legendary Lionel Hampton, The

New Crisis, The, Nov/Dec 2002 by Seymour, Gene

APPRECIATION

I'd forgotten about the Rudy Giuliani campaign button until just now. It reminds me that my one-and-- only visit to Lionel Hampton's Manhattan apartment near Lincoln Center took place in 1993, which would be the last year of David Dinkins' bittersweet term as mayor of New York. Hampton, then 85 and still coming back from one of many strokes that would mug him throughout the last decade of his life, was sporting a button in his lapel for Dinkins' soon-to-be successful opponent in the mayoral race. He'd mentioned at some point in our conversation that he was one of Guiliani's "local [campaign] directors."

Which wasn't a surprise. Hampton (1908-2002), like many African Americans of his generation was unflinchingly loyal to the party of Lincoln. The walls of his apartment were cluttered with signed photos of - and framed letters from - Eisenhower, Nixon, Ford, Rockefeller, Reagan and the first president Bush posing alone or with Hampton at various black-tie affairs. My favorite was the letter to Hamp from Nixon's attorney general and convicted co-conspirator John Mitchell, who mentioned how much he and his wife, Martha, "enjoyed you on the Merv Griffin Show last night."

It's sad to think that about four years later, in January 1997, a fire started by a halogen reading lamp in Hampton's bedroom would consume these and other pieces of memorabilia, along with a piano, a vibraphone, a set of drums and scores of written music. Such misfortune would traumatize most of us into helplessness, But Hampton kept on working, touring and traveling for as long as his health would permit. Nothing, it seemed, could immobilize him besides death itself. Which it did on Saturday morning, Aug. 31. He was 94. With Hampton's passing, one could feel a long, glorious era coming to a close. He wasn't the last of the swing-era titans to leave the planet - Benny Carter is still with us. But among the towering figures of jazz's first century, Lionel Hampton was the unstoppable life of the party. Even toward the end, when his orchestras lacked the prodigious talent of his earlier groups, Hampton remained the irrepressible showman, putting himself out for the audience, reaching for glory.

Virtuosity and timing were important values, and Hamp had both. But I think those who worked with Hampton through the years, from Charlie Christian to Clifford Brown, Dinah Washington to Betty Carter, Nat King Cole to Quincy Jones, profited most from the example he set as an entertainer. One imagines him reminding his charges, "Hey, you can be as much an artist as you want, but genius don't mean nothin' unless you put your artistry out there big and hard so people can see it!" Musicians aren't the only ones who could profit from such advice.

- Gene Seymour is a film critic for Newsday in New York. He is the author of Jazz the Great American Art (Franklin Watts), a history of jazz for young adults.