All language subtitles for The.Devils.Horn.2016.1080p.WEBRip.x264.AAC5.1-[YTS.MX]

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*

*

Narrator:
Alchemy, sorcery,

the infernal creation
of the mad inventor,

Adolphe Sax:

a man driven by a dream
of dancing demons,

summoning the
devil himself.

A Serpentine
cylinder of brass,

breathing a sound
more deeply human

than the
human voice.

The saxophone
breeds temptation.

Just as the player must choose
which way to bend each note,

he must
also choose

which way to
bend his soul:

towards the saint
or the sinner.

I think that came from
a pope, didn't it?

Didn't a pope refer
to the saxophone

as the devil's horn?

The saxophone has been in my
life for many, many years,

a instrument
of love.

When I blow,
things happen,

I can't explain it,

'cause I'm blowing
from my soul.

It's from here
and here, both.

You have good heart,
good gonna come in.

You have
bad heart,

bad music is
gonna come in.

Narrator:
Charlie Parker,

Lester Young,

John Coltrane.

Whoever chooses the tainted
embrace of the saxophone

risks being consumed
by its fire.

It is the
devil's horn.

[Jazz Music]

*

Narrator:
The saxophone was
conceived in Belgium.

Adolphe Sax was born in the
small town of Dinant, in 1814,

the age of Napoleon
and Beethoven.

His father made trumpets
and clarinets for a living,

fascinating his young son with
the mystical transformation

of base metals
into music.

From the day
of his birth,

a strange destiny hung over
Adolphe Sax like a cloud.

He drank poison in his
father's workshop,

thinking it was milk.

The roof shingle split
his head in two,

a gunpowder explosion
burned half his body,

and he almost drowned in
the river behind his home.

Narrator:
But he did survive,

long enough to breathe
life into a new instrument

and to give
it his name.

It's an instrument

that draws people towards it
with a strange fascination

and casts a spell over them
that can never be broken.

Jimmy Heath fell under that
spell a long time ago.

He's now almost
ninety years old.

He was part of a
generation of giants

whose brilliance was
darkened by its shadow.

*

*

It can be the devil's horn
if you want it to be,

and it could be
the angel's horn.

It can be an instrument to try
to attract the opposite sex.

And, you know,
people do that.

If the guy, that guy with that
saxophone is getting the girl,

I'm gonna get me one of them
so I can get me some girls!

It doesn't work
like that.

'Cause a lot of
those ladies,

want to give the
drummer some!

[Jazz Music]

*

I love him,
he knows that.

He knows it!

He's the greatest
saxophone player
in the world,

'cause he hired me
and give me a job.

That's the
only reason?

No! And musically,
and musically,

he's the baddest dude I
played I don't know nobody...

The first thing he said
is I gave him a job!

Musically, that
comes second!

David Wong even
called me up.

Look at him, he's talk dark
and handsome, there he is!

This is my man,
right here.

If I was gay,

I would hit
this guy.

[Offscreen Laughter]

I'd give
him some.

[Jazz Music]

*

*

Jimmy Heath:
Oh yeah,
that's my brothers.

Percy is the bassist,

and my brother, Tootie,
he is the drummer.

We're taking after my father and
mother there in that picture.

My mother sang in church choir,
she's a singer.

And my father played
the clarinet.

*

Hey,

know who that
photo is:

Sonny Rollins
and Ruby Dee.

That's Quincy Jones
and that's Roy Haines.

James Moody
and myself.

And that's
my mentor,

right there:
Dizzy Gillespie.

In my time we didn't go to
college to-to learn jazz.

We learned from um
our...associates,

the guys who were
before us, the elders.

*

Uh, Train died uh
forty-eight years ago,

because uh we are,

he's uh one month
older than I.

Uh, that picture
you see up there,

you can hardly
see it,

but on that picture
that's my big band

and Charlie Parker is
playing my saxophone

'cause his was
in the pawnshop,

and he borrowed
my horn.

And that's my back,

and in between us is a picture
of Coltrane with a cigarette.

And he's looking
at Bird like,

'cause Charlie Parker
was playing all this

wild and beautiful music.

And uh we all were in
awe of Charlie Parker

'cause he was the genius
that we really latched on to,

when he came
on the scene.

Narrator:
Charlie Parker:

the rebel angel that led the
armies of jazz into the future.

Did it with a
needle in his arm

and a demon on
his shoulder.

He spent time in a
mental hospital,

he attempted suicide,

and by the end
of his life,

Birdland, the club that
was named after him,

wouldn't let
him play there.

If you look through a list
of the saxophone greats,

you'll see name after name
whose lives were filled

with torment
and despair.

Stan Getz was arrested trying
to hold up a drug store

to get morphine;

Sidney Bechet challenged a
rival musician to a gunfight,

accidentally wounded
three bystanders,

and served a year
in a Parisian jail.

Wardell Gray was discovered on
a lonely road in the desert,

killed three
times over:

his neck broken,

his skull fractured,

and a lethal dose of
heroin in his system.

Sure,

the players of other instruments
have had misfortunes too,

but there's something
about the saxophone,

something about the way
your soul passes through it

and hovers,

naked and exposed,

waiting to be consumed.

*

Narrator:
Picking up
the saxophone

is like stepping up to do battle
with a fearsome opponent.

Not everyone can
win that battle.

Some people lose
their lives,

some people lose
their souls,

and some lose the world to
which they once belonged.

*

*

Matt Lavelle:
Giuseppi was a
complete mystery.

If you look on the record,
there's no,

I couldn't-even online I
couldn't find any actual photos,

or actual image
of who he was.

So at Sam Ash you never know
who's gonna come in there.

Do you need a
neck strap, man?

Man:
Sure, yeah.

Matt Lavelle:
I mean, every day,

people from
every scene...

anyone could
come in there,

from all over the
world of Jazz.

It's a common thing with guys
that play on the street,

and are pretty low on funds,
they'll come in.

You can tell that,
you know,

they're a street
kind of person,

and they usually
ask for one reed.

So Giuseppi came in.

Uh, I didn't
know who he was.

So I looked at him and
tried to figure out,

well which lost
legend is this?

Because I'm used to
encountering stuff like that.

So half-kidding,

more for myself
than anything else,

you know,
I said:

Man, so who
are you, man?

You who are
you like,

Giuseppi Logan or
something like that?

So, turns out,

it was Giuseppi Logan!

Narrator:
In the 1960's,

Giuseppi Logan had a
future and a family.

In those days he would come
to Tompkins Square Park

with his young son.

He was a musician
on the rise,

playing with people like Charles
Mingus and Ornette Coleman,

the artists who were
inventing the new form

called "free jazz".

But all that came
to a sudden stop,

when Giuseppi Logan disappeared.

Yeah, knocked out, you know.
Yeah, knocked out, you know.

Uh, he was-he was put
into a mental home,

but it was
pretty serious.

I mean, it was, you know, they
locked it-they locked it down.

I don't know if they
did shock treatments,

like they
tend to do.

But uh he was-he was
away for a while.

Steve Swell:
You gotta realize

somebody like Giuseppi,
from the 60s,

when people were
doing something very
amazing in music

that has allowed
a whole host of
people nowadays

who don't even
realize their
connection

even to people
like Giuseppi,

who were out
here playing
free music.

He actually talked about
freeing the music up,

eliminating bar lines,

eliminating chord changes
and just playing freely,

and Giuseppi was one
of those people,

at the beginning
of that time.

I heard Giuseppi first
on a Roswell Rudd record

called "Everywhere".

Do you remember
that, Giuseppi?

You don't remember that?
Oh man.

Matt Lavelle:
There's a photo of that
day in the paper.

That's actually
from that day.

Narrator:
Giuseppi Logan emerged
from the shadows:

he recorded his first
album in 34 years,

there was an article
in the New York Times,

but none of that meant that
the shadows had disappeared.

Let's do Satan's dance!

Bap bap, baaa da bap...

*

Narrator:
Satan's Dance is the
composition of his

that everyone remembered.

But the thing about
dancing with Satan

is that when the
music stops,

the dance still
goes on.

Yeah!

Matt Lavelle:
When you talk about
the devil's horn,

there are some people that won't
be able to relate to that,

and you can hear
that in their music.

I'll put it
like that.

You know, you don't-you don't
have to dance with the devil

to play jazz.

But the people that do,

you can hear it
in their music.

And the people
that don't,

you can hear it too.

Giuseppi's music,
when you hear it,

those forces, it's almost
like an elemental force,

is part of it.

It's deeper than who
you are physically,

it's who you are spiritually,

it's what you need to
do to be who you are.

[Jazz Music]

*

*

Narrator:
Giuseppi Logan
lived in shelters

until he was
beaten and robbed.

Then he lived on
park benches.

Now he has a room,

but he can't practice
the saxophone there,

so he sits and waits for
the next day to come.

With the saxophone,

you have this
particular thing
that is really

so rich and
so flexible,

that you can really put any
nuances of emotion in the tone.

And of course,
human emotions can be good,

or ah less good!

Narrator:
François Louis
makes mouthpieces.

The most famous saxophone
players in the world

make the long pilgrimage
to his tiny studio

in the Belgian countryside

because François Louis

is the man who can open the
door that lets their breath

turn into sound.

I'm a mechanic.

I was a mechanic,
I raced motorbikes,

and I prepared and raced
bikes for other people too.

I put a lot of dedication into
those engines and things.

And at a certain point I started
questioning my dedication.

Because I thought it
was a little unuseful,

or maybe not as rich
as it could be,

to dedicate so much,
uh, vital energy

to have two wheels go
as fast as possible

and taking chances for
my life doing that.

This is very important because
that's where the air will

flow in the mouthpiece.

Even if it's a very precisely
made mouthpiece by computerized,

controlled machineries,

you need this final
touch by hand.

And I had experimented
a lot on the engine,

when I prepared
motorbikes' engines.

All the fluid dynamics,
is very important,

the way the gas
mixed with air,

enters the chamber
of the engine.

Actually, problematic
is exactly the same,

as the air stream interrupted,

here by the reed that opens
and close the mouthpiece.

And I say: okay, we
have the same problem,

I think the same solution
should be helpful.

Playing any mouthpiece,

a strong player will always
have the same sound,

and will do the
same thing.

But with one mouthpiece,

that's not the perfect
mouthpiece for him,

he's going to have to-to
struggle with the piece

to get what
he wants.

So what I'm
trying to do

when I make a custom
mouthpiece for someone,

is to have the thing that
just makes him feel like

there is no mouthpieces
anymore, you know?

He's there, he's
blowing his ideas.

You can blow directly
your ideas into sound

without even thinking you have
to go through the mouthpiece.

*

Narrator:
In honour of Adolphe Sax's
200th birthday,

two hundred saxophones are
getting ready to perform

in the place where
he was born.

Indeed, the whole town is
preparing to celebrate

its favourite son.

[Uptempo Saxophone]

Narrator:
Sax had created
an instrument

that allowed the players to
bend the sound to their will,

shaping the timbre,

bending the pitch,

ranging from a
whisper to a scream.

It took the best features of
the orchestral instruments

and merged
them into one.

Alain Crépin:
He took from a
brass instrument,

the metal,
like-like the brass,

but he took the system of
the flute for the fingers,

and the system of the
clarinet for the mouthpiece.

Narrator:
He showed it to the most
famous composers in the world,

hoping it would earn a place
in the classical orchestra.

Hector Berlioz proclaimed
that no wind instrument

could match
its expressiveness.

But it turned out

that that versatility would
lead it to places its inventor

had never intended.

The first place where it
became wildly successful

was in military
marching bands,

first in Europe,

and then the
New World as well.

When jazz was born,

the saxophone was
there waiting for it.

It turned out it could play
a role in any form of music

you could imagine.

And the saxophone

spread around the world like
an uncontrollable virus.

[Gypsy Folk Music]

*

*

It's the gypsy music,
you know.

*

*

Narrator:
Yuri Yunakov plays the
music of the Roma people.

Music created to accompany the
great celebrations of life.

Music that would make him
the most famous sax player

in Bulgaria.

*

Bulent Kayabas:
He's the best of the
world gypsy music,

and he's the best
saxophone player.

Sunaj Saraci:
I know he plays
Turkish music,

he plays Bulgarian,
very-very good music,

he plays Albanian music,
he plays Serbian music,

any Balkan music,
Yuri's the best.

*

Yuri Yanakov:
The rhythm is
very important.

This rhythm is good for any
kind people who not understand

this music to dancing.

You can't sit on the chair
to listen this music,

you play gypsy music.

You have to stand up,

you have to dancing.

You're not going to
stay on the chair!

*

Narrator:
In communist Bulgaria,

the Roma did not
officially exist.

Their languages
were forbidden;

their music was
"ethnically impure".

But Yuri Yunakov's saxophone

became the voice of
a persecuted people

who refused to
be crushed.

He was forbidden from
performing in any public venue,

but at private parties
throughout Bulgaria,

his music was welcomed
and celebrated.

Before long,

it wasn't just the Roma
celebrating Yuri's music.

It didn't matter if it was
considered subversive;

the father of the bride

would still want the best
band in the country,

no matter what unwelcome
attention it might draw.

The owner of the-the
wedding party,

he invite almost like 200
people or 250 to 300 people.

On the outside,

these people are coming
to see us, you know,

it's a thousand, thousand
people to five thousand,

ten thousand.

Whole town, town, town is coming
to see the-the-this orchestra,

and to dancing,
you know.

Narrator:
The jazz age was born:

a new age of freedom
for the young,

a new age of sweetness
and seduction.

The saxophone still sounded
like a human voice,

but now it was a voice
that was laughing.

Rudy Wiedoeft

was the most celebrated
saxophonist of the age,

and his playing captured
the delighted spirit

of a generation
running wild.

*

Narrator:
But no matter how
light his playing,

there was darkness
behind it in his life.

His wife stabbed him
with a butcher knife

in a domestic dispute;

he would die an
alcoholic's death.

The saxophone became a
symbol of unbridled freedom,

and all of its
evil consequences.

[Saxophone Solo]

*

When I first started,

people didn't want to receive
the saxophone in the church,

you know, it was known
as the devil's horn

and it was at the
clubs and everything;

they didn't think, ever,

that the sax could
be in a church.

I started
making records,

I made a 45, one of
those 45s at first,

and then we started giving
them to radio announcers.

They wouldn't
play it!

They wouldn't
play it;

they said you
gotta be joking.

A saxophone playing
gospel music?

They said,
you're joking!

[Amazing Grace]

Narrator:
Pastor Vernard Johnson

has become the man
that many now call

the greatest gospel saxophone
player in the world.

You gotta realize that-that
Vernard Johnson...

God used Vernard Johnson
to-to take the saxophone

from the clubs
to the pulpit.

[Gospel Music]

This is our
building now.

It doesn't look
like much,

but I got a
vision here.

It's about twenty-six
thousand square feet

of this building,

it's a solid building,

just brick and steel.

And I see a triple dome
up here on this building.

A bigger dome in the middle
and then two smaller domes

on the right and left
and we're gonna call it

Amazing Grace Triple Dome.

[Gospel Music]

*

Vernard Johnson:
Let's go up the stairs,

let's go up the stairs.

I plan to build a area
right here for my secretary

and her office will
extend all the way down

to the light
down there.

Now here is our
Multi Purpose Room,

it's gonna get a little dark
in here because, you know,

we're working on it.

We'll have a table here and
the staff can put their

uh lunches in the cabinets,
and everything like that.

Uh huh, yeah!

This is our sanctuary...to be!

Yeah. This is our sanctuary.

Oh my God,

I can feel the presence of
God even when I walk in!

The stage will
be right here,

uh maybe
a foot,

foot and a
half high,

not too high,

but it will be
right here,

and I'll speak:

Hey everybody,
how y'all doing?

Praise the Lord, Everybody!

I'll be speaking
to the crowd here.

*

*

Vernard Johnson:
Now I gotta get y'all

to see something
extremely important

for this building.

This is the reason
why I believe

they couldn't sell
this building:

'cause God had
it held for us.

They had stacked canned
goods all up in this corner

and of course they had
a partition across it.

And it got so
hot in here

that the canned
goods exploded.

And they exploded
on this wall!

And when they got
through exploding,

there was the
face of the Lord,

the face of the
Lord right there.

There's the eyes,
there's his hair,

there's his fist balled
up and coming down here.

Oh my God.

And then that priestly
crown on his head up there.

Oh.

Nothing could have made
that except God, you know.

Man could-could not
have drawn this,

and they caught him,
right there,

fighting for us.

Oh, thank God.

*

[Cheering & Clapping]

For the 200th
anniversary of
Adolphe Sax

we had to do
something with

all Adolphe Sax instruments we
have here in the collection,

because our collection
is the biggest

and the most beautiful
in the world.

He wanted to be able
to have an orchestra

that could play all the range,
musical range,

with the same instruments.

So he make families from the
high voice to the low voice,

and that was really like
his madness, you know.

His instruments was
almost perfect,

just from the beginning.

There are small differences
in the keywork for example,

or in the shape of the bell,

but the saxophone
as Sax invented it,

and the
saxophone today,

is almost the
same instrument.

The saxophone is still at
its beginning, you know.

It's an instrument
that is so open,

there are so many
possibilities to explore,

that not the whole instrument
has been explored yet.

So young generations,

they approach the saxophone
with another idea,

with another sound
in their mind.

And then they find ways to make
their own sound, nowadays,

with the saxophone.

[Deep Growling Saxophone]

*

It's not like
just shooting air
through the-the

mouthpiece and
vibrating the reed

and having the
resonance of
the saxophone,

'cause every-like
so much of what

we do to make the sound
that we individually create

is happening in here.

It happens in here,

um and so that's all just
absolutely personal.

[Deep Growling Saxophone]

*

And then the other thing
is that saxophone,

because it's had the
history that it's had,

has been able to be so
many different things.

So you can-your
sound can be...

I mean...you can-you're
free to invent.

[Deep Fierce Uptempo Saxophone]

*

*

None of the techniques that
I do are unique to me...

multiphonics is all part
of saxophone playing,

and vocalizing:

you use a hum
to create.

You don't hear the
specific pitches;

what you hear is the-the
sound of the saxophone

change in colour.

*

*

Circular breathing
is certainly

thousands and thousands
of years old,

and I think it's probably
one of the first things

that we did in
making sound

and interacting
with the universe.

*

You breathe in air
through your nose,

at the same time breathing
out air through your mouth.

You get enough of a um,
of a reservoir of air there,

so that you can continue to
keep the-the air pressure

through the mouthpiece and
through the reed to keep

all of the sound
being produced,

and at that moment you suck
in air through your nose.

*

*

At first,

its-it takes everything
that you have

just to get that just the
quick back and forth.

And then after some
time dealing with it,

you can increase
the volume,

you can increase the amount of
air that you can do that with.

The bass saxophone just
takes a lot more pressure

so your lungs need
to be bigger,

uh face needs
to be bigger,

face needs to
be stronger,

um and then
so yeah,

then you figure out how to
make your lungs bigger.

And which is
true and real.

*

We train our bodies
to do something.

It's not like I just
asked you to step up,

having not
had my life,

and then now you're
doing this thing

which would blow some
portion of you out.

But it's all in the
context of a lifetime

and of the activities that
get us to a place we're at

in the moment.

Narrator:
The free spirit of the
saxophone was despised

wherever a rigid system
sought to constrain

the human mind.

The pope banned it
from the church.

The Nazis banned it from
the face of the earth.

[Clapping]

Narrator:
It was music played
by negroes and Jews,

for the Nazis that
was degenerate music,

and it went on the
fire along with books.

In the great
Soviet Republics,

the saxophone reeked
of the decadent West.

Stalin sent saxophone
players to exile in Siberia.

Music was for the glory
of the revolution,

not for the liberation
of the human spirit.

Yuri Yunakov learned
that lesson.

Here, from uh 1988.

This are my
old band!

[Fast Tempo Gypsy Music]

*

Narrator:
In Bulgaria,

the music of the Roma sprang
to life like a flame.

A flame the state was determined
to stamp out forever.

Bye.

Hey Bubby.

Bye Daddy!

[Saxophone Solo]

*

*

*

Here coming the police;
he arrests us,

he put in the jail,
fifteen days.

That's it; you have be
fifteen days in the...

he put us, you know, the best
musicians in-in the Bulgaria,

the-the top musician,
you know.

*

Three times,
haircuts, everything.

He take my car.

[Indiscernible Dialogue]

How many times?

The people, five thousand
people you watch,

the best musicians.

How-how-how? Running.

How? Running, because it's
coming the police to catch us.

*

Narrator:
The legendary master of the
gypsy saxophone fled his country

and now works during the
day as a limo driver

in New York City.

Yuri Yunakov:
I'm start here from
this country from zero.

Just from
twenty dollars.

I'm not gonna forget
this home, never.

*

Yuri Yunakov:
I love America.
I love it.

Anybody in this
country is together.

No Chinese, no Arabic,
no Armenian,

Turkish or Bulgarian
or something.

You know, everybody together,
living, you know.

It's like, you know,
one family.

No more prison. No.

François Louis:
To me, first of all,

I was attracted
by just the shape

and the image of
the instrument.

It's like a factory.

It's a sound factory,
you know?

So many mechanisms that
interact and things and:

it's a whole conception.

And to me it's really a pure
product of the industrial era.

It came at the
same time as

the railroad and
all those things.

It is pure industrial product
but turned into music.

That's also what makes
it a little futuristic.

And that probably makes
Sax wasn't understood,

too much.

By the time he
designed the saxophone

and he presented the
first saxophone,

he really had
like enemies,

people making this
instrument ridiculous,

saying it's
out of tune,

saying whatever, "The sound
is like an elephant!"

I mean so-so yeah.

That wasn't
easy for him.

Narrator:
The saxophone arrived on the
scene like an atom bomb.

Wherever it
was shown,

it drew crowds
of thousands.

At competitions
between brass bands,

it annihilated
the opposition.

But all that success didn't
come without a price.

He made enemies
in Paris

of wealthy and powerful
instrument manufacturers

who couldn't compete with
the quality of his work.

But they could try
to destroy him.

His factory was
set on fire;

a bomb, placed under his bed,
went off early.

[Boom]

He survived.

A hired assassin was
sent to kill him,

but by mistake killed
his assistant instead.

Adolphe Sax survived.

But the curse of the saxophone
wasn't done with him yet.

[Saxophone Solo]

Vernard Johnson:
We're right in the middle
of the inner city.

Some people call it the hood,
or the ghetto.

And somebody asked
the question:

Can anything good
come from the hood?

And I say yes,
Amazing Grace.

*

Charles Davis:
I grew up in California
in a life of crime;

I was an
ex-gang member.

And now I'm
a minister.

Gina Hodges:
I had this vision

of a place
where I was,

and there
was a white
house there,

and a hill,

and up over
this place

there were all
these children

that were
reaching for me.

I had no idea what
was going on.

But I came to
Kansas City

and when I got here and I
was standing in the doorway,

I happened to look
across the street,

and there's the
white house.

And I looked to my left,
and there's the hill.

I was like, okay God,
is this where you want me?

Quindaro, up there,
that's one of the worst streets,

they say,
in Kansas.

We've had
shootings up there

and all kinds of things on
the news, so, you know,

everybody knows
where it is,

but they don't know it
in a positive manner.

We're gonna change
that around.

Narrator:
This is Kansas City.

This is ground zero,

because it's here that Charlie
Parker lived as a young man.

And it's here that,
after a car accident,

he went to the pharmacist

who suggested that he
try a cheaper painkiller

called heroin.

And when that first needle
entered Charlie Parker's arm,

the hands of the devil tightened
their grip around the saxophone.

Vernard Johnson is trying
to rip it from his clutches

and return it to
the hands of God.

In this community,
people are broken,

and they're bruised,
and they're wounded.

And what I try to do is-is
bring healing through God,

through Christ,
to the broken-hearted.

Music has a way of
integrating all of us.

Everybody that comes
to church doesn't have
the same feeling,

but once that
horn gets there,

it brings the whole-the
whole body together.

It's a spiritual transformation
that takes place.

And when we're finished,

it's as if we've
had a rebirth.

Renee Abernathy:
It's-it's like the holy
spirit just enters into you.

It-it words don't even
have to be stated.

He just his-his music just
brings that joy out of you.

[Gospel Music]

*

It is God's voice.

It's kind of like
you're being used,

but-but God is singing
through your instrument.

I guess that's why people
get so happy and shout,

'cause they hear God
speaking to them,

through the saxophone.

The devil's horn that has
been made God's horn.

Narrator:
It was not just
the church

that feared the sinful
and sensuous sound

of the saxophone.

Hey Stella!

Narrator:
Even in Hollywood,
it had its enemies.

Stanley:
Hey Stella!

Narrator:
A Streetcar Named Desire
was a very sexy film

until the League of Decency
got through with it.

Woman:
I wouldn't mix in it.

Narrator:
The composer had to rewrite
the music for this scene

for French horn

and audiences in the
50s never got to hear

the original steamy
New Orleans saxophone.

*

*

Narrator:
When you hear this
kind of music,

you know the story
that's being told.

The story that nobody in the
50s wanted to be told just yet.

But they were going
to be hearing it soon

harder, faster, and
louder than ever before.

[The Sonics]

* Some folks like water

* Some folks like wine

* But I like the taste

* Of straight strychnine

* Wahhhh!!

Narrator:
Before the
electric guitar,

it was the saxophone
that gave the angry,

edgy sound to
rock and roll.

Wherever bad girls
were turning worse,

wherever good boys were crossing
the tracks to find them,

the saxophone was
blowing its cool.

* Wine is red

* Poison is blue

* Strychnine is good

* For what's ailin' you

Narrator:
And the saxophone defined the
sound of the band that was punk

before punk was born,

that was grunge before
grunge was created.

While other bands were
singing about fun in the sun,

the Sonics were singing about
poison, witches, and death.

* Strychnine-oh, oh

* Strychnine-oh, oh

* Wahh! Strychnine...

The difference,
for me,

between playing clean and
playing sax in The Sonics.

Clean is sort of:

*

And playing in The Sonics
is dirtier,

and what I mean by that
is something like this:

*

Like that.

And it's-it's just gravel,
it's just dirt, you know.

'Cause we're a dirty
ol' rock n roll band,

and I'm a dirty ol'
rock n roll sax player.

* Well you know you will

* Say don't you know

* And do you remember

* That I told you so

* Gonna do you in

* Cause she's a witch

* Ahhh-hoo, ahhh-hoo

[Cheering & Applauding]

The Sonics
were playing,

and the Vietnam
war was going on,

and there
was a draft.

And I got a
draft number,

and I went to a
draft physical,

four months before I was gonna
get a degree from college.

And I was naïve

and I tried to talk
reason to them:

I said, well, leave me
alone for four months,

I'll get my degree,
and then I'll do it.

They said: no, you
don't understand kid,

you're going
in two weeks.

Narrator:
For the Sonics,
and for Rob Lind,

the Vietnam War was
the end of the road.

Rob Lind became
a Navy pilot,

and didn't pick up the
saxophone again for 40 years.

* With your devilish tricks

* Let's just say if
I need to call ya *

* I'll dial 666

*

*

Narrator:
Perhaps it's just as well
that Lind was drafted,

because in Vietnam,

he was safe from the
saxophone's curse.

[Cheering & Applauding]

"Mona's Mood".

When he wrote
"Mona's Mood",

I said: why did you
make it so sad?

I don't find this life
so serious or sad.

But he was telling
another story.

*

You know, I was on the
rebound of a love affair

that ah went wrong,

and that's when
somebody offered
me some,

what they call now,
as substance abuse.

They all know me as
a little happy guy,

you know, they
don't know me,

they didn't
know me then,

stealing and
all that stuff.

I was poisoned,
I was poisoned.

It was a scourge of
the earth as far as
I'm concerned,

is narcotics so,

we don't even have
to talk about this;

let's get back to
the saxophone, man!

Albert Heath:
I'm so used to seeing
him like he is now,

and not like
he was, until,

I have to really search
my memory to go back

and-and look at all of
those things that happened

in my childhood.

The impact of his
addiction on the family.

And I always
say to Jimmy,

now, that he never,

my mother never saw
this side of him.

He was always a
pain in the ass.

Jimmy Heath:
There's a certain degree
of deep concentration

with one of the drugs
that I was using.

That one, heroin.

That ah, I-I find,
you know,

it's not worth it!

But when I was in it

I found out, you know,

that's probably why Coltrane
could practice so hard all day.

'Cause he was zooming right in
on everything he didn't know.

And he would make sure

he was working on
something all the time.

And he could concentrate
on, you know,

on that deep concentration.

*

*

You don't-you don't
really think,

that that drug, man.

That's a powerful thing.

When it gets a hold on you,
you get sick without it.

An addiction
is rough,

I don't care what
you are addicted to.

There's only two
ways you leave:

you die or you
go to jail.

Or both!

Narrator:
Jimmy Heath was
convicted in 1954

of selling heroin to
an undercover officer,

and spent four and a half
years in a federal prison.

Jimmy Heath:
When I was away,

a lot of musicians
of my generation

reached their pinnacle,

and their height
in the music.

Coltrane became a
household jazz name,

while I was
away, man.

When I came back,

Coltrane was a monster in
recognition, you know.

But, you know,

there's a-a lot of guys who fell
by the wayside with narcotics.

The fact that they took
the time away from him,

and he corrected all
those bad habits,

and he realized
that was not him,

he's another person,

uh it might have
been a blessing

because a lot of the people
that did not go through

what he went through,

didn't survive.

I saw him in the
pain-in the pain,

that he was in,
-And that was it!

and how awful
it was for him

to have to go out and do
this kinda stuff daily.

I remember he used to hide
shit in his socks in a drawer.

Be needles-be needles
and shit in a drawer,

you know, like
eyedroppers and spoons

and I'd find it wrapped
up in my socks.

I said, what the
hell is this?

Sticking this
shit in his arm.

Oh my god,
I'm not doing that.

I'm like all right,
that's it.

I'm not doing that.

[Cheering]

*

*

Narrator:
Adolphe Sax's life was one
filled with turmoil and strife.

He'd invented the most
successful instrument

of his age,

but that instrument dragged
him into an endless battle

against those who wanted
to sabotage his work

and steal his ideas.

Narrator:
His business
was in ruins,

his debts were mounting,

and now a new curse
descended upon him:

a black tumour appeared
on his lower lip

and grew to a
monstrous size.

He could only eat
through a tube.

The only solution
seemed to be surgery

that would remove half
the flesh from his face.

In desperation,

he fell upon a certain
mysterious doctor from the east,

Dr. Noir,

who treated him with
secret herbal preparations

from the islands
of Indonesia.

Dr. Noir was later revealed
as a trickster and a fraud,

but all the same,

Adolphe Sax's
tumour fell off

and healed completely.

Once again,

some mysterious
power intervened

to save Adolphe Sax
from death.

I decided that I had
tried many things,

and they had failed.

And I had hit
kinda rock bottom.

Empty inside,
lonely inside.

And I looked up to
heaven and I said God,

if you're truly real,

If you are real,

I want you to
touch my lungs

and take this asthma
that I had all of my life

out of my lungs.

And one day as
I was blowing,

"Only what you do
for Christ will Last",

oh my God.

And while I was
blowing it,

something
happened to me.

I held this note,

* "only what,"

and I held this
note so long,

till I passed out.

*

If God doesn't
touch me,

I'm gonna die right here,
you know.

I'm-I'm gonna hold this
note until he comes.

*

Vernard Johnson:
When I came to,

I heard that
same voice say,

check your lungs, Vernard.

And I was-I was
miraculously healed.

Thank you Jesus.

Thank you Lord.
Thank you Lord.

[Gospel Music]

*

*

*

I can't explain what
happens to me when I blow.

Um, all I know is that,
oh my God,

please don't let me
get happy here,

but all I know is when I think
of the goodness of Jesus

and all he's
done for me,

my soul cries out:
Hallelujah,

thank God for blessing
and saving me.

Colin Stetson:
What I try to get to is the
same place that we talk about

when we talk
about meditation.

Which is to
purely experience

this moment in time
as consciousness.

You know, as
consciousness pure,

unadulterated with contemplation
of future and past,

but to be in
the moment.

So when I'm performing
my solo music,

my goal is to,

to become the sound as
much as I possibly can.

So that, consciously,

I cease to
be this um,

and-and this interaction,

I cease to be body having an
effect on this piece of metal,

and instead
become the sound.

So you now are
just the sound,

and you can...

you can become whatever it
is that you want to be.

*

*

Colin Stetson:
In my pursuit of,

for lack of
better terms,

we call like "transcendent
experience" with music,

I don't think of it
as supernatural.

I don't think of
it as magical,

I think of it all as some very,
very profound parts

of what it is to
be conscious.

There's something about
working our physical form

to such a degree.

It's not-it's
not out of body,

it's not removing
yourself from that,

but you become
something more.

And once you've
glimpsed that,

it's very hard to just
come back from it,

and not to pursue it for
the rest of your life.

[Saxophone Solo]

*

[Gypsy Music]

*

*

Narrator:
As Adolphe Sax's life
drew towards its close,

he realized
that his dream,

of getting the saxophone
into the classical orchestra,

would never come true.

Narrator:
In the Damnation of Faust,

Hector Berlioz,

the saxophone's
greatest champion,

left two lines
of music blank,

for a saxophone part
that was never written.

Adolphe Sax's
patent had expired,

and other people were
building his saxophones now.

With his business and
his fortune gone,

he was reduced to
working as a stagehand

in the opera where his
instruments were now rejected.

His mind turned to
thoughts of revenge.

His new inventions were a
giant musical instrument

that would blast the people
of Paris with bombastic music

from a hilltop

and a huge cannon that would
level the city with a cannonball

ten metres wide.

In his final years,

he wrote to his brother to
tell him of a terrible dream

in which black demons
with saxophones

carried the souls of
sinners down to hell.

[Thunder]

Sometimes the-the events are
blurry about what happened...

happened when,
but at some point

he was in the
hospital again.

He got hurt again and
there's conflicting reports

about what actually
went down.

I haven't seen him
now probably I'd say,

in like less ah eight months,
nine months.

Right now we're heading out
to Far Rockaway, Queens.

End of the A line.

All the way at the end,

where we located Giuseppi Logan
at a nursing home.

Well, he told me
that he fell,

and I believed I-I
believed that he fell;

I mean, yeah, he's an old guy
he could fall and everything.

But uh, it turns out that
ah he actually didn't fall,

that he had gotten shot by
one of these drug dealers,

maybe one of these kids,
you know,

and I'm not really sure
exactly what went down but

I don't doubt it.

But out here-out here in
the nursing home though,

he isn't-he's cut off.
He's cut off.

He's cut off from
Tompkins Square Park,

and he hasn't
even had a horn.

But he's been cut
off from everything.

[Organ Music]

Matt Lavelle:
Hey man!

What's up, baby?

[Laughing]

What's going
on man?

Mr. Logan, well,
when he came in,

we didn't really
know that he was
famous until Robin,

his social worker,
did-did her interview.

And then we found out that
he played the saxophone.

I've been in here
a long time.

Matt Lavelle:
Where your reeds at?

Giuseppi Logan:
Is that a two or a one?

Matt Lavelle:
That's a two but the two
might-the two might work.

Diane Moore:
I can check downstairs to see if
he left any in the other cases.

Matt Lavelle:
I'm gonna take your
horn back to the city

and get it fixed, man.

And then we'll get
you 1.5 alto reeds,

and then you'll be
back in business, man.

This is the joint
when he sings,

this-this might be
my favourite track.

Right here, this is
Giuseppi singing a ballad.

[Love Me Tonight-Giuseppi Logan]

* The way you used
to love me... *

Matt Lavelle:
That was for
his first wife!

And it didn't
work out, but uh,

you know,
it's a love song.

But it's very personal.

You know, it wasn't a
song for, you know,

to get a hit record
or get paid.

It was a song for someone
that he loved, you know.

* You make me
feel crashing *

* down in your mind

* all your loving
and your kisses *

* will bind my heart
forever more *

* please love me tonight,

* and never let me go

* Doo-do-do-do

* Never let me go

[Laughing]

When he has
a bad day,

he usually comes downstairs
and we put on music

and everything
is forgotten.

His bad days are wanting to
be back outside in the park.

He talks about
that all the time.

But once we start
putting music on

and we start talking
about the different

jazz artists that
he played with,

he forgets all about
going outside.

He's happy.

Alright, it was good to
see you, man. Alright?

Take it easy now

I'll uh...I'll tell Dan
what's up with that new horn

and we'll probably
have it within a week,

and then you'll
be back online.

All right, man.

All right, brother.

You all take care
of yourselves now.

Cool.

You should have a
story to tell, you know.

Miles Davis had a story
to tell, you know.

Charlie Parker had
a story to tell.

Having a story and-and telling
it through your music.

Narrator:
Adolphe Sax's story
came to an end

on the 7th of
February 1894.

He had created
an instrument

that enchanted everyone
that heard it.

But for himself,

he had chosen a path that
led to bombs and burning,

poisons and cancer,

and in the end,

a lonely death as a destitute
and disappointed man.

It's a horn that for
nearly two hundred years

has led some people down a
pathway to evil and despair,

and yet has opened the path for
others to experience the ecstasy

of being truly human.

[Happy Birthday Song]

*

Man:
Bonne Anniversaire,
Mr. Sax!

[Clapping & Cheering]