Remembering soul singer Jerry Butler, aka the 'Iceman'

TERRY GROSS, HOST:

This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. As a playwright, actor and director, Athol Fugard defied South Africa's apartheid system, and the government punished him for it. He died Saturday at the age of 92. We're going to listen back to the interview we recorded in 1986, eight years before the end of apartheid.

Fugard was a white South African who wrote about the emotional and psychological consequences of his country's white supremacist system. When Fugard co-starred in his 1961 play "The Blood Knot" with Black actor Zakes Mokae, they became the first Black and white actors in South African history to share a stage. Soon after, Fugard was approached by a group of Black actors seeking his help to start a company. Together, they formed the Serpent Players. The company was frequently harassed by the authorities. A few members were imprisoned. Fugard's reputation for defiance spread. And in 1967, the government revoked his passport. It was restored four years later.

Fugard wrote more than 30 plays, including "'Master Harold'...And The Boys" and "Boesman And Lena." He co-wrote the plays "Sizwe Banzi Is Dead" and "The Island" with the Black South African actors John Kani and Winston Ntshona. His plays have been staged in the U.S. Six of his plays were produced on Broadway. He won a Tony Award for lifetime achievement in 2011.

When I spoke with Fugard in 1986, I asked him why he remained in South Africa, where he lived under the apartheid system he opposed.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

ATHOL FUGARD: I suppose it's a question of my continued existence as a writer. I just couldn't see myself writing about any other place or any other time. I have, on occasions in the past, described myself as a regional writer, not meaning to be falsely modest or anything like that, but a regional writer, in the sense, I think, that Faulkner was a regional writer in America. And my region is South Africa.

GROSS: Do you feel constrained there at all by limitations of what will be allowed to be performed on stage?

FUGARD: I think I've got - I think I've become so used to living with that danger, with the danger of censorship. And in some ways, the situation today is a lot easier than it was in the past. I mean, I had to contend with a South Africa that was much more authoritarian in terms of its control over the arts than is the case today, where the government has attempted to persuade the outside world that it's moving in a liberal direction by allowing certain things to take place in theater and in the arts generally, which wasn't the case many years ago. I do not feel constrained. I've learned how to live with that.

GROSS: Do you ever feel that if your work is not censored, then you're not doing your job?

FUGARD: (Laughter) Yes. There is a terrible - there is the danger of a terrible sort of snobbery along those lines - you know? - that if you haven't been banned or if your work hasn't been censored or - let's put it even crudely - if you haven't been to jail at least once or if you haven't been raided by the security police and searched in the early hours of the morning, you haven't actually earned your credentials. Unfortunately, yes, I think a little bit of that does operate back home.

GROSS: What do you think is the power of theater or art in general to help topple the apartheid system? Do you think of art in those terms? Do you think of art as having an overt political function?

FUGARD: Well, it obviously does have that. I mean, I - for example, I heard a story about a South African who had had very, very strong, traditional South African attitudes and who, for some reason or the other, had been at Yale when I was doing "'Master Harold,'" who had come along and seen the play and who had been so affected by that production, who had in fact undergone a change of heart and - now, I have heard of quite a few cases like that in terms of responses to mine and other works of art, other - to novels and things like that from South Africa. So one has got to reckon with the fact that apparently art can do - be as profoundly effective as that in terms of people.

GROSS: You've had collaborative relationships with many Black actors, and I'm sure that there are many obstacles in having that kind of relationship in a separatist country. Perhaps one of the first relationships you had like that was with Zakes Mokae in "The Blood Knot." Were there any obstacles in actually getting together and working together on the play and then afterwards on performing it?

FUGARD: Oh, yes. Well, firstly, I mean, just in - just for Zakes and myself to get together as two actors and to go up onto a stage, that had never happened before in South Africa - that a Black man and a white man had appeared on a stage, and a Black actor or a white actor had appeared on a stage at the same time. We were the first in that regard, and all sorts of complications were attendant on that. I mean, in traveling around the country when we eventually took "Blood Knot" to different cities, Zakes had to travel third class because he had no other choice. I traveled first class. Life was very complicated.

Zakes, on a point of principle, refused to carry his reference book. He made a - wanted to make a political statement in his personal life. I knew that if we didn't have that book around with us, that we'd be in trouble. Zakes would be in jail, and the show couldn't go on. So I carried the book for Zakes, and whenever the police stopped us, I presented it and pretend that Zakes was my - was working for me, things like that. Yes, there've been lots of complications along those lines.

GROSS: Did that affect the relationship that you had with each other since when officials asked, you had to be in the superior-employer relationship?

FUGARD: (Laughter) No, you're quite right. Well, no, you've learned - you learn to play those games as part of your survival mechanism in South Africa. I mean, you know, many, many times, in order to bail Zakes and myself out of a tight spot, for example, with the police, I would put on a heavy Afrikaner act and talk to the policeman and - as if I was a good Afrikaner and Zakes was my boy, my employee. And Zakes knew that I was doing it in order to - you know, to keep the two of us out of jail.

GROSS: You also, in the 1960s, were a co-founder of a group called the Serpent Theater, which was also integrated. What were some of the difficulties then of rehearsing together? Were you allowed into the Black townships? Were they allowed into the white communities?

FUGARD: Well, the Serpent Players were a group I worked with in my hometown of Port Elizabeth. And Port Elizabeth has always been a difficult area for me because the authorities there have consistently refused to allow me to go into the Black ghetto areas to - into the Black townships. So in order to work with Serpent Players, we had to find a sort of neutral territory halfway between their Black world and my white world and, in fact, in one of the twilight zones in Port Elizabeth. And that is where we would get together and rehearse and meet. And I was faced with these sort of - a rather unhappy situation, where sometimes I would direct a play and not be able to attend performances of it.

GROSS: Your play "'Master Harold'...And The Boys" is based in part on the relationship you had when you were young with a Black man who was a waiter, I think, at a cafe that your mother ran. There's an incident in the play that I think is based on an incident in your life, where the young white boy, who's the son of the mother who owns the cafe, who's really, very close with the waiter, spits in his face. From what I understand, it was very difficult for you to write that part in. Can I ask about the personal significance that that event had for you?

FUGARD: Yes, that did happen. Tragically, regrettably, a moment of - a cauterizing, traumatic moment of shame in my life - that I still live with - that was there at a point in my childhood coming out of - I can remember the day, a spasm of bewilderment and confusion. I can't remember what had upset me so much that day, but I turned on the one person I had in my life, the one true friend I had. And he was a Black man, and he worked for my family. He worked for my mother as a waiter in this little tearoom we had.

I spat in Sam's face. And the moment I had done it, I knew what I had done. A second after I had done it, I knew that I had most probably done one of the truly ugly things of my entire life, even though I was only 13 years old. I knew that it was going to be very, very hard for me to ever equal the ugliness of what I had done because, I mean, I had sullied, I had dirtied what was one of the most beautiful things I had in my life was that friendship. And I've lived with that - I lived with that shame and still do live with the shame of that act.

And when it came to writing the play, I didn't write the play just for that reason in an attempt to finally deal with that moment. I'd been trying to write about Sam and another man that worked for the family as well, also as a waiter, a man called Willie. I had been trying to write about Sam and Willie for a long time in my life, just to celebrate them because they were two very, very beautiful human beings. And very instrumental, very important in me, finally starting on a process of emancipation from the prejudices of my country, of the traditional South African way of life.

And I just wanted to celebrate those two men. And when I finally put the little boy in there with them, I realized that I potentially had an opportunity to do both that and also deal with this unbelievably ugly thing that I had done. And in writing the play, I thought for a long time that my craft as a playwright would stand me in good stead and that I would not necessarily have to sink so low as to actually have up there onstage a moment when the white boy spat in the Black man's face. But the deeper I worked myself into the play, and the more I developed the play and wrote it, the more I realized that there was just no avoiding that moment.

GROSS: Is there a moment when you can point to and say, this is when I realized that the system of apartheid was evil, was unjust?

FUGARD: Yes. I mean, I knew it was. The process of discovering that it was evil and unjust, that it maimed and mutilated people, destroyed them, was something that happened, you know, more or less from the time I spat in Sam's face. That was but the full extent, the sort of - the moment of certainty, the moment when I realized the extent of what that system was doing came when I, for a variety of reasons, took on a job in Johannesburg, which was to be the clerk of a court, of a criminal court that sent - that tried Black people for offenses in terms of the passbook that they are compelled by law to carry.

And it's when I sat in that courtroom five days a week for a period of about six months and watched a Black man or woman and sometimes a child being disposed of at the rate of one every three minutes, being sent off to jail. When I saw that tidal wave of humanity being processed by this diabolical machine that the full extent of the - of what apartheid meant and does and was doing dawned on me - when it was brought home to me. Now, that was one of the - if I can talk about spitting in Sam's face as being the traumatic personal moment, that was the traumatic social moment. That was the moment in terms of my political conscience.

GROSS: Was that about the time that you started writing plays also?

FUGARD: Yes. Yes. That is, in fact, the period when the very - my very first published play was written. I still think of it as an apprenticeship work, and it precedes the "Blood Knot," a play called "No-Good Friday." It was also the first play that - it marks the first meeting with Zakes Mokae, who's in the "Blood Knot" with me.

GROSS: We're listening back to the interview I recorded in 1986 with playwright, actor and director Athol Fugard. He died Saturday at age 92. We'll hear more of the interview after a break. This is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF GILAD HEKSELMAN'S "DO RE MI FA SOL")

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. Let's get back to the interview I recorded with white South African playwright, actor and director Athol Fugard. He died Saturday at age 92. His plays were in opposition to his country's apartheid system. One of the consequences he faced was being unable to leave South Africa for four years because the government revoked his passport. I spoke with him in 1986, eight years before the end of apartheid.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

GROSS: I know one thing that drives a lot of white people who live in South Africa crazy is that every time you sit on a bench or board a bus or enter into certain stores, you are in a way making a complicit act with apartheid if that is a segregated bench or bus or store. And I wonder how you reconcile that now.

FUGARD: The thing that you have to live with constantly in South Africa as a white South African who opposes the system is that even in opposing the system, even in doing what you can by way of writing plays or protesting or doing this, your daily life is still rotten with compromise. And you're involved in that very, very dangerous exercise of hoping that what you do at one level outweighs that, the way you live, the fact that you live in a whites-only area among affluent white people. You hope that those compromises haven't irremediably stained or poisoned your life, that you somehow are still making some contribution towards an eventual decency in that society. It's a dangerous lifestyle. I mean, but there's no way of avoiding it other than to get out. And if I get out, how am I contributing to anything then? I still have got to believe that being inside that country, inside that society, even though I have to live with these compromises, that somehow I still contribute more by being inside and doing my thing than I would be by going into voluntary or enforced exile.

GROSS: Do you feel that yourself and other white people who oppose apartheid end up feeling that they have to shoulder a lot of guilt for being there or for acts that may seem compromised from your youth, before you gained the awareness that you have now?

FUGARD: Oh, that's very important. You really are touching on one of the major factors in the psychology of the white South African, is the operation, the presence of, the genesis of, the hoped for elimination of guilt. Major, major factor. God knows I think that - I mean, I lived with that as one of the most potent factors in my psychology. I'm, as I've said before, 53 years old now. I must admit that as I'm getting older now, I'm getting a bit tired of being guilty, of feeling guilty. And I'm beginning to ask myself, just how guilty am I? Haven't I, in fact, laid a lot of those guilts on myself? Am I as guilty as I thought I was? And, well, let me just leave it at that. I mean, just say that I'm in the process of really addressing the question of my guilt, and that I think that possibly a lot of my writing - some of my writing in the future might be an examination of that fact.

GROSS: Do you have to ask yourself how productive guilt is at a certain point?

FUGARD: True guilt, the admission of true guilt, is very important and can only be productive. To act out of false guilt is stupid and pointless.

GROSS: Your plays have been performed in South Africa and in America. I was thinking that American audiences might find it easier to give themselves over to your plays in that the kind of racism that is addressed in your plays is the kind of racism that exists in South Africa. And what I'm saying here is that I think American racism is a more covert kind of racism than the apartheid kind. And because it's happening over there, and we are not directly implicated in it, it's easier to perhaps not internalize some of the statements that you're making within your plays.

FUGARD: Yeah, very interesting. You are absolutely right. I mean, I would go along with what you have just said 100%. It's very interesting actually to sort of examine in what respects racism in the two countries, racism in South Africa and America, are similar and dissimilar. The way racism in South Africa, because it is institutionalized, because it is, in a sense, the system - it is built into the system. The way in a sense it frees the individual of having to - you know what I mean? South Africa has never produced a lynch party. You get my point? The lynch mob is something unknown in South Africa for the simple reason our system does it for us. Our system hangs them. We don't have to get together as a mob and go out after the Black man.

GROSS: Is there a time that you have in your mind when you think you would actually leave South Africa, if things reached a certain point?

FUGARD: I would never leave South Africa. I'd like to believe I would never leave South Africa. But in making that decision, I mean, I sort of commit my wife to it as well. I haven't quite resolved that for myself yet.

GROSS: My interview with Athol Fugard was recorded in 1986. He died Saturday at age 92. After we take a short break, we'll listen back to an interview with soul singer Jerry Butler, who died last month. And we'll remember jazz drummer Roy Haynes. Today is the centennial of his birth. I'm Terry Gross, and this is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF DOLLAR BRAND'S "ANTHEM FOR THE NEW NATION")

TERRY GROSS, HOST:

This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. The great soul singer Jerry Butler died last month at the age of 85. We're going to remember him by listening back to our interview from 2000. He first recorded with the group The Impressions, which he co-founded with his friend Curtis Mayfield. Butler sang lead on The Impressions' 1958 hit "For Your Precious Love," which he also co-wrote. After leaving the group, Butler went solo and had the hits "He Will Break Your Heart," "Let It Be Me," "Make It Easy On Yourself," "I Stand Accused," "What's The Use Of Breaking Up," and "Only The Strong Survive," which is the title of his memoir, which had just been published when we spoke. The Philadelphia radio DJ Georgie Woods nicknamed Butler the Ice Man because his style and stage presence were so cool.

Butler was born in rural Mississippi in 1939. Three years later, he moved with his family to Chicago, where he continued to live. He became politically active in the city, serving on the Cook County Board of Commissioners from 1985 to 2008. When we spoke, he was serving his fourth term. We started with his 1969 hit, "Only The Strong Survive." He co-wrote the song with Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) I remember.

JERRY BUTLER: I remember my first love affair.

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) I remember.

BUTLER: Somehow or another, the whole darn thing went wrong.

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) I remember.

BUTLER: And my mama had some great advice, so I thought I'd put it in the words of this song.

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) I remember.

BUTLER: I can still hear her saying, (singing) boy....

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) Boy, boy.

BUTLER: (Singing)...Oh, I see you sitting out there all alone, crying your eyes out 'cause the woman that you love is gone. Oh, there's going to be, there's going to be a whole lot of trouble in your life.

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) Whole lot of trouble.

BUTLER: (Singing) Oh, so listen to me. Get up off your knees 'cause only the strong survive. That's what she said. She said only the...

JERRY BUTLER AND UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing)...Strong survive. Only the strong survive.

BUTLER: (Singing) Yeah, you got to be strong.

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) Oh.

BUTLER: (Singing) You better hold on.

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) Hold on.

BUTLER: (Singing) Don't go...

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing) Go, go.

BUTLER: (Singing)...Around with your...

GROSS: Jerry Butler, welcome to FRESH AIR.

BUTLER: Thank you, Terry.

GROSS: Tell us the story behind this song.

BUTLER: Actually, this song and the lyrics were actual - a conversation that I had with my mother when I was about 16 years old. I was in love with an older woman, if you can believe that. And naturally, she said, this is a kid. I've got to move on with my life and do some other things. And so she just kind of dropped me like a hot potato. So I went, told mama, hey, look, this is the end of the world. She said, boy, (laughter) let me tell you this - that you have not seen half of the beautiful, lovely women in this world, and for you to be going through these kinds of changes this early in your life is absolutely ridiculous. Get out of here. You'll get over it. And "Only The Strong Survive" was really created out of that conversation. Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff were the co-writers on it. But the introduction that is recited was really from that conversation with my mother.

GROSS: What's - what would you say is the importance of this song in your career?

BUTLER: You know, the - first of all, it was the first legitimate gold record. And when I say legitimate gold record, I mean "For Your Precious Love" and "He Will Break Your Heart" probably were gold records, but I never received one for it.

GROSS: Right.

BUTLER: "Only The Strong Survive" was the first record that I actually got from a recording company that said, you are certified as having sold over a million copies of this song. But more important than that was that it was during the period of the Civil Rights Movement. It was near the end of - a lot of things were happening. The Black Power movement was in vogue. And as a matter of fact, I realized that the song was a hit doing a concert at Prairie View college in Prairie View, Texas. And the kids had kind of adopted the slogan - "Only The Strong Survive" as their theme song. And then there were a bunch of soldiers who came back from Vietnam, who told me that "Only The Strong Survive" was helpful in seeing them through some very trying times, and they believed that it had helped them to come out of those foxholes.

GROSS: Now, you first sang gospel music. You were part of a group called the Northern Jubilee Singers. And Curtis Mayfield was in that group, too, and, of course, you also sang together in The Impressions. How did you first meet?

BUTLER: Curtis' grandmother, the Rev. Annie Bell Mayfield, was the pastor of this little congregation called the Traveling Soul Spiritualist Church, and Curtis' older cousins had this little group called the Northern Jubilee Singers. I wound up at this church one afternoon with a friend of mine, a fellow by the name of Terry Williams (ph), because we just had singing in common and loved to do it. And he said, I want you to meet these people and get to know them, and maybe you'll decide to get involved with the group. In fact, I did. We used to kick Curtis to the side because he was probably 9 years old. He was the little guy, you know? I was 13. I was an old man.

(LAUGHTER)

BUTLER: And so we kind of kept shoving him to the back, shoving him to the back, until he learned how to play the guitar. And then he kind of just took over because he was the real musician out of the group.

GROSS: Had your voice changed yet?

BUTLER: As a matter of fact, it had. I - my voice went into the baritone register when I was about 13, and it has never come up again.

(LAUGHTER)

GROSS: What about Curtis Mayfield? His couldn't have. He was only 9. How did he sound?

BUTLER: Well, you know, Curtis was just the opposite. Curtis always kind of sounded like a little girl, you know? (Impersonating Curtis Mayfield, singing) You got to keep on pushing. Can't stop now. Move up a little higher.

(LAUGHTER)

BUTLER: So he always had that kind of thing going. And I think over time, he effectively, as Smokey has done, used it to the point that it became really kind of his natural sound.

GROSS: Now, did you and Curtis Mayfield leave gospel music for rhythm and blues at about the same time?

BUTLER: You know, see, we were never big and famous, as was Sam Cooke or Lou Rawls with the Pilgrim Travelers and Sam Cooke with the Soul Stirrers. And so when we started singing rhythm and blues, nobody was really affected by it but maybe the people who belonged to the church and us. When Sam left, that was an uproar throughout the whole country in most of the churches because here was this gospel icon that had gone from singing the sacred music to singing the secular music.

But Curtis and I, we really made the - and I would like to say we made an extension rather than a transition because even in Curtis' music throughout the Civil Rights Movement or what have you, you can still hear the strains of the gospel. And he really wrote kind of inspirational songs as opposed to what I call hope-to-die love songs, which are the kind of things that I was writing.

(LAUGHTER)

GROSS: What's an example of a hope-to-die love song?

BUTLER: (Singing) Your precious love means more to me than any love could ever be.

Whereas he was writing, (singing) got to keep on pushing. Can't stop now. Move up a little higher.

You see?

GROSS: Yeah, yeah.

BUTLER: A difference in attitude.

GROSS: Well, I think it's time to hear your first hit...

BUTLER: Yeah.

GROSS: ..."For Your Precious Love," which was recorded in 1958, when you were with the Impressions. And you say that this was - that the lyric was originally a poem that you wrote when you were in high school?

BUTLER: Yes. A poem called "They Say," as a matter of fact, as you will hear it in the lyric.

GROSS: Was it changed at all for the lyric? Or is it exactly the same?

BUTLER: The only thing that was changed is the title, "For Your Precious Love."

GROSS: OK. This is 1958, Jerry Butler and The Impressions.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "FOR YOUR PRECIOUS LOVE")

BUTLER: (Singing) Your precious love means more to me than any love could ever be. For when I wanted you, I was so lonely and so blue, for that's what love will do. And, darling, I'm so surprised, oh, when I first realized that you were fooling me. And, darling, they say that our love won't grow. But I just want to tell them that they don't know. For as long as you're in love with me...

GROSS: My guest is soul singer Jerry Butler. That's his 1958 hit with the Impressions, "For Your Precious Love." Now, let's talk about how you recorded that song. You had been with a group that was, I think, called the Roosters?

BUTLER: Actually, the Roosters became the Impressions.

GROSS: Right. So who changed the name to the Impressions?

BUTLER: It was Curtis' idea. Curtis said one day, after we had decided that - well, let me give you a little history.

GROSS: Yeah.

BUTLER: The Roosters was Arthur and Richard Brooks and Samuel Gooden, who were from Chattanooga, Tennessee. And while they were living there, they had a group called Four Roosters and a Chick, which is very cool for Chattanooga, Tennessee. They came to Chicago hoping that they were going to get a recording contract, because at that time, Chicago was one of the music centers of the United States. Lots of record companies here. The chick and one of the roosters decided that these other three roosters had lost their marbles, and they weren't coming to Chicago on this fool's errand. Curtis and Jerry Butler then become the other two roosters. And then one day, we were doing something at my wife's home, as a matter of fact, down in the basement. And one of the little smart aleck friends of hers said, cock-a-doodle-doo.

(LAUGHTER)

BUTLER: And that kind of wiped out the rooster name. We said, no, man. We've got to change this name. And Curtis said, well, wherever we go, what we want to do is to leave a lasting impression. And we said, that's it. That's what we're going to call ourselves, the Impressions. And that's how it came about.

GROSS: We're listening back to the interview I recorded with Jerry Butler in 2000. He died last month at age 85. We'll be right back with more of the interview after a short break. This is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF MAX MORAN AND NEOSPECTRIC, FIEND AND NICHOLAS PAYTON SONG, "ALL RIGHT")

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. Let's get back to the interview I recorded in 2000 with soul singer Jerry Butler. He died last month at age 85. His hits included "He Will Break Your Heart," "Let It Be Me," "Make It Easy On Yourself," "I Stand Accused" and "Only The Strong Survive." When we left off, we were talking about his first hit, "For Your Precious Love." He cowrote the song and recorded it with The Impressions, the group he cofounded with Curtis Mayfield. Butler sang lead on the track.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

GROSS: Were there any squabbles about who would get to sing lead on your first recordings?

BUTLER: You know, it kind of came with the song. For instance, if Curtis wrote the song, Curtis sang the lead. If I wrote the song, I sang the lead. There was a squabble after "For Your Precious Love" was released because Vivian Carter, who owned Vee-Jay Records - and she decided, having had an experience with a group called the Spaniels where she wanted to take the lead singer and give him a career of his own, but he was so interwoven with the fabric of the Spaniels that she was afraid she would destroy the whole thing - made a promise to herself that the next time someone came through that door that had a unique sound and had a unique voice in it that she was going to build that unique voice along with the group, so that in later years, if there was a breakup or if she decided to move one of the parts toward another career, she could take one act and make two. The Impressions happened to be that act, and Jerry Butler happened to be that voice. And so when the recording was released, it was released as Jerry Butler and the Impressions. And the group never recovered from it. We argued and fought about the billing from that day until the day I left, which was about seven months, eight months later.

GROSS: Did that have to do with your leaving?

BUTLER: Yes.

GROSS: Explain more about that.

BUTLER: Well, here we were - five young guys walked into a recording studio as the Impressions, walked out as Jerry Butler and the Impressions. The other four guys were wondering, well, what did Jerry do to get top billing? How did all of a sudden it start to look as though we're working for him as opposed to him being just part of the group? When we get to the Apollo Theater in New York, you have Jerry Butler in great big letters, the Impressions in small letters. By the time we get to Miami, Florida, there's just Jerry Butler on the marquee. No Impressions at all. And in each one of those places, the other guys refused to perform because their feelings were hurt. Their pride was hurt. They just never could understand it. And no matter how much I told them that I hadn't done anything, that this was a decision that had been made by the record company, they just never bought it.

GROSS: Let's hear the - what I think was the first hit you had when you went solo - "He Will Break Your Heart"?

BUTLER: Yes.

GROSS: Yeah.

BUTLER: With Curtis singing in the background. So even though it's a solo record, it's not really. It's more of a duet (laughter).

GROSS: And how did this become the song that you made?

BUTLER: What happened was my wife, Annette, Curtis and a young fellow by the name of Eddie Thomas, who was at that time working as a roadie, we were driving from Philadelphia to Atlantic City, and we were talking about how the girls hang at the backstage door to get a chance to say hello to the stars, and hopefully they would get a chance to be invited out, and etc., etc. And then the next morning, the artists would leave town and those same girls would go back to whoever they were dating, whatever they were doing before the stars came to town. And that was the concept behind "He Will Break Your Heart." He uses all the great quotations. He says the things I wish I could say. But when he takes his bow and makes his exit, you know, I'll be there to take you home because I'm Jerry. I'm Jerry always be here. That guy is Jerry going to be gone in the morning.

GROSS: OK. Recorded in 1960, this is Jerry Butler with Curtis Mayfield. It's been so much fun to talk with you. I want to thank you so much.

BUTLER: Thank you.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HE WILL BREAK YOUR HEART")

JERRY BUTLER AND CURTIS MAYFIELD: (Singing) He don't love you like I love you. If he did, he wouldn't break your heart. He don't love you like I love you. He's trying to tear us apart. Fare thee well. I know you're leaving.

GROSS: My interview with Jerry Butler was recorded in 2000. He died last month. He was 85.

Jazz drummer Roy Haynes, who played with jazz luminaries from Lester Young and Charlie Parker to Gary Burton and Pat Metheny, was born a hundred years ago today. Jazz historian Kevin Whitehead will have an appreciation after a break. This is FRESH AIR.

(SOUNDBITE OF JAMES HUNTER SONG, "I'LL WALK AWAY")

TERRY GROSS, HOST:

This is FRESH AIR. Today is the centennial of the birth of jazz drummer Roy Haynes. He almost made it to the occasion. He died in November at age 99. Haynes was one of the most in-demand drummers in jazz, working with Lester Young, Miles Davis, Charlie Parker, Bud Powell, Stan Getz and Sarah Vaughan, and many others before he turned 30. And later with Gary Burton, Chick Corea, Pat Metheny and others. Jazz historian Kevin Whitehead says Haynes was a powerhouse who liked to prod his fellow players.

(SOUNDBITE OF STAN GETZ'S "I'M LATE, I'M LATE")

KEVIN WHITEHEAD, BYLINE: Drummer Roy Haynes with saxophonist Stan Getz in 1961. Haynes was on one of his several hot streaks in the early '60s, enlivening a few classic records with drum intros that grabbed your attention and sparked the action. Here's Roy Haynes kicking off a tune by Oliver Nelson.

(SOUNDBITE OF OLIVER NELSONS' "CASCADES")

WHITEHEAD: And one by pianist Andrew Hill.

(SOUNDBITE OF ANDREW HILL'S "LAND OF NOD")

WHITEHEAD: And one more, Eric Dolphy's "G.W."

(SOUNDBITE OF ERIC DOLPHY'S "G.W.")

WHITEHEAD: Behind the drums, Roy Haynes displayed power and intelligence. He was a quick and highly interactive listener who knew when to support a soloist and when to provoke them. He grew up in Boston, picking up the sticks around age 7, and started playing professionally before he even had a full drum set. His parents were from Barbados, and a variety of Anglo and Latino Caribbean rhythms would inform his phrasing. On a 1951 Charlie Parker record date with a Latin flavor, Haynes on drum set seamlessly blends with Afro Cuban conga and bongo players, then swings in straight jazz time on his own, moving easily from one groove to the other.

(SOUNDBITE OF CHARLIE PARKER'S "WHY DO I LOVE YOU")

WHITEHEAD: Roy Haynes had moved to New York as World War II ended, soaking up the music uptown and down. He landed a choice two-year gig with saxophonist Lester Young in 1947, and by the early '50s, leaders were vying for his services. Haynes left Miles Davis to join Charlie Parker. He did a season backing Ella Fitzgerald, then five years with the even more acrobatic singer Sarah Vaughan. IDing the members of her trio on stage, Vaughan took to giving him an introduction fans would echo ever after.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SHULIE A BOP")

SARAH VAUGHAN: Roy. Haynes. (Vocalizing).

WHITEHEAD: He liked smart clothes, fast cars and staying in shape. Roy Haynes prided himself on his fluid beat. He wasn't one for practicing the rudimental exercises drum students learn early. Like other heavy swingers at the drums, he'd give two-beat patterns a triplety (ph) three-beat feel for tumbling headlong momentum. Haynes could be crafty, playing behind Thelonious Monk live in 1958, sometimes matching the piano's intransigence with a bit of his own.

(SOUNDBITE OF THELONIOUS MONK QUARTET'S "EVIDENCE")

WHITEHEAD: In the early '60s, Roy Haynes subbed in John Coltrane's quartet when Elvin Jones was unavailable. A few years later, he connected with a young pianist whose father he'd known in Boston - Chick Corea. His trio album, "Now He Sings, Now He Sobs," with Miroslav Vitous on bass was an instant classic that had spawned a few sequels. Check out Roy Haynes' creative work on cymbals, high hat and snare drum on "Matrix." He's a sleek, modern designer in sound.

(SOUNDBITE OF CHICK COREA'S "MATRIX")

WHITEHEAD: Roy Haynes at age 43, 1968. By the 1990s, Roy Haynes was a widely respected jazz elder known for his unfailing good taste. He was choosy about who he recorded with, not just anyone who had the money. Besides leading his own bands, he'd reunite with former comrades like Chick Corea, Sonny Rollins and Pat Metheny and connect with young bloods like Christian McBride, Joshua Redman and Roy Hargrove. In the new century, Haynes assembled a so-called Fountain Of Youth Band, which featured a series of up-and-coming players. That band's last release session comes from 2011 when Roy Haynes was 86, capping a 65-year recording career studded with more jazz classics than we have time to even hint at. He was a heavy hitter, whose limber beat could lift a bandstand.

(SOUNDBITE OF ROY HAYNES' "GRAND STREET")

GROSS: A Kevin Whitehead is our jazz historian and author of the book "Play The Way You Feel: The Essential Guide To Jazz Stories On Film." Roy Haynes' centennial is being marked today with a jazz memorial and centennial celebration at St. Peter's Church in New York City. If you'd like to catch up on FRESH AIR interviews you missed, like this week's interview with comic and actor Bill Burr or with journalist David Enrich, whose book, "Murder The Truth" is about how freedom of the press is being threatened by tech billionaires, corporations and political figures, check out our podcast. You'll find lots of FRESH AIR interviews. And to find out what's happening behind the scenes of our show and get our producers' recommendations for what to watch, read and listen to, subscribe to our free newsletter at whyy.org/freshair. FRESH AIR's executive producer is Danny Miller. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham. Our managing producer is Sam Briger. Thea Chaloner directed today's show. Our co-host is Tonya Mosley. I'm Terry Gross.

(SOUNDBITE OF ROY HAYNES' "GRAND STREET")

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