The saxophone player on the Jackson Street Bridge — Part 4
Playing downtown
This is the fourth and final part of the series telling Jacque William’s story. Jacque is a street musician in Chicago and has played in the city for more than 30 years. To read about Jacque’s life growing up and his early years read:
Playing my horn on the streets got to be an everyday routine. It was usually the same place every day, every year. Every year I would play my horn around the same events.
Before it was the Taste of Chicago, it was named the Chicago Fest. There was always the Blues Fest, the Jazz Fest, and the Gospel Fest. During these events I was either playing at or around Grant Park or Navy Pier. One time when I was playing at Navy Pier, the police were called because I was allegedly playing too loud. I showed the policeman my permit when asked but he said I would have to move and go and play someplace else.
After that I started to play at the Chicago games, the Bulls, Bears and Blackhawks. I made good money until they stopped letting me play at the stadiums. Even though I had a permit it was obvious it didn’t mean anything. I felt the city was just ripping me off. The permits cost $100 and didn’t carry any weight.
One of the many lessons I learned on the street was not to have too much money showing in my instrument case at one time. On one occasion when I was playing, some young kids came by. They acted like they were going to put money in the case but snatched some of the money I had in my case and ran. I learned a valuable lesson on that occasion.
I was playing downtown one day and I was talking to a couple of people that always came by while I was playing and mentioned that my old horn was in bad shape and I needed a new horn. The one I had was a cheap horn and needed a lot of work. One guy offered to sell me a horn he owned at a cheap price. Another guy heard the discussion and said he had one that he would give me. I thanked God and realized the power of prayer.
Another day I had finished playing and was starting to head home when a guy came up to me and started talking to me. The next thing I knew he pulled a pistol out of his pants. He said, “you know what this is,” I panicked and immediately started running. The only thing he got was my horn, that was the horn that had been given to me. That really hurt, not only because it was a really good horn but I was now without a saxophone to make a living. I couldn’t sleep all night worrying about what I was going to do. The next day, fortunately, I was able to buy a brand new saxophone with some help from a friend of mine. It was one of the happiest days of my life.
Playing at Wrigley Field
Around 1997 I started playing my sax outside of Wrigley Field at every game. The money was good. At one time the Cubs put my picture in a book called Cub Collection. My picture took up an entire page. I felt that I should have received some compensation but I never did. I kind of felt cheated but didn’t know what I could do about it.
When I would go to Cubs Ball Park, I would play my horn outside the left field stands. People in the stands would throw money down while I was playing. It turned out to be a lot of fun. It all stopped when the bucket boys started coming around beating on their buckets making so much noise that it made it bad for all the other musicians. They basically stopped us from playing at the left field wall. I then started to play after the game when the fans were letting out. It cut into my income but was still worth my while to go and play my horn.
I also played at White Sox Park as well as Cubs Park. There was a noticeable difference between the two parks. At Cubs Park during that time there was a lot of racism. There was some at Sox Park but not as much as Cubs Park. I’ve had people shout out racist remarks and even spit on me. That particular incident caused a big fight between fans about how I was being treated. That kind of activity never happened at White Sox Park.
The Christmas season was one of the best times of the year to make money outside on the street. During the holiday season, I rarely played by the Adams Street Bridge but I played a lot of different locations around downtown. I found I could make more money playing at the big Christmas tree at Millennium Park or the Christkindl Market at Daley plaza. Playing Christmas carols and Christmas songs really put people in the Christmas spirit. I played Christmas songs and carols from Thanksgiving to New Years.
The amount of time I would play at a time at the different locations would depend on how long I could stay out in the cold. It was really cold in Chicago over the holiday season and I really had to dress warm. Usually I would wear long johns, two pairs of pants, three sweatshirts, my coat and heavy boots. Over all this I would ware my coveralls just to be warm. I would have to wear gloves with the finger tips cut out so I could finger the keys on the sax. After being out in the cold for a long period of time my hands were so numb it felt like they were going to fall off.
I really enjoyed the holiday season and I hated it when it was over. During that time the football season was also under way and I would play at the football games if it was not too cold. On several occasions in the past, a number of friends and I would go the super bowl games in different cities. We were able to make good money, even after expenses. It turned out that when Dallas hosted the Super bowl or the Dallas Cowboys played in the super bowl they had the most generous and friendly fans.
After football season was over, we would always go to New Orleans for Mardi gras. It would last ten days which gave us an opportunity to make some decent money. After that gig, I was always glad to get back to Chicago, even though it was still cold in March.
Over the years, I have had a lot of people from around the world take pictures of me playing on the street. I’ve also had a lot of people that said they have seen my picture in their own countries.
Playing on the street, I’ve met a lot of really wonderful people but I have seen a lot scammers and outright crooks. I’ve seen the boys that asked to shine your shoes and after they were finished, wanted to charge you $8 per shoe, which was a scam. There were also the little boys who beat on buckets and called themselves the bucket boys. I’ve seen some of these kids snatch money out of people’s hands and run from the police. The latest scam I’ve seen was young kids asking people for money to support their basketball team to buy uniforms, which was a lie.
With all that type of activity going on, it made it hard on the honest musicians. With all this going on there was a time when I just wanted to play my horn and not talk to people at all. I realized it was the wrong thing to do. Just as soon as I started talking to people again, I started making more money.
After the harassment on Michigan Avenue I started playing on the Adams and Jackson Street Bridge next to Union Train Station. There were always a lot of people going to and from the trains. When we first started at that location, there were about seven or eight of us musicians playing music. We would play from 4 to 6 p.m. every day. We made some pretty good money back then. At that time there weren’t all the people setting around with signs, what we called “cup shakers” asking for money.
A while after I started playing on my own the paper called “Street Wise” came out. I met a guy named Ted who started selling “Street Wise.” His given name was Alexander Nathaniel Person, but everybody called him Ted. At first we argued over the location we were working but we decided that it really didn’t matter, because we were doing different things. After that we became the best of friends. We were down at that location everyday pretty much all year long.
Later on Ted started having health problems and couldn’t make it every day. It started out with him having severe pain in his legs where he could hardly walk, but he did his best to show up to sell “Street Wise.” He never complained but you could see he was hurting. A couple of years later he started having heart problems. He didn’t like to take the diuretic pills for his heart, because they make him have to go to the bathroom frequently. Shortly after that I didn’t see him for about three days and found out he had passed away in his small apartment. I remember Ted as being one of the best and kindest men you could ever meet. I sure do miss my friend.
Over the course of a year, Jacque sent my dad more than 20 letters with updates about what was going on in his life, updates on his family and these stories from different stages in his life.
This compilation of Jacque’s letters and stories is incomplete because Jacque’s story is incomplete.
A lot happened to Jacque over the past year, he mourned the loss of a family member and was in and out of the hospital with health problems that forced him to stop playing downtown.
New regulations on where and how street musicians can earn a living have also made it more difficult for many performers.
Because of his health complications Jacque doesn’t know if he will be able to play downtown again — even though it’s the thing he want’s more than anything.
A fundraising account has been set up for Jacque on gofundme where anyone can make a donation to help pay for Jacque’s medical costs, food and housing. If you are able, please donate. Any help is greatly appreciated and will make a big difference for Jacque.
Chicago is ever evolving and has had many names and many faces. Jacque is one of those faces and his music has been a part of our city for decades. His story is both incredibly unique and emblematic of a Chicago musician at the same time.
Thank you for reading.
— Nathaniel Hamilton
