Posted: Thu Mar 21, 2019 12:09 am Post subject: Key West Hotel Casa...
By the mid-late 30's, Fats Navarro had been taking gigs in his home of Key West, as well as upstate Florida, before going on the road with a bigband and leaving the town for good.
One of these, the Casa Marina, built during the Henry Flagler railroad era of 1920's, was one of his haunts. The place welcomed travellers, in large part from the northeast booking trips south by rail during the winter months. Around the :40 second mark, a good amount of original facing and exterior is shown, and so a small group would be hired to play for guests on the grounds, tables, or poolside. ..Enjoy
'Remote' but no signpost exists in a town caught up in it's history of the island : guided tours of Truman library, Hemingway house, etc. So despite being locally raised, there's no shred of awareness of his life.. zip. During his peak, Downbeat awarded him 8th or 9th spot..well back of McGee, Dizzy, and Miles. Not a screamer, but warming up he once showed Howard McGee a high B flat, after a move to a smaller cup, and hitting high F's quickly.
The Petersen-Rehak book indicates a reserved and quiet fellow...with a somewhat hardened father who possessed basic skill on piano, but didn't visualize a career for his son. After a stint with Andy Kirk's band, Kirk had supper in Key West with the family around '42. The father took to boasting..that his bloodline actually connected him to the great Charlie Shavers, reflecting on the fact with considerable pride.
For anyone familiar with Halloween, goblins.. or stuff that can 'raise the hackles', you might check out the medieval castle he was taken the last weeks of life on former 'Blackwell Island. The biography writes he was dropped off by friends at Bellevue, but if a cursory exam by physicians found a condition of rales in the chest area, these patients were often taken to Renwick hospital..
Joined: 06 Jan 2010 Posts: 543 Location: Brooklyn, New York
Posted: Sun Jul 05, 2020 2:49 pm Post subject:
rothman wrote:
For anyone familiar with Halloween, goblins.. or stuff that can 'raise the hackles', you might check out the medieval castle he was taken the last weeks of life on former 'Blackwell Island. The biography writes he was dropped off by friends at Bellevue, but if a cursory exam by physicians found a condition of rales in the chest area, these patients were often taken to Renwick hospital..
Wow, crazy. I played a gig there last year for "Manhattanhenge," the one day of the year when the sun lines up perfectly with the streets in midtown Manhattan. Had no idea that's where Fats spent his final days. _________________ New Album "ensemble | in situ" on Bandcamp
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