Bill Henderson

When his time is not taken up by movie and TV acting assignments, Bill Henderson remains capable of reminding his audiences that he is one of the few totally qualified male jazz singers still extant. Thursday at the Vine St. Bar & Grill, despite an attendance diminished by the earthquake, he rose above the circumstances to offer the best selected, most persuasively performed set this observer has heard in many years of Henderson-watching.

Falling has serious implications. You either break your neck or, if you believe in such things, much worse: You find yourself alone in the wilderness, outside the providence of God. Bill Henderson's belief in both--and his willingness to risk either--make "Tower," his account of constructing such an eponymous structure nearly 20 feet tall on the coast of Maine, a strange and fascinating book. Twenty feet may not seem tall, but Henderson wastes no time framing his task in mythic proportions.

There's nothing lacking in the vocal artistry of Bill Henderson. He has an appealing, gravelly warble, a drummer-like sense of rhythm, a way to the essence of a lyric and grand taste in songs. Others who have felt the same way are Count Basie, Horace Silver, Oscar Peterson and Jimmy Smith, all among the jazz greats with whom the singer Henderson has either performed or recorded. These days, though, Henderson mostly spends his time with his other love: acting.

There's nothing lacking in the vocal artistry of Bill Henderson. He has an appealing, gravelly warble, a drummer-like sense of rhythm, a way to the essence of a lyric and grand taste in songs. Others who have felt the same way are Count Basie, Horace Silver, Oscar Peterson and Jimmy Smith, all among the jazz greats with whom the singer Henderson has either performed or recorded. These days, though, Henderson mostly spends his time with his other love: acting.

A broken friendship and a lost opportunity frame a bitter behind-the-scenes prologue to Bill Henderson's "The Bitter End." Many of Henderson's decisions about how to make "The Bitter End" were shaped by an incident that began in 1989 when, he says, he and two associates came up with the idea for a film called "Roadside Prophets," an update of "Easy Rider," the '60s counterculture landmark that launched Jack Nicholson's career.

For the sake of a point, let's divide things this way: There is only one kind of people, but there are two kinds of questions. There are questions we ask each other. Did O.J. do it? Can Dole beat Clinton? Do I look better in red or green? And, there are questions we increasingly face alone, if at all. What is the meaning of life? The nature of God? Do we control technology or does it control us? We are socialized for the first group of questions.

The conventional wisdom is correct. Since the end of the Korean War, fewer and fewer large circulation magazines have published fiction (and even fewer serious poetry), but at the same time, the writing population of the United States seems to have increased--and certainly brushed up on its technique--probably as the result of the growing number of writing programs, most at the graduate level, some undergraduate, and proliferating summer workshops around the country. Where to publish, then?

The man I love hates technology, hates that he's forced to use it: telephones and microfilm, air conditioning, car radios and the occasional fax. He wishes he lived in the old world, sitting on a stump carving a clothespin or a spoon. He wants to go back, slip like lint into his great-great-grandfather's pocket, reborn as a pilgrim, a peasant, a dirt farmer hoeing his uneven rows. He walks when he can, through the hills behind his house, his dogs panting beside him like small steam engines.

Being between engagements is the seemingly constant state for actors and musicians. Being between careers is an even more demanding state for Bill Henderson, a man whose singing talents are known to the jazz world and whose character acting is known to television and film audiences. The pendulum now is swinging toward singing and the Chicago-born Henderson is preparing for his return to the jazz clubs. (He opens a two-night stint at Le Cafe on Friday.

Bill Henderson's opening night set at Hollywood's Catalina Bar & Grill on Tuesday started out with all the signs of a disaster in progress. The room was barely half full, his accompanying trio--Mike Darson on piano, Brian Bromberg on bass and Dave Karasony on drums--had limited familiarity with Henderson's arrangements, and the sound system was having problems adjusting the mix between singer and musicians.

For the sake of a point, let's divide things this way: There is only one kind of people, but there are two kinds of questions. There are questions we ask each other. Did O.J. do it? Can Dole beat Clinton? Do I look better in red or green? And, there are questions we increasingly face alone, if at all. What is the meaning of life? The nature of God? Do we control technology or does it control us? We are socialized for the first group of questions.

The man I love hates technology, hates that he's forced to use it: telephones and microfilm, air conditioning, car radios and the occasional fax. He wishes he lived in the old world, sitting on a stump carving a clothespin or a spoon. He wants to go back, slip like lint into his great-great-grandfather's pocket, reborn as a pilgrim, a peasant, a dirt farmer hoeing his uneven rows. He walks when he can, through the hills behind his house, his dogs panting beside him like small steam engines.

A broken friendship and a lost opportunity frame a bitter behind-the-scenes prologue to Bill Henderson's "The Bitter End." Many of Henderson's decisions about how to make "The Bitter End" were shaped by an incident that began in 1989 when, he says, he and two associates came up with the idea for a film called "Roadside Prophets," an update of "Easy Rider," the '60s counterculture landmark that launched Jack Nicholson's career.

Bill Henderson's opening night set at Hollywood's Catalina Bar & Grill on Tuesday started out with all the signs of a disaster in progress. The room was barely half full, his accompanying trio--Mike Darson on piano, Brian Bromberg on bass and Dave Karasony on drums--had limited familiarity with Henderson's arrangements, and the sound system was having problems adjusting the mix between singer and musicians.

At the end of this century we embrace the short story (and the newer short short story of a mere two or three pages), some say because it fits into our lives of easy consumption, neat packaging and over-scheduled time, or because the spread of parvenu taste has taken its toll and like television, turned us toward more intense, minimal tales. But the popularity of the short story seems much more complex than this, harking back to the beginnings of the genre, when its purpose was didactic.

These books, collections of snippets of nasty comments on well-known books or well-known authors prior to and after 1961, respectively, force one to confront a hideous, hidden truth about high culture: Critics hate authors even more than authors hate critics. One could be generous and ascribe this hatred to the critics' love of language and veracity, elements frequently trashed by authors, or to a pronounced ecologic1634476147to so unworthy a collection of phrases).

Falling has serious implications. You either break your neck or, if you believe in such things, much worse: You find yourself alone in the wilderness, outside the providence of God. Bill Henderson's belief in both--and his willingness to risk either--make "Tower," his account of constructing such an eponymous structure nearly 20 feet tall on the coast of Maine, a strange and fascinating book. Twenty feet may not seem tall, but Henderson wastes no time framing his task in mythic proportions.

When his time is not taken up by movie and TV acting assignments, Bill Henderson remains capable of reminding his audiences that he is one of the few totally qualified male jazz singers still extant. Thursday at the Vine St. Bar & Grill, despite an attendance diminished by the earthquake, he rose above the circumstances to offer the best selected, most persuasively performed set this observer has heard in many years of Henderson-watching.