Not yet A Great Day

[17 East 126th Street, Harlem, Manhattan, c. 1939–1941. From the NYC Municipal Archives Collections. Click for a much larger view.]

The arrow points to a fine-looking brownstore. But it would look even better with fifty-seven musicians and a bunch of kids in front, no?

On August 12, 1958, 17 East 126th Street was the location for the celebrated Art Kane photograph known as A Great Day in Harlem.

The moment is well-documented. Here, from The Guardian, is the photograph, with full identifications and additional photographs. One omission: the photograph with Marian McPartland on the left doesn’t identify the musician in profile on the right. That’s the bassist Milt Hinton, who took photographs of his own that day. Here’s one. Home movies shot by Milt’s wife Mona Clayton Hinton may be seen in the documentary A Great Day in Harlem (dir. Jean Bach, 1994), unavailable for commercial streaming but easy to find at YouTube. The film’s website has photographs with Willie “The Lion” Smith (who tired of standing and went to sit down on another stoop) and Dizzy Gillespie’s photograph of latecomers.

I must mention that Elaine and I and our wee daughter Rachel met Milt and Mona Hinton in 1988 and again in 1989 at a then-yearly jazz festival in Decatur, Illinois. Mona later sent several postcards to Rachel and her newly arrived brother Ben all those years ago. Such kindness.

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A reader reminded me of the 1995 reprise, photographed by Gordon Parks. The surviving musicians (unidentified at the site with the photograph): Hank Jones, Eddie Locke, Horace Silver (left); Benny Golson, Art Farmer, Chubby Jackson, Johnny Griffin (top); Marian McPartland, Milt Hinton, Gerry Mulligan (right). Sonny Rollins is missing. I don’t know who’s sitting on the curb: one of the kids from the 1958 photograph?

In 2023, two musicians from the 1958 photograph are still with us: Benny Golson and Sonny Rollins.

Related reading
More photographs from the NYC Municipal Archives (Pinboard)