University Times

When Gregory Morris stopped and thought really hard — the kind of thinking a documentary filmmaker encouraged during an 8-hour interview last year — he broke down and cried remembering the days after the death of his uncle, Billy Strayhorn, the famed Pittsburgh jazz musician whose name is synonymous with Duke Ellington’s.

Strayhorn, a pianist, composer and arranger who collaborated with Ellington for almost 30 years, wrote the classics “Take the ‘A’ Train” and “Lush Life,” and co-wrote “Satin Doll.” Born in Dayton, Ohio, Strayhorn, a child prodigy, honed his musical abilities at a private conservatory when his family lived in Pittsburgh.

Although not in the spotlight like Ellington, Strayhorn has been described as the creative catalyst contributing to many of the Ellington orchestra’s musical achievements from the early 1940s to the mid 1960s. And, Morris points out, his uncle’s homosexuality, which he did not hide, prevented some industry players from promoting his work.

Strayhorn died from esophageal cancer in 1967.

Why was Morris, a Pitt associate professor of education who retired recently, so overcome with emotion during an interview for a documentary on his uncle? Because not only was he mourning the loss of an uncle who was a mentor and who helped pay for his college education (bachelor’s and master’s degrees and a Ph.D. in education, all from Pitt), but he was overwhelmed with his responsibility as executor of the Strayhorn estate.

To begin with, Morris had to arrange for two funeral services, one public (to be coordinated with the Ellingtons) and one private. Plus all of his uncle’s belongings had to be dealt with, including more than 1,000 manuscripts in Strayhorn’s New York City apartment, many of them unpublished.

Morris also had to contend with people rummaging through his uncle’s belongings. Ruth Ellington, Duke’s sister, brought two people to look for material that they thought belonged to the bandleader, he said. “They were tossing things here and there and being very disrespectful. I asked my attorney to tell them to leave,” he explained.

After the funerals, Morris packed up his uncle’s possessions and embarked on a decades-long struggle to reclaim publishing rights and unearth some of his uncle’s unpublished music. He helped establish Billy Strayhorn Songs, Inc., operated by the Strayhorn family heirs, which manages and promotes the jazz musician’s catalogue. “I’m not doing this all by myself any longer, thank goodness,” he said of his family’s corporation. “The family unit is now able to do things that we couldn’t do as a group of unorganized heirs,” he added. For example, the family is actively promoting Strayhorn’s work rather than sitting back and waiting for interest to trickle down from Ellington’s fame.

Promoting his uncle’s music has become a full-time occupation, said Morris, who vacated his Pitt office last week.

Although a life such as Strayhorn’s becomes legendary, it’s often the estate managers who help those legends live on. For Morris that has meant multiple legal struggles to renew copyrights and secure publishing rights. (Generally, copyrights have an initial 28-year term of protection, which requires renewals for future rights.)

Strayhorn’s estate managers battled the Ellingtons to renew copyrights as they expired. Many compositions written by Strayhorn with or for Ellington were published by Ellington’s publishing house by mutual agreement. When Morris was perusing his uncle’s legal papers, he found notices alerting him of copyright renewals, which he had to initiate. He renewed the copyrights and the lawsuits began. After more than three decades of legal snarls and filing paperwork for renewed and new copyrights, the Strayhorn estate now has the rights to many of Strayhorn’s compositions as they come up for copyright renewal. For example, the estate captured the copyright for “Take the A-Train” and soon will have the publishing rights for “Lush Life.”

Instead of Pitt classes, now Morris’s days are filled with appointments such as meeting with a well-known actor-producer in Los Angeles to discuss a proposed screenplay on Strayhorn’s life. “Maybe nothing happens, but you go to talk,” Morris said. Also, he is tracking down clearances on poetry that Strayhorn used as lyrics for some unreleased songs. Interest in his uncle’s music will continue to grow, Morris predicts, as new artists keep Strayhorn’s music alive. For instance, Queen Latifah recorded a version of “Lush Life” last year.

While Morris continues what’s turning out to be a lifetime’s worth of work promoting his uncle, he still misses the man and the role he played in his life.

Consider the legendary tale of when Strayhorn got his big break by wowing Duke Ellington after a show with his orchestra at Pittsburgh’s Stanley Theater in 1938. According to “Lush Life: A Biography of Billy Strayhorn,” by David Hajdu, Strayhorn finagled an audition with Ellington, who was so impressed that he assigned Strayhorn to write a lyric. Shortly thereafter, Ellington offered Strayhorn a job and soon the two were collaborating.

“When Duke gave him his first payment, my uncle went to an expensive shoe store in East Liberty and paid $6 or $7, which was a lot of money back then, for a pair of shoes for me. And I was a little guy then, soon to outgrow them,” Morris said. Their relationship started when he was very young and lived with Strayhorn’s mother, Lillian Strayhorn, who was Morris’s grandmother.

“He was always down to earth,” Morris said of his uncle. His genius was unforgettable, he noted. “He would be in the middle of a conservation and he’d say, ‘Excuse me Greg, I have a song in my head.’ He would spend just a few minutes writing and then he would be back in the conversation. Later, he would write the composition out in full. He was so casual about it.”

Strayhorn was not one to flaunt his reputation, power or money, according to Morris. But sometimes it was impossible.

Once, he took Morris with him to an East Liberty bank to withdraw several thousand dollars. “My uncle had an account there plus a mortgage for my grandmother’s house. He was wearing casual, sporting clothes,” he explained. The bank tellers looked Strayhorn up and down and didn’t move too fast to wait on him, according to Morris.

“My uncle laughed and said, ‘When I show them the bank book, they’ll change their tune.’” Sure enough, when the bank tellers discovered they were waiting on the moneyed musician, according to Morris, “They were saying, ‘Oh yes, Mr. Strayhorn. Right away Mr. Strayhorn….’ My uncle knew the power of money.”

Morris remembers his uncle’s insistence on the importance of traveling and knowing people. “My uncle told me, ‘Education is not all about books. It’s about meeting people and learning their different styles and cultures.’” He received postcards and phone calls from Strayhorn during his travels throughout the world.

As Morris sat in Pitt’s International Jazz Hall of Fame recently, he glanced at the plaques of the inductees. “Look at all the plaques here. Here’s Billy Strayhorn’s. When I was a student here, there was no hall of fame, no appreciation. Now we have this, two books about my uncle, books that my children and grandchildren will be able to read.”

Morris is especially thrilled that younger people are turning on to Strayhorn’s music. While at a music convention where he was promoting his uncle’s work, Morris was approached by a young man who said, “I read ‘Lush Life’ and I played it too. My teacher is devoted to Strayhorn.” Morris explained, “That said an awful lot to me about the importance of documenting and providing materials for these young people to learn and to play.” Now, he’ll have the time.

—Mary Ann Thomas