Detroit Playboy Club

I saw all the interest in the Detroit Playboy Club on E. Jefferson but now I can't find it. For those of you curious about the inside, I saw it all every night for 7 years from 1962 till' 69 because I played String Bass with the Matt Michaels Trio backing up all the shows. We had the great Art Mardigan on drums, my name is Dan Pliskow and of course Matt played piano.I'm trying to load a photo of our Trio taken in the club but so far no luck. I will check it out.
Any questions you have for me?
Dan

Did you date any bunnies?

I for one Jazzer, Would appreciate anything you can remember about that scene. I couldn't wait to grow up and join the club. Of course, by the time I did, it was all gone. But we do have Dave and Busters. I was hearing Take Five in my head as I read your post.

My dad played at the playboy club in the 60's. He was the piano player in the Vince Mance Trio.

TMAN - Dan is the one who did the detroit jazz page I sent you. i have his phone # and am going to call him to see if he can help get dad's stuff onto cd from the reels.

What I can remember about the Playboy Club could fill a book or two. What part are you interested it. Management, Entertainment, Bunnies, The picket lines, the customers? Where do I even start?
Jazzer

I sat up on the stage every night after playing for the singers and played some Jazz for the listeners and then worked the comic. About 2/3 of the shows we played for them and the rest we got off for 30 minutes. I loved sitting behind them because #1 you laughed all the time and 13 years in a row of doing that was good for your head, heart and soul. Actually life seems boring compared to those years with all the humor every night. After the shows we sat around with them and kibbitzed which was just as good.
There were always other musicians coming in to visit like Les Mc Cann dropped in one night, grabbed Art Mardigan and me and dragged us downstairs with my bass so he could sit in and play for 2 hours straight and he was fun! He didn't play the Funk he was known for but Be-bopped his way through the night and I had never heard him play like that. Things like that happened all the time.
Did I date the bunnies? I was married with 4 kids and we were playing 3 Gigs a day. At the Attache Restaurant on E. Jefferson we played 5 - 8 PM cocktail hour and then went across the street to the Playboy from 8 - 2 Am. We got home at
3 and slept until 5;30 AM when i got up and called Matt Michaels and Art Mardigan to make sure they were up and drove to WXYZ-TV to play the rehearsal for the Morning Show from 6:15 to 7 AM and then the live TV show from 7 to 8:30. I know it sounds like the job from Hell but do you know what a kick it was to stand backstage talking with Cassius Clay for an hour or Neal Armstrong or Rosy Greire? I loved it. Bunnies? No, married, busy and tired.
I'll be back to tell you more.
Pliskow

Thanks, Jazzer!

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Originally Posted by Jazzer

I sat up on the stage every night after playing for the singers and played some Jazz for the listeners and then worked the comic. About 2/3 of the shows we played for them and the rest we got off for 30 minutes. I loved sitting behind them because #1 you laughed all the time and 13 years in a row of doing that was good for your head, heart and soul. Actually life seems boring compared to those years with all the humor every night. After the shows we sat around with them and kibbitzed which was just as good.
There were always other musicians coming in to visit like Les Mc Cann dropped in one night, grabbed Art Mardigan and me and dragged us downstairs with my bass so he could sit in and play for 2 hours straight and he was fun! He didn't play the Funk he was known for but Be-bopped his way through the night and I had never heard him play like that. Things like that happened all the time.
Did I date the bunnies? I was married with 4 kids and we were playing 3 Gigs a day. At the Attache Restaurant on E. Jefferson we played 5 - 8 PM cocktail hour and then went across the street to the Playboy from 8 - 2 Am. We got home at
3 and slept until 5;30 AM when i got up and called Matt Michaels and Art Mardigan to make sure they were up and drove to WXYZ-TV to play the rehearsal for the Morning Show from 6:15 to 7 AM and then the live TV show from 7 to 8:30. I know it sounds like the job from Hell but do you know what a kick it was to stand backstage talking with Cassius Clay for an hour or Neal Armstrong or Rosy Greire? I loved it. Bunnies? No, married, busy and tired.
I'll be back to tell you more.
Pliskow

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So what do you tell your students about the life of a working musician? Let's face it the opportunities you had are not available to musicians today. I am curious how you view the academic jazz world compared to the real working musician world. Jazz band concerts at the recital hall are not the same as schlepping your stuff across town to play to a few people on some dead Tuesday night. I am interested in your thoughts.

You sure have it figured right down to the nutshell! There is no more jazz Biz and the little that's left is a joke.
I can divide up my Wayne State students and private students into these kind of groups. Some want to learn how to play because of their sheer respect for and interest in Jazz. They have had a small taste of the joy in playing and feel it's worth the time and effort to explore and figure it out whether or not they can make a living.
Some are doing it because they are more interested in the recording or business end of music and want to learn more about the sound and dynamics of making music.
Most are Rock & Rollers who know there is something else out there besides I IV V chords and have an insatiable curiosity to find out what it is.
Some are brought by their parents to help fulfill their parents love of Jazz.

I'm interested in your statement about learning to play Jazz in a college Jazz Studies Program because I have taught through Wayne State's Jazz Program for 30 years and have mixed emotions about it too. In the 1950's there was nobody teaching how to play it and it didn't matter if you were Paul Chambers, Ray Brown, Ron Carter or Charlie Mingus. We all learned on the band stand and quickly figured out that if someone played a tune you didn't know you had to memorize it after playing one chorus. If you didn't you wouldn't have to bother to come to work the next night. It is easy to do and you play the 1st 8 and remember what you played correctly and eliminate whatever mistakes you made. Now comes the 2nd 8 and you know it so when the bridge is played you do the same thing and fix what ever changes you missed and you already know the last 8 and the whole tune. And you know it forever when it is played. That is how all the guys learned 5000 tunes in any key but I can't make my students learn how to do that and I can't figure out why either.
I'm not even sure it means anything anymore because the younger pianists are learning tunes out of a fake book with all the wrong changes so when I play the tunes with them I use what Bud Powell, Oscar Peterson, Bill Evans and Wynton Kelly used which is the way we all learned them.
That was a Hell of a question you asked and I wonder how you look at it.
Jazzer

According to the ex-Playboy Bunnies online forum, there was a second Detroit Playboy Club on James Cousins near 8 Mile Rd.

I quit the Matt Michaels Trio at the Playboy Club downtown in 1969 because my marriage was failing and I thought by moving with my wife and children to Gaylord, buying a farm and taking her back to the country would help. I also saw the end of the six nights a week Jazz clubs coming to an end and was worried about how I would make a living so the offer to work at The Hidden Valley Ski club in Gaylord six nights a week sounded like the answer. In answer to your question, Playboy Management was discussing moving the club from downtown to Detroit to The Lodge Expressway just south of 8 Mile and we knew that was not the pocket where all the money was and they were making a terrible mistake by not going further North. They did it anyway and went under in a few years.

As an erstwhile pro musician I understand the dynamic and the conflict you experience. I am older i.e way past 50 so I came along when working was learning. But as my age will tell you I cam before the huge wave of jazz/pop music being part of academia.Although I did attend Oakland the last years Doc Holaday was there. I also have a close friend that is a theory prof at Mich. He is also very knowledgeable in area's other than Wagner,Bach and Beethoven and does play jazz.

What I have observed and sadly so is that the jazz school players are somewhat insulated from the realities of the life. They want to be paid as if they were superior to the other musicians when often the opposite is true.They have little knowledge of Ellington or Jimmie Lunceford or Jay McShann and other earlier jazz icons.......and in a big band I have yet to see one student that is willing to serve the music ala Basie and play simply and rythmically...often their beat is weak.And they don't want to rehearse or play for the pleasure of playing;and inevitably when the gig comes it will never sound as good as w working rehearsed band.

And as time progresses often the teachers are just products of academia as well.....they will not have the experiences you did and that is not good.

Ironcially because I came up on Rock that is how I learned to play by listening to records.It was only later I learned to read.I still like to learn from records.

Getting back to my friend the prof he is the one that enlightened me to the idea of resisting fake books and playing simpler with better conviction.

I hope you don't have too much conflict. You are doing what any of us would do. You were able to experience the best of each world. I don't begrudge academia at all.It is just interesting trying to reconcile this music with academia as it has zero roots in academia.But the great players are still discovered and you should take pride in preparing some of them.

To those that are interested in the Playboy club apologies. I am very interested in the history of nightclub entertainment and would have liked to experienced it as jazzer did. Detroit certainly has a rich tradition.

Thanks for this thread. Very good.

I wrote a book about my playing music in Detroit from 1951 to the present called, " He's base, He's Vile, It's Dan Pliskow.
Lots of stories & photos of Detroit's great players. It's name comes from Steve allen introducing me at DB's in the Hyatt Regency in the 1970s'. If you'd like a copy send a check for $10 to;
Dan Pliskow
4025 Normandy
Royal Oak, Mi. 48073

if you are interested in my Website containing 45 pages of stories and sound tracks of Detroit and New York's greatest players go to;
http://web.mac.com/danpliskow/iWeb/S...20HISTORY.html

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Originally Posted by Jazzer

I wrote a book about my playing music in Detroit from 1951 to the present called, " He's base, He's Vile, It's Dan Pliskow.
Lots of stories & photos of Detroit's great players. It's name comes from Steve allen introducing me at DB's in the Hyatt Regency in the 1970s'. If you'd like a copy send a check for $10 to;
Dan Pliskow
4025 Normandy
Royal Oak, Mi. 48073

if you are interested in my Website containing 45 pages of stories and sound tracks of Detroit and New York's greatest players go to;
http://web.mac.com/danpliskow/iWeb/S...20HISTORY.html

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Great stuff keep it coming

Hey Danny, I just found out about this website. My name is Jim Hankins and I played Bass downstairs with Vince Mance at the same time you and Matt were upstairs. I live in NJ but work mostly in NYC [[Still playing Bass).