to play the piano, as a young girl. She taught me a couple of songs when I started out writing. They had a piano upstairs too. There was the sounds of pianos upstairs and downstairs. We could hear each other whenever we played songs. Sometimes we would play something and answer each other whenever we played a song. For instance, I would play the left-hand part of a song and Cindy would would answer me with the right-hand. They had a younger brother too, my cousin Paul but he didn’t play.
Sometimes a jazz musician would come to visit upstairs and they would teach Cindy something on the piano. As soon as they would leave, she would come downstairs and teach me. That is how I learned to play the blues song, after Hours. After he taught her how to play it, she came downstairs and taught me. I found out years years later, (about 15years ago) from my Aunt Brent that is was jazz pianist, Tommy Flanagan’s version of After Hours that I learned. He was the one who taught Cindy how to play.
Another keyboard player that used to stop by upstairs was Tucker Cole. One summer day, early afternoon, I was in the living room at the piano playing a couple chords, trying to come up with an idea for a song. The front door was opened but the screen door was lock. The door leading to the enclosed front porch was open too. Tucker Cole came up on the porch and before he rang the bell to go upstairs he heard me playing.
He tapped on the sceen door. I went over and he asked me, through the door, “Is that you playing the piano”?
I answered “Yes”
He then said, “Do you mind if I come in for a moment and show you a couple chords”? So I agreed and opened the screen door and let him in. He walked over to the piano and sat down. I sat next to him.
I had never met him before this day. He probably had heard me playing the piano at another time when he was visiting.
He began to play a series of chords in the key of F. I recognized them as jazz chords because the were 7 chords. I wasn’t using 7 chords in my songs yet. Anyway, he did an entire set of 7 chords where he started at A minor 7 and ended at F major 7. Then he played the bass notes with a cords. He told me to watch him and then asked me to play it. I stumbled thought it. So, he played it again and then he asked me to play it again. I did and then he had me play it once more.
After that he said “OK. You got it”. Then he stood up. I thanked him and he left and went upstairs.
After he left, I kept playing it. I liked the way it sounded . I was worried that I might forget it. I played it over and over and over. I t was a new sound for me. I LIKED IT. The next day, when I got up, I couldn’t wait to play it to some more. Then I started putting a beat to it. I liked the style of it. It was the first time I played 7 chords. They sounded smooth. Those chords later became the main verse structure for “I Have No Choice”. At that time Ollie McLaughlin had not requested a song. I was just something I wrote on my own.
The next time Ollie came by, I played “I Have No Choice” for him and he liked it. He had me play it again and really listened. A few days went by, maybe a week or so and he came over and told me he wanted to bring Johnnie Mae Matthews over to hear it. So, he did. He had me play it for her. She liked it. They both had a nod of approval to each other.
Then Ollie said to me, Johnnie lives down the street. She will be coming over to learn it and practice it. I said “Okay”. He told me he wanted to record it on her.
I was happy to meet her. But I tried to be cool about it. I Detroit, back in those days, you grew up learning how to be cool; to be reserved about music, even if you liked it. At least that was the behavior I had become accustomed to spending time with the musicians at United Sounds. I was familiar with the song she had out at the time because I heard it on the radio everyday. It was titled, “My Little Angel”.
Johnnie Mae Matthews was living down near the corner of 14th St., on the opposite side of the street. My house was in the middle of the block. So, she would walk down and me play the song and sing it with her. I remember she had her daughter with her who happens to be one of my Facebook friends. Her name Kaiya Matthews Johnson. She saysshe remembers walking down to my house.
Johnnie and my mother got along well. They would have coffee sometimes and talk. Johnnie was a genuine human being. She was one of those tell it like it is women. I enjoyed listening to her talk. It was during one of her conversations with mother that she found out that I had two songs out on Barbara Lewis one that was charting on the Billboard Hot 100, by The Searchers in the UK.
She informed my mother about the importance of me joining BMI as a songwriter. She explained that I could get paid radio royalties every time my songs are played on the air. We followed up on her suggestion. I sent a letter to BMI and requested to join. They sent me papers to fill out, sign and send back. They also requested an 8×10 black and white photo. We promptly sent all the forms in the mail, and I joined BMI as a writer that year (1964). I was fifteen.
Soon after so many rehearsals, she had finally learned the song. We made a tape tape copy eventually she got the track recorded. I didn’t know what kind of deal she had with Ollie, I just knew he was producing it. Maybe he was paying for the studio and the musicians. I didn’t really know.
Her vocals was recorded at United Sounds. Ollie picked me up. It was, you guessed it, a Saturday. He wanted me to be there to see Johnnie record my song. I do remember se wore a flowered dress. I believe that session took place place in 1965. I was surprised to learn from Richard Gilberts book that James Jamerson played bass on “I Have No Choice”. That means that Johnnie was the one who booked the session and contracted the musicians to recorded the track. That makes it even more special!
I found out later Johnnie Mae Matthews is the who discovered The Temptations and brought them to Motown. Her history in the industry is mind boggling. She was the first woman in the United States, of any color , to own a record label.
I turned sixteen in January, 1965. I remember my brother received a visit from my grandmother one afternoon. No one home except me and mother. I believe I standing outside near the back door of the house, when I noticed my grandmother’s car in the our driveway. So, I came in the back door, which lead to the kitchen, and I could hear them talking in the dining room, but the kitchen door was closed.
As I approached, I could hear my grandmother’s (my father’s mother)telling my mother that she was going to selling the property and that we all had to move. I didn’t say a word. I could see through a slit where the kitchen door was attached to the wall. I could see this was causing my mother distress. She didn’t know what to do. At that time, my father was living in another state and my mother was working part time a Hudson’s department store downtown. Now we had to move.
Link To Buy My Book “The Last Note”
https://amzn.eu/d/2eJCFcy
Till Next Time…Sharon McMahan