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| Gavin Walker & Kate Hammett- Vaughan - Dec 2003 |
Gavin Walker - Four One More Time
After finding out that my friend Gavin Walker has died a week ago I have been soundly affected. I first met him in the late 70s at the Classical Joint. We had a standing sort of joke. I would ask him loudly something like, “What’s the deal with Richard Twardzdik?” His quick answer was, “Alex as far as I know he is still dead.”
Twardzdik was an unusual jazz pianist with a style that was completely his own. He was as identifiable as Thelonious Monk or Dave Brubeck. Twardzdik died of a heroin overdose when he was 24. My fave tune of his was called Albuquerque Social Swim.
Through the years I would often talk on the phone with Gavin. When he was a taxi driver he often drove a friend of mine, architect Abraham Rogatnick, who had also friended Gavin.
Today I happened, on impulse, to go to my Gavin Walker file in my extensive set of many metal filing cabinets. I found nothing new. Later I was looking for another file and happened to catch Kate Hammet- Vaughan. And there they were!
I smiled when I saw the photographs which I printed in my Kerrisdale darkroom and are in the file with slides and negatives. It seems that in December 2003 I photographed Kate Hammett-Vaughan with Gavin. Here they are and I am sure that those who see them will smile, too.
