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| Doug Halladay (Photo by W. Kim Heron) |
This article first appeared in the Metrotimes
Doug Halladay, one of Detroit’s great jazz creatives during
the late 1960s and ’70s, was on vacation in Mexico with his wife Sandra in 2009
when he began feeling as if something had sapped the energy from his body. Concerned
— having never been seriously ill before — he cut his vacation short and went
to his family doctor. His blood pressure was suspiciously low. After finishing
the exam, his doctor admitted Halladay to Henry Ford Hospital where he was
diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, a blood cancer that attacks the blood
and bone marrow.
To
stay alive, Halladay needed a bone marrow transplant. Acute myeloid leukemia
was the cancer that killed the famed jazz saxophonist Michael Brecker in 2007
after a lengthy and unsuccessful search for a donor. Halladay was luckier. His
search turned up Herman Eyr, a 25-year-old in Germany. The transplant was
performed in May 2010. It beat back the cancer, but left Halladay partially
blind in one eye.
“Life
takes on a different meaning when you come through something like that. I was
so grateful to the doctors and the nurses at Henry Ford that I wanted to do
something to give back,” Halladay, 69, said on a Sunday afternoon in late
summer, sitting on the patio of the co-op he owns in Lafayette Park and petting
his collie Sasha.
Halladay
is a tall and a thin man who looks like a cross between a retired NBA forward
and a college professor. After enjoying success in music, Halladay left the
business in the 1970s to embark on several different career paths, including
stints in educational television, school reform and health care reform.
On this particular afternoon, he talks about being a leukemia survivor, about his efforts to educate African-Americans, Arab-Americans and Hispanic-Americans about leukemia, and about how this relates to his return to jazz.
A
study published in the Journal of the American Cancer
Society in 2010, reported
African-Americans are 40 percent less likely than whites to receive bone marrow
transplants for blood cancer treatment, and they account for only 7 percent of
the 8 million people registered with National Marrow Donor Program.
Halladay’s
pianist friends Buddy Budson and Keith Vreeland convinced him to organize a
benefit concert. The concert attracted a bunch of sponsors, including Henry
Ford Health System. Twenty-five Detroit jazz musicians participated in the
concert, which raised $20,000. Halladay put on two more concerts at the
Kerrytown Concert House in Ann Arbor and the historic First Congregational
Church in Detroit. Pianist Charles Boles, who arranged some music for the
concerts, said the Detroit jazz musicians were eager to help Halladay because
he’s a good man.
“I
think first and foremost, the jazz musicians like him as a person, and they
respect his ability as a composer. That’s why they were eager to help Doug,”
Boles says. “A lot of times, people won’t help you if they don’t like you. They
have to like you. I don’t care what caliber of musician you are. I think Doug
is a fine man for what he’s doing, and he’s an excellent music writer. In spite
of his illness, he has grown considerably as a composer.”
Halladay
grew up in Grand Rapids. He’s a largely self-taught musician, although he took
courses in music theory and harmony at Albion College. He played trumpet up and
down the North Shore of Chicago with pianist Eddie Russ, later to be part of
the popular Detroit group Mixed Bag. Russ also recorded with the great
saxophonist Sonny Stitt.
“When Russ touched the piano, it was like a godsend. He was like the great jazz pianist Wynton Kelly. Eddie showed me a lot, and we played a lot of gigs. He was one of those unsung heroes who never got the right recognition. He died of kidney failure,” Halladay recalls.
In
1967, Halladay moved to Detroit and hooked up with jazz musicians, such as
Kenny Cox, Charles Moore, Doug Hammond and James “Blood” Ulmer. Halladay bought
a Victorian house on Lincoln Street, renting rooms to saxophonists Phil Lasley
and Faruq Z. Bey. They formed the Lincoln Street Band with bassist John Dana,
drummer Danny Spencer and pianist Keith Vreeland in the rhythm section.
Halladay
quit playing in the early ’70s. Some of his musician friends begged him not to.
“Honestly, I wasn’t a good trumpet player. I wanted to play at a certain level
and I couldn’t do it. To play at a high level of creativity on the Detroit jazz
scene, you had to be on the bandstand six nights a week doing it. I didn’t want
to spend the weekends playing weddings and polka gigs, or doing what musicians
have to do to make a living.”
He
earned a graduate degree from Wayne State University, and later worked as the
director of communications at Channel 56. “I had other interests outside of
music,” he says. “I grew up in the ’60s. I was involved with the civil rights
movement. I was a member of SNCC. I got a master’s degree in urban sociology
and race relations. My wife and I bought a home in the city, and we’re involved
with trying to improve the quality of life for people in Detroit. So, I’m proud
of what I’ve done to try to make Detroit a better place. My music took a back
seat to that.”
Halladay
kept writing music, but it wasn’t performed publicly. That changed when he put
on the benefit concerts. The first concert was recorded and released as bye the
New Beginnings Ensemble. “Point of Interception,” the opener, has the rhythmic
feel of and early Blue Note recording. Other compositions such as “Samba for
Eddie” and “Only the Noze Knows,” show that he’s essentially a swing-conscious
composer. The players sound as if they had an absolute ball playing his music
and never wanted to stop.
Halladay
never thought he’d be spending his days at home composing music — or having it
played for a worthy cause. There are two more benefit shows coming up. First is
Nov. 2, at Historic St. Matthew’s & St. Joseph’s Episcopal Church,
underwritten by a grant from the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute. In
December, at Kerrytown Concert House, a concert featuring arrangements by
pianist Gary Schunk of some of Halladay’s Latin music is scheduled. Lately,
he’s taken a stab at writing big band music.
“I’m
alive, and I’m grateful to be here and do what I can do on this planet. I want
to get the message out, particularly to minority people who are dying out here
because they can’t find a match, whether it’s leukemia or other types of blood
cancers,” Halladay says.
It just so happens that getting the word out also involves spreading some interesting music as well. And that benefits us all.
Doug
Halladay’s New Beginnings Ensemble performs 4-5:30 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 3, at the
Historic St. Matthew’s & St. Joseph’s Episcopal Church, 8850 Woodward Ave.,
Detroit; 313-871-4750; $15 in advance, $20 at the door.
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