Thieves in the Temple: A Prequel to Purple Rain

CH. 12 And the Melody Still Lingers On- Chaka Khan

Kid practiced in Mrs. Knaeble's lab after school everyday. For every major lesson he learned, she gave him a forty five record. After six weeks, he had a collection of records by Ted Nugent, Wes Montgomery, Django Reinhardt, John Lee Hooker, Charlie Byrd, Jimmi Hendrix, Santana and Muddy Waters. He played them in the living room listening closely to every note.

Francis sat and listened to the records with him. He liked Django Reinhardt best. The boy fingered against his belly to the record. Kid played his invisible guitar with precision beyond his years. Francis tried to be annoyed but he couldn't. He wanted to tell him to go practice the piano instead but guilt weighed on him. He could not truly justify a reason for Kid not to play the guitar, just like his father could not justify a reason for him not to play jazz some twenty years before. Francis was keenly familiar with this same unscratchable itch. Emotional poison ivy's a bitch. He would never forgive himself if he didn't let the boy get easy relief instead of fighting for it the way he had to. Ultimately, he could not stop Kid from playing the guitar anyway. "Kid, come with me," Francis said putting on his coat. "We gotta go to the pawn shop."

Kid was not exactly sure why they were going to the pawn shop but he knew whatever they were getting would be cool.

"Go look at those guitars," Francis told Kid. Kid tried to match Francis' lack of enthusiasm but failed. He scampered over to the wall, dismounting each guitar, placing them on his knee, feeling out the best one while Francis chatted with the pawn shop owner, Sterling.

"Haven't seen you in a while," Sterling said stretching his cardigan over his round belly. "The security guard business must be treating you better than the piano playing business."

"One puts food on the table, one puts food in the soul."

Francis was known among local musicians as difficult to work with. He had a low tolerance for entertainment. He loved jazz music. He loved the complication. He loved that it was unfettered by lyrics that forced unnecessary repetition. Pop, rhythm and blues and rock and roll were so predictable. He despised having to add a little of one or the other to his jazz shows to make a living in Minneapolis.

Disco and funk forced jazz to Europe. Only a few musicians were able to make real money in jazz; Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, Wayne Shorter, Joe Sample. Even Dizzy Gillespie was watering down his music as he made more and more television appearances. Francis was an uncompromising purist.

Francis got into arguments with band leaders because he had no problem playing the music as written, if it was written correctly. Most of the musicians in Minneapolis played by ear and had no concept of precision.

Francis' father, Monroe Smith was a professor of music at Wilberforce University in Ohio. Monroe played classical piano. Some piano teachers held a twelve inch ruler in their hands to pop their students' fingers when they made a mistake. This made no sense to Monroe. "How can you play well with your fingers stinging?" Monroe asked his classes. Yet, Monroe did not spare the rod. He hit his students on the back of the neck with a twelve inch ruler. "Perfection must be perfect!" he shouted. "Again!" he hollered as he stood behind ten year old Francis at the piano. Francis played the same songs again and again until they were perfect; absolutely perfect. Only then would Monroe teach him another. Monroe did not treat anyone differently. He hit grown men at the college with twelve inch rulers, breaking a few. He expected the same perfection from everybody. Nobody was special.

Francis remembered his father with disdain, but not because of the ruler. Francis was grateful for the ruler. He thought it made him a superior musician and in fact, it did. Francis' rancor rested in the fact that Monroe did not appreciate his creativity. Monroe discouraged original composition. He told Francis, "Any dribble you tinker out will never be as great as Mozart." He demanded that he never listen to or attempt to play, "that undignified jungle music."

Francis became determined to tinker out something special in the form of straight-ahead jazz. It was noise to Monroe. That noise drove Francis from his parents' house at age sixteen. Francis had started hanging out in a juke joint. The owner let him play sometimes and people started to talk. That would have been fine if Monroe hadn't started to hear. Monroe pulled out his pistol and told Francis he'd rather have a dead son than a disobedient one. Francis ran from his parents' home to the sound of a twenty-two caliber bullet whizzing past his ear with nothing but the shirt on his back and fifty cents jiggling in his pocket.

Francis hitchhiked to New York where he worked with different jazz bands here and there. He went on tour with the Kenneth Griffith Four traveling to Tijuana, Mexico.

The Kenneth Griffith Four became the Kenneth Griffith Three when they left Mexico. Francis could not leave without the prettiest seventeen year old girl in Tijuana; Juanita Rosa Sanchez Murillo.

Francis stayed for six months using every bit of charm he had to persuade Juanita's mother, Lupita to let him take her daughter to the United States of America. Francis was tired of trying to make it as a musician and had heard from his cousin, Mitchell that Minneapolis, Minnesota was fruitful with jobs for Blacks.

Francis' Spanish was better than Juanita's English. Francis learned it quickly- even more so motivated by love. He loved Juanita with all he had inside him, refusing to leave without her. Juanita's mother liked the tall dark man who played piano at the local bar for pennies. She was impressed with his gumption but could not allow her daughter to marry a man who was not Catholic. Every time Juanita tried to get him to go to mass, Francis thought it was simply to please her mother. He did not understand the weight of these church visits. When Juanita's older brother, Oscar returned home from Texas, he explained the whole situation to Francis. Francis converted to Catholicism immediately. He would have done it months before if language gymnastics had not tangled the three of them up. Francis and Juanita married and left for Minneapolis, Minnesota to make a life together.

Kid picked out a guitar. It was the best and the most expensive one but Francis didn't care. He had come a longer way than the five miles from Clinton Avenue to a place of truth. Francis picked out a decent amplifier. He negotiated a payment plan with Sterling and left feeling a sensation he had not felt in a long time; optimism.