At thirteen, I liked a lot of music that was before my time: Louis Armstrong and Dixieland jazz, Sousa marches, and barbershop quartet singing.

Thb shipwreck of the Grovesnor East Indiaman, in 1782, on her homeward-bound voyage from Ceylon, was attended with circumstances of more than common interest.

The sudden sharp sound made me jump.

I am an American, Chicago born—Chicago, that somber city—and go at things as I have taught myself, free-style, and will make the record in my own way: first to knock, first admitted; sometimes an innocent knock, sometimes a not so innocent.