Hadda Brooks

S = Standifer
H = Hadda Brooks

S We'll ask her in a few moments to give us her full name, and how she got this particular name. She's sitting in the front lawn of her home here in East Los Angeles. Over here in the background there's a scrapping of someone across the street who is doing some house work, we won't be involved with that too much longer. Good morning Ms. Brooks.
H Good morning!

S Can you tell us something about where we are in L. A. and about the neighborhood?
H Well ah this neighborhood used to be, cause I was born in this neighborhood, it used to be ah mostly Jewish, some Hispanics and some Blacks. Now it's really mostly Hispanics, it used to be called Pearl Heights. It still is Pearl Heights. I don't know just exactly how they, East L.A., got the name, but they are identified by both those names.

S How long have you been living in the neighborhood?
H I can't tell you. Ha, Ha, well I was born here quite a while.

S Oh you were born in L. A.
H I was born here, just a block over from where we are now.

S Now that's very unusual, you're the first person I've really met in this country... in this town that's really from this town. Everybody seems to be from somewhere else.
H Yes, I mean they do seem to marvel at someone being born in Los Angeles.

S And especially one having lived in the same place or near the same place where you were born, that's even more unusual.
H Well my grandfather built this home, and he also built the home where I was actually born, which is as I said a half of a block from here on the other street. But ah I haven't thought to go anywhere else, my mother was here and my family was here, when ever I came back off the road I came home.

S When you say, what was your grandfathers... Brooks for example, is that a married name?
H No, no, that's a stage name first.

S A stage name, what is...
H My real name is Hop- good...

S How do you spell that?
H Hopgood

S So that's your grandfather's name ...
H Right...

S Now that's a very unusual name in ah... is that a family that goes way, way back in L. A.?
H I don't think I traced it but we were the only Hopgood in the book for years and I don't know about any other Hopgood. There was one Hapgood, but we were the only Hopgoods, Samuel Alexander Hopgood.

S Samuel Alexander Hopgood.
H Yes...

S Have you any idea what the derived, maybe is it German or... ?
H I'm not quite sure, when I was in Australia Jim, there were 8 Hopgoods in their phone book, phone directory. Eight Hopgoods and two Hapgoods, now I don't know exactly what happens there.

S I see... what was your mother... your grandmothers from?
H My grandmother, oh...

S Was she from L. A. as well?
H No, no, no, no, they came from Georgia, Atlanta

S Oh... Atlanta good ole soul folk
H My grandfather brought his family out here. His son, well he only had one child and that... my father, he and his wife and my grandmother I mean, and then his son came out here and my mother followed. And of course naturally his sisters and brothers and uncles came out later.

S So the entire family really came out here then, practically.
H Well yeah, my family yes. I call... what I really call my family is my grandfather, my mother, my grandmother I didn't know, she passed before I was born.

S Now how many sisters and brothers did you have.
H I just had one sister

S And that's the one that I met the other night at the club, right?
H That's right...

S She's beautiful and she's marvelous, it was nice talking with her...
H Yes she is beautiful.

S Does she live near by as well?
H She has her home right into the side of me on the same property.

S I see over in this direction here?
H Yes, to the back...

S I see... is she also a singer, a performer?
H No, she is a nurse, pediatrician

S Oh that's good... well I started to say that's good because when you get sick she can help you, but if she is a pediatrician I guess you haven't had the need for that in quite a while have you?
H Well no not me but I mean, like she does have a great bit of knowledge about medicine.

S I see well...
H She can... she doesn't prescribe but she can help you.

S As a girl, lets move back to when you were young and I'd like to know what motivated you to become a performer a pianist a singer did you start out wanting to be that?
H No I didn't start out wanting to be that I hadn't... I didn't have a career as to that I was going to end up being a performer. My father gave my sister and I lessons when I was four, piano. And the teacher took me only if I could stretch an octave.

S At four?
H huh...

S At four?
H At four... and ah I think she waited a week, and when she came back I could stretch an octave and then she took me. A year later my sister started, but I continued on with her for about twenty years.

S Let's see you hand...
H It is hurt... this one

S ah huh...
H I had an accident but there is a span.

S Okay, cause I say that at four years if you could stretch an octave that's pretty presumptuous on the part of a teacher isn't it?
H I mean like in other words if you were capable of stretching an octave, then she could advance you as quickly as possible, because of the fact that you could put some cords into your fingers and you didn't have to stretch to reach them.

S I see...
H But if ah... I'm not going to say it was that easy. I'm going to say that I did have to practice stretching.

S What kind of music did you play with her as of early?
H Oh my goodness... ah all classics.

S So no blues no jazz no folk...
H Oh no, no, no, no, no, in fact I hit... when I got up into my teen I hit all jazz and the popular songs and the sheet music before she came to teach me a lesson.

S So you were doing that already then or...
H I was trying and I was reading it yes... ]

S I see... did you have any church influence at all...
H No...

S You know I ask that because so many of the performers, especially the women tell me that they really got most of their biggest opportunities for experience in the churches, I guess because it was more difficult for women to get experience than men, and so ah... that's interesting, I mean it's not a ________ of course but ah were your family involved in the church at all?
H Well my mother... and she's to in fact my sister and I went to Sunday school just as soon as we ere able to ah walk I guess, I mean I don't remember her carrying me, but we were Methodist-Episcopal and the things that I did go into with church was ah I gave a lot of readings. They seemed to think that my voice diction was clear and then I used to play for... we had different programs like women's day and girl's day and I used to play the organ for those programs.

S Oh I see...
H But I did not play for church...

S How early did you start getting experience and where?
H Experience in what?

S In performing?
H oh...

S I'm again putting a perspective, sometimes you can get experience in the church when you can't get it else where, or playing for marriages and weddings and things.
H Oh yes... I had ah... experience in playing for a dance studio. A Rudy Coven Dance Studio, he was a terrific dancer. We taught the stars. And ah one day I was in a music company trying to figure out how many different rhythms I could get from the Poet and Peasant, trying to get a Roth trying to get a two-step rhythm, trying to get ah I don't know... a boogie rhythm or a blues rhythm, and there was somebody standing behind me, which I didn't know and it frightened me and he said can you play boogie? And I said I don't know, and he says well I'll he says I'll give you a week till you have one and we'll record it.

S oh my goodness...
H And he says ah... if something comes up we're in business and if nothing comes up, I've lost money.

S Who was this person?
H It was Jules Bihar...

S Did something come of it?
H It came of it...

S Is that your first recording?
H First recording...

S When was this?
H ah forty-six 1946...

S Has that... I know most of your records you mentioned to me you said some of the old records that you can't ... their out of print or you don't have. Is that still available or is it...
H No, it's a collectors now...

S oh I see... what label was it on?
H It's on Modern Records of Hollywood

S Modern Records of Hollywood...
H yeah...

S And ah did you have one in your own possession?
H Yes I have one... in fact ah here recently there's a lot of people that collected them for me. Even in seventy-eights they work and their breakable, and ah then they gave some of them to me in forty-fives.

S I remember last... the other night at the performance someone brought a recording that you said that you didn't have or hadn't seen for a long time.
H Yes and I received that... I received one just like day before yesterday. It was marvelous.

S What are you going to do with your material and collections... do you intend to give them to a museum or archive or sell it as the Hadda Brooks memorabilia or what?
H Well I have a small nephew and a niece and if their interested they can have it, I mean nobody's approached me about a museum.

S You're approached as of now... I'm the director of the Afro-American Music Collection, we have stuff like Mary Leah Williams, and Edith Wilson ah Miss Rose Chee-chee Murphy is talking to us about this now. The advantage of it and I'll talk to you about it more off camera, is the fact that we're able to preserve it in a way that three hundred years it will be as fresh and beautiful as ever and your around now to direct what happens to it. So that its value increases rather than diminishes because so many of our black performers such as you, Miss Brooks we want to historicalize, but their material either doesn't exist or it exists in someone's attic. So it's important that you keep it that's the main thing, and you ought to do that.
H yes...

S Lets get back to off the commercial for a while... but I wanted to make that pitch while I had the opportunity. Tell me something more about as a young girl, as you grew into your career, you mentioned your first recording in the forties, forty-six did you say?
H Yes, just at the end of world war two.

S okay, then after that did your career blast off or it took a little more dues getting before you were able to.
H No, I've often been approached, Jim, to write a book and I keep telling people there isn't really much that I think I have to write about, because it wasn't any dues paying or struggling to make it. I mean like that sounds like it's... I don't know how it sounds but it's the truth. I mean the very first record a Sherman and Clay in San Francisco was a classical house, they have nothing but classical music on their shelves and it was a very, very prestige's place. My sister went to San Francisco and she took a box of my first boogie, Blues and the Boogie, she took it up there and she... I guess she sold it. They bought it and it went from there on. Everybody was very, very surprised because of the music that this place was selling and for them to take a boogie, they were very, very not upset but surprised.

S This is one that you had written...
H Oh I wrote all my boogies, but I mean like this one was ah the very first one. I had a saxophone on this boogie, which I didn't like but I mean they bought it.

S Speaking of a saxophone, have you generally been a soloist or have you had accompanist, group or trio?
H Oh no, I had a trio.

S And what pieces were they...
H A bass, drums and guitar... I've always loved guitar, I've always loved guitar, drums is not my favorite, and I will steer away from it if I can.

S Or if you got a good drum you can put a mask on him and tell him to be quiet most of the time.
H Well I mean I usually direct them as to use brushes no sticks, and they've been very, very beautiful with following with what I wanted to do. A drummer is somewhat of an egotist and he wants to be heard.

S Right... most are. Well tell me let's move into a little chronological development of your career. Having the singing and performing and I know you've done some movies and had some spots on television, tell us how some of those things accrued name us some of the things that you've done.
H Well after I became so popular with all my boogies, and Count Bassie made one record very, very popular because they had a radio show judging newcomers records as they came out and he gave my record double zero, and everybody went out to try to buy it to find out what in the world he found wrong with it, so it became very popular. Anyway on what's as popular or popularity I received an engagement with Charlie Burnett at the Million Dollar Theater here in Los Angeles downtown, which was, bring big name bands, like Lionel Hamilton, Dizzy Gillespie, and Charlie Barnett asked me one day or before maybe the show if I got an encore what was I going to do? And I said I guess I'll play another boogie, and he said no, he says why don't you sing, and I said I can't.

S Why was that now?
H Well because I never sing professionally.

S Oh I see...
H I was just beginning to be known by the boogie, and someone ah wanted to like Charlie Burnett wanted to break up the monotony he said you know I said I can't sing he said well jive, jive it to me. I went back to the studio real fast because I knew that... I can't think of the name of the trio, they were recording a tune that I liked very much, and I learned it; in fact I practically knew it you know. And the next show I received an encore and I sang the tune and the audience I can very safely say, flipped, so I had to record it, and that was my very first song and I didn't play anymore boogies. I just kept on singing.

S What label was it the same one?
H The same label, on Modern Records.

S And what year again?
H This was forty-eight.

S We're going to look for all of these things if we can find them, and that's why I'm trying to get these dates... in forty-eight. All right, after that what are some of the other things that began to occur?
H Well engagements after Charlie Burnett, then we traveled back east, I traveled not with the band but we went back to the theater in Washington D. C.

S The Warrington maybe?
H The what?

S The Warrington Theater
H I thing it was the Lido?

S It could have been the Lido
H Yes... it was a big theater also and I was there with Mercy Ellington, Clean Ed Vincent, and Jackie Moms Mobley she was absolutely a beautiful singer.

S Clean Ed Vincent too, my goodness...
H Yeah, Clean Ed Vincent, and ah I closed the show. They were ah very, very I can use the word sweet to me, cause I was a new comer.

S Now Moms Mobley had been around for a little while at that time...
H Yes she pulled a very, very funny joke on me.

S What was that?
H Well when I was in my dressing room, I was getting ready for the show being very, very nervous, this is the first time I'd been back East. Charlie Barnett was ah the band I was the extra-added attraction, Jackie Moms Mobley put a baby in front of my door, with a note on it because the name of the song that I made very, very popular was You Won't Let Me Go. So she put a note on the baby saying; Dear Hadda take care of this baby, I know you won't let him go.

S Oh my goodness...
H This went on all day Jim, I mean every time I went out they would announce; would the mother please come get the baby. They announced it on radio every 15 minutes; will the mother that left the baby in front of Hadda Brooks dressing room please come get the baby. At 11:00 the last show I worked out on the stage, Jackie Moms Mobley comes and she puts the baby in my arms and the mother comes from this side of the stage, Jackie Moms... I was about ready to drop, the baby was going to fall, I stood there and cried, here comes the mother and she got her baby, I almost went off the stage without doing my show. Well it was upsetting you know, I was imagining that I was going to have to take the baby back to my hotel, keep it all night; what was I going to do.

S Because no one would tell you who's baby it was or anything?
H No, no, nobody told me...

S Boy that's horrendous...
H But the popularity of the publicity of that incident, everybody flew into the theater just to see just what exactly I was going to do with the baby. And I had to leave my companion with the baby when I went to lunch, when I went to dinner before the last show, I didn't know what was going to happen.

S Well who... Moms Mobley... now that's, I think that's a beautiful story, and its also a very interesting way to get some publicity also.
H Well she thought of it, she thought of it because they were all looking after the baby. The mother didn't have anything to worry about, I wouldn't leave the dressing room, I really had to just go have lunch.

S What king of person besides that was Moms Mobley? Was she a sort of always joking person, a serious person or...
H Oh she was serious, she was serious, she took care of me like I was a baby, I mean she just warned me about this about different things and be careful and...

S So always giving you advice...
H Giving me advice about, not the show, advice about how to live, like not that particular day or that particular time, but maybe in the future, she was beautiful.

S What about Clean Ed Vincent, was he a pretty good chap to perform with?
H Oh yeah he was friendly, he was just friendly, I mean he didn't really go out of his way you know I mean like... I don't mean to sound like he was stand offish, but I mean like we were all on the show...

S Right
H We were all like the family, you know...

S You were pro's so you were there to get a job done...
H That's right...

S When did the movies discover you? Was that during that time?
H Yes, I came back here after I did the Apollo Theater with Charlie Barnett, and my agent called me up and said, they wanted me out at the Eagle Lions motion picture production place, and I asked him what for and he said they want you in a picture. They didn't even audition me.

S No screen test...
H No screen test, they just gave me the song and told me when to report back. That was the first picture.

S What song was listed?
H Out of the Blue...

S How's that go, now excuse my ignorance, is it a tune that I would recognize?
H I'm not quite sure, unless you've seen the picture, it was written by a man called Nemo. It starts, your love forget you forget he ever met you. True love will say howdy to you out of the blue... and I don't know the rest of it. I wished I did because I liked it. I'll review it someday.

S Well it sounds like a good tune and...
H It's a very good tune, especially sung with the complement of the piano and sung right, I mean when you get in the mood.

S Right... how does it work into the script, I mean how would you... how did they get you into the script?
H Well as far as I'm concerned I made two pictures and I still say when I announce them they're still looking for the plot, but I really don't know... I don't know how that's all felt, the name of the picture was Out of the Blue, the name of the song was Out of the Blue, Ann DeVoric, George Brent, Carol Landers, and I can't think of the other...

S That's quite a cast...
H Turon Bay I think was in... I don't know how it fit.

S Those big celebrities were... how did they treat this new comer, this singer, this non-actress with all this talent? You know, no screen test, you got on and I'm sure they started; they had to go through the obstacle course.
H Ann DeVoric, George Brent, and Turon Bay, Carol Landers was going through a property... personal trauma, so I mean like I didn't get close to her but George Brent and Ann DeVoric, Turon Bay just stood around and we talked after the director would say cut, and we would talk the entire time. And in fact the name that they gave me was Hazel, and I didn't like it so I asked the director, his name was Will Jason, and I said; my name is Hadda, so he had Ann DeVorik come over her voice after she had said: Hazel play it again. And she came back and she said; Hadda

S A voice over her...
H To make it come out in Hadda, how ever they do it I don't know, she said it four or five times... Hadda would you play it again... Hadda would you play it again... Hadda would you please play it again, and which ever one they it was in the picture.

S So is this then Hadda... the name Hadda was born so to speak?
H No... my name was Hadda when I started.

S Who gave it to you... how did you get it?
H My mother gave it to me...

S Oh your mother... oh that's... when you started, I was thinking when you started your performing rather... okay then, your mother... your given name... Hadda
H Yeah, and everybody in school called me Haddie.

S From Haddie in school, and Hadda, your mother had the best taste, I like Hadda. Very unusual
H They still call me Haddie, when ever I see them, Haddie Hopgood, I mean yeah that's alright.

S Well I know that I'm James but they call me Jim and Jimmy, so you know they always find something... so the Hazel, is they wanted to, just like they do anyone else, give you a name and it was Hazel.
H Well the script called for the name Hazel, I mean like you write a story and its either George or and your name could be Jim or Charlie or your name could be Buster you know but Hazel was in the script and they didn't know that I was going to really you know notice it.

S So then Hadda... well that's good cause Hadda is your real name, your given name in the movie, which is fairly unusual for most actors.
H I did... in that particular movie I mean I didn't have a chance to be approached in the other movie with Humphrey Bogart.

S All right, tell us about that.
H Well I mean, Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughn tried out for the singing scene in that picture, and I didn't say they didn't want them. I tried out for it and they chose me. So we went to the studio after they had made up their mind completely that I was to be the singer in that scene, we recorded it. And I don't sing a song the same way twice, because my mood might be different.

S Right...
H So I mean like ah the director was Nicholas Ray and he was trying to get me to which I don't remember, he was trying to get me to sing it the way he wanted it sung, and Humphrey Bogart said; well I'm sorry, you can't make a Shirley Temple out of a Judy Garland, so let her alone let her sing like she wants to sing it and that's the way it came out.

S Again, I'm going to ask the same question. Can you remember... give us anything about how that was worked into the script per say in terms of the story line?
H The story line was that Humphrey Bogart was neurotic he was... he had a quick temper, and he and Gloria Graham, who was in the picture, she was the star too. They went to a nightclub, and I was in the scene and I was singing; I Hadn't Anyone Till You, which was the song they picked and the detective that was following him around, trying to see if he had committed murder, or trying to harass him. He looked around and saw the detective there, and he slammed his hand on the piano and I looked up, very indignant as if to say; how dare you. That was the only part that I can think that was worked into the picture. I mean he was followed and he didn't like it.

S Did you have anything to say about, hey look this is not what I really want to do it, or could I do this way or could I... could you have any suggestions at all that they might have taken to?
H I did suggest that they start the record and let me come in later because there was no way in the world I could go in with I hadn't anyone, it would always come in first, I would come in second, and I wasn't synchronizing with it. So I said take the camera off of me and as soon as you see me synchronizing with the record then come back on me. Which was about I hadn't anyone TILL you is when they came in.

S Could you give us a verse or two of that to sort of give us atmosphere of what this song was like again, we all have herd it but just for our record.
H What... I hadn't anyone till you?

S Yes...
H I was a lonely one till you; I hadn't anyone till you; I was a lonely one till you; I used to lie awake and wonder if there could ever be someone in this wide, wide world

S Okay... that's so wonderful I'm going to ask you to start it again, with out the competition of the... the words the lyrics to this song we were just talking about that you sung in the movie, now what was the name of the movie again, Hadda?
H In a Lonely Place.

S In a lonely place and the lyrics to the tune that you sang in that movie were... could you give us those lyrics?
H Well the tune I sang _____ was "I hadn't anyone till you", and it starts; I hadn't anyone till you, I was a lonely one till you; I used to lie awake and wonder if there could ever be, someone in this wide, wide world just made for me. Now I see

S Great...
H Without piano... I went the wrong key.

S Speaking of key, what is your favorite key?
H I sing in E flat, G, F, some things in C and one song in B flat, well maybe I sing several, but maybe one of my favorite recordings is in B flat.

S You didn't try your boogies in E flat though do you?
H Oh yeah...

S Really...
H I do them in E flat I did boogies in C I did boogies in G and I did boogies if F. I was called on, I was at the Million Dollar Theater when Lionel Hampton was playing and I was standing back stage, he called on me. He introduced me as a guest unannounced to me and I went out and played a boogie in A flat and the band was grasping around trying to find the key you know but I mean they got with me.

S It took a little time but they found you huh?
H Well everybody plays boogies in C.

S Right, I know that's why I asked that, and most of the bands are accustomed to that so they get sucked in to that and they're shocked...
H Yes... but they didn't know what I was going to play, you know like we hadn't rehearsed I mean nobody knew that Lionel Hampton was going to call on me.

S Lets walk a bit...
H Okay...

S I would like for you to show me a tour of your place here and tell something about it, you mentioned how old it was and it was built by someone.
H Well the roses have bloomed and they are coming back out and this lawn is St Augustine which is like a carpet.

S I noticed that... and what is that plant in the corner there that is...
H That's a cactus and its almost in the same thing as aloe and Hispanics put it on their skin especially if they have an open cut or something in their hand, or they put it around their eye and it heals because it has some kind of ... what do you call it... I call it sauce, but it drips.

S I see ... that comes from the...
H It comes from that... you break it... you can break it in half.

S The leaves here?
H Yeah... and the other one over there is a little bit more popular, this is more show.

S So it grows kind of tall or it can.
H Oh it grows tall, and it started from a little bud.

S Oh really...
H And it... well you see the bottom of it there. It's coming out again

S Yes I see... it looks like a very happy plant I guess its very comfortable here
H It doesn't take very much care

S And you mentioned this lawn again, it is your right, it's like a carpet
H It's like a carpet, you plant it in patches Jim and it spreads...

S Oh so you don't have to worry about it, so it's a plug here and a plug there.
H A plug there and a plug there and a plug here I mean it just spreads all over and in the winter time of course the first rain I mean it just goes greener that apples.

S What is this plant... back behind you like a palm of some sort; I see a lot of those out here, this big fan.
H That's a yucca...

S A yucca tree...
H Yeah, you mean this one or the big one?

S The big one there...
H Oh that's just a palm that I brought back from Palm Springs, it was small too. I might... I don't know, it doesn't get much shade. It just spreads out like a fan.

S But it's a perfect place for it, it gives just the correct setting for it
H Yes...

S Now that one there, that was a yucca?
H This is a yucca...

S I see... now do they require much water?
H No... very few requires ah any water at all, in fact I ... as I said I brought it from the desert, I set the yucca tree right there and it just took root.

S No kid... now this obviously the center area here is what you've really worked with though.
H What this... ah the roses?

S Yeah the carnations... are those carnations there?
H Yeah these are carnations. I had about 3 little plants and I set them here and they spread.

S And you don't have to plant those every year?
H No, no, when they go dormant ah it will be some time after the buds open and ah if I give them some more water they'll come back but then in the wintertime they sort of just stay green and when the sun hits them then they'll bloom.

S Bloom again...
H Yeah...

S And the roses?
H Ah these roses I mean they... I've gotten these all cut off because I give them away to my friends.

S I see...
H This rose is a magic rose... it will turn five different colors.

S Oh really, well that's...
H Before it then I can shake it and it will go away and soon as it goes away then I break it off.

S And I'm told that by breaking them off it encourages the plant to blossom even more...
H Yes, it will blossom more I mean because they... if they sit there, they'll draw the strength from the other buds.

S I see...
H So it's always easier for another bud to come out if that plant isn't draining it.

S You have someone obviously help you keep very interesting lawn...
H This is my favorite though...

S Your favorite...
H This is my favorite...

S What is that?
H This is a gardenia ...

S Oh I thought that's what that was.
H I wore one everyday to high school.

S They really smell... you can smell up the whole evening...
H Oh yeah, yeah it smells up the whole yard, the fragrance is so pungent and as soon as you touch it with your hands or you put it to your nose, it will turn brown.

S Oh really...
H Yes...

S So it's very sensitive to ...
H It's very sensitive to touch, I used to buy them by the dozen in ah Honolulu and they were the great big ones. These will maybe get a little bigger but they have a gardenia they call the mystery gardenia.

S I understand, you put that in your room that even smells up your room so you have this beautiful ...
H Oh it smells up the whole house.

S I see now why they have gardenia in powder, gardenia perfume...
H Perfume... yeah... ah it gives my sister a headache. She is sensitive to touch...

S What about this plant here?
H This? Ah I don't know what that is. That came out just about two weeks ago

S Oh really.
H Yeah, and new leaves are coming but they, their fussed up like that and soon as they spread out this is just exactly the way they go. I cut it down every year and it comes right back.

S And it comes back. Well all of these plants obviously are very, very comfortable... I keep saying that because there, they look so vibrant. I guess coming from the part of the country where I am, we only see these things in shops and things.
H Yes ah ... well this is the north and these flowers thrive on the rays that come from the north. I've had a lot of people tell me that they don't have any northern exposure and they can't keep their plants growing, even in the house, so

S I see... we keep coming back to this gardenia, I still can't believe its real.
H Well there's another one

S Oh another one coming?
H And there's another one and another one and every little hole there is a bud.

S That is so beautiful...
H Yeah... it hasn't completely opened yet.

S How long will it stay like that, before it begins to wither?
H Oh... it might stay there about four days, it opens completely and then of course naturally, I've got friends that come over here and always want to smell them so they just start dying.

S Starts dying, right...
H I try to take them in the house so they won't get to it, because it's my favorite too.

S Why don't you show us some other parts of you... in the back we saw... I'm talking a picture of this tomato that you picked off, in the back there, I want the people to know that you have a garden is... this is a tomato that is naturally grown back there.
H It's a complementary plant.

S We're moving to the back area of Miss Brooks home again she's showing some more exotic plants. At least we would call exotic plants.
H Now if you can move in close...

S Okay...
H You can see this,

S Oh yes.
H See that?

S Right,
H That's what they put on their open wounds or put under the eyes, and if your familiar with the cosmetic, they're coming back with a lot of aloe cream and aloe hair shampoo, this is a healthy thing I guess they do.

S Is this a poinsettia? This big plant here does it have red... this, this tree?
H This is a poinsettia.

S Yeah, you know we have the little tiny ones back east.
H Yeah this is a poinsettia, it's now beginning to come in after Christmas, then it starts its leaves again.

S I see, well we get them in Christmas, and we pay a fortune for them, they wind up about this size.
H Yes... ha, ha, aha, you're not very complimentary ... here's another yucca tree.

S Another yucca...
H It started from a little plant about that high, and there's my voluntary tomato.

S Oh yes, this is where the tomato in the front came from... it's just loaded with tomatoes.
H Yes, it's loaded with tomatoes...

S And Miss Brooks simply comes out as she needs a little salad and she plucks one off...
H Yeah, and I like to fry them green too... for breakfast.

S Oh really, well that would make a good ah what do they call them, a western omelet?
H Yes...

S And this area here...
H This area here is where we do a lot of barbequing and we do a little lawn for a chosen few of our friends, and ah

S It looks very private too, you don't have to worry about...
H Not too much...

S The neighbors...
H No we don't have to worry about anybody peeking or...

S Hob-knobbing or what ever...
H A lot of out neighbors...

S The pauperize doesn't have... doesn't bother you back here you can do your nude bathing or your sun bathing as they say, and you don't have to worry about the photographers from Media Magazine or from...
H Ha, ha, ha no we don't do any nude bathing, but I mean like we sure do at times come out in our play clothes, sit around in the sun. When my niece was here she did a lot of sun bathing with her little son, my nephew, but ah I like to go down to Palm Springs for my sun...

S Have you performed down there?
H Oh yes...

S What is that place like... we drove through there and you can't tell anything about it because all the houses are secluded for the most part.
H Well most of the homes except for a certain part of Palm Springs are secluded, and Cathedral City where most of the, you say rich and famous and the stars live up in the hills. There very, very, very, very secluded, in fact Frank Sanatra has a street named after Bob Hope has a street named after him.

S That's right, I did see a Bob Hope Ave. or street or something like that.
H And ah Audrey ... what's his name?

S Gene Autrey oh yes...
H Has one named after him down there.

S When you performed there, where did you perform... what are places people go to perform there?
H Well they have their clubs there, I mean they have great big beautiful spots there. Out on Palm Canyon Drive...

S Right...
H And there's quite a few ah... I can't think of that name...

S Yeah but I ...
H That's a beautiful, I mean well it was an after Gould berg dinner; it's a very posh club.

S Do they pay well?
H Yes they pay very well.

S I mean above scale... we are sold that Palm Springs is lousy with rich folks so they should pay well but this...
H No, no, I mean they don't really entertain many of the rich people.

S Oh I see...
H They do most of their entertaining in their home, they have beach partied and all that sort of stuff, but if they do come into your club it just might be one or two of them at a time, but not complete.

S I see...
H No they're not completely into going out.

S They give that a rest and get away from the business so to speak.
H They get away from... yes that's right...

S I see, well tell me something about... now gradually grinding down... can you tell us something about what you intend to do in your future career, your just starting out again...
H Ha, ha, ha you said it, I didn't... future career, they took me out of retirement to do the show that I just completed in Purino's here in L. A.

S Oh really, so how many days were you there, about six weeks.
H Yeah I was there six weeks.

S And you had not been performing in six week I mean regularly.
H I haven't been performing in L. A. in sixteen years.

S My goodness...
H I did do a show in Palm Springs in August of last year.]

S Was it kind of intimidating coming back and...
H No... I was going to give it a chance, to see just exactly how my audience was going to react. And they surprised me.

S You liked it... well the night...
H They acted very well.

S Well as the audience grew that night that I was there on Sunday night or was it Saturday night, Saturday night...
H Yeah Saturday...

S I could tell, you play an audience like nobody's business lady.
H Ha, ha, ha, ha,

S And you were right, I remember you coming over and told me that the audience wasn't very alive at first, but as soon as they did you'd feel better and got in to the act and it was a joy... you can't describe it, you have to see it folks, I'm sorry...
H I have to work an audience, because I want to know that ah your hearing everything I do, at least I feel if your there you must have come to see me.

S Right...
H And ah I want you to go away with ah... not complements but enjoy, and maybe want to come back so about the only thing I can do is work an audience and warm up to them so that they can warm up to me.

S Quickly, are you, how would you consider yourself... a boogie woogie pianist, a boogie blues singer or a boogie swing sing... how should I categorize you? If I wanted to advertise Hadda Brooks, coming to Detroit Michigan, the what, what, what, what.
H Singer pianist, I mean they wanted jazz, I don't ah... they call me a jazz piano player or jazz singer, I mean I don't think that I'm a jazz singer, but I don't know... maybe they can't find another word, I don't know.

S Well you're so versatile the other night it was difficult for me to categorize you...
H That's what I'm saying... I don't do it all the same way, I mean it's not jazz.

S I see...
H It's... I can do a blues but it's really not a down home blues. I do my version of the blues, you know and ah I think I'm more of a lyric pusher you know.

S Did you ever have voice lessons...
H Nooo...

S So what we see is natural Hadda...
H Yes... I mean I just started singing, I was singing in the Glee club in high school and junior high school and I mean like finally when I didn't want to sing in the high school, then they put me on the piano and I accompanied the Glee clubs and the Carpel Choir and the boys Glee club, and ah I didn't sing with them anymore.

S If there's anybody that you might say influenced most. Is there a performer, your style?
H Billy Holliday...

S Billy Holliday, what about Nancy Wilson, I can't help but say that you remind me of her in many ways.
H I do?

S Yes... even in appearance and the way you flourish, your eyes and you're... the way you do your head and so forth when you're singing.
H Oh...

S Yes
H Well I know Nancy very well, that's the first time I think I've been compared to her...

S Compared...
H Or not compared either but I mean ah sort of say that I sound... some people say that I sound like Dina Washington. I mean they get mixed emotions or mixed things and...

S Oh yeah Dina, there are some things with...
H Yeah they hear a few things in there you know and so they come out of just what they hear and they say Dina Washington or Billy Holliday.

S Right...
H But I would lean toward Billy...

S Okay...
H For my ah inspiration.

S That's some good leaning, believe me...
H Yeah

S I'll say, well I think that let's end the tape by, if there's ... let's say this tape was in a time capsule and we come back fifty or one hundred years from now and we want Miss Hadda Brooks to tell the people who you are, and what you want people to know about you, in spite of everything that's been written by or will have been written by publishers on Hadda Brooks. If you want us to know who you are, you say well I'm a blues singer or I'm a pianist I'm from this place and I want to be remembered as a person who sings these kinds of songs or what ever, what would you tell us?
H I would tell them that I am a very sentimental ballad singer, I have put various other songs in my repertoire to vary it up, you know put a little variety or change the mood, but I am really a lyric pusher and a ballad singer and that's exactly what I would want them to think of me as. Some of the songs that they've heard me sing.

END OF INTERVIEW