Gerald Jay King

Gerald Jay King was weaned on Elvis Presley and was guided through his adolescence with the Beatles and Otis Redding. Gerald Jay King saw colored bathrooms, and was called Jew Nigger-lover for the crime of performing “Tossin’ and Turnin’” with the first black male student ever to enter his high school. The small-town Jewish boy from Virginia was a camp counselor for underprivileged kids from Harlem Picked apples and pears in Israel. Paid one lira for a falafel. Racked shoes in a shoe warehouse. Played in rock and soul bands in Fort Lauderdale. Played jazz, rock, and country guitar in the Army Band. At the School of Music, they had to get 2.7 to pass the final exam. The expression “2-6-5 NO EXTENSION” would pop up in conversations, meaning that you missed it by that much, and you didn’t try very hard, so you didn’t get the sometimes customary EXTENSION of 1 month to try again. When they rode to jobs on an Army bus, which had bad shocks, you really felt every bump, and they would joke about whether the driver got PAID BY THE BUMP. Performed with Michael Damien in Brooklyn At the Sidewalk Café and the Orange Bear, and the late great C-Note. These experiences combined to make the music that is Gerald Jay King