Music was all over the place [in the 1950s]. When we [the Lowell Fulson Blues Band] got to New York, we hit the Apollo. And there were as many people hanging out backstage, listening to us rehearse and mess around, as out front. Must have been at the Apollo that I played behind Jackie Moms Mabley. She was doing her bit--acting like an old lady who wants to be loved by a young man--and she cracked me up. I played piano behind her when she sang her songs. Things like "My Man”. I also met the other great comics playing the black theaters back then--fabulous cats like Pigmeat Markham, Redd Foxx, Slappy White, and Clay Tyson. In those days their material was raunchy and rough and funny enough to make you weep and pee in your pants at the same time. << less