Les Paul. I saw him on a thing the other night. That's somebody who's played so much guitar in them days. He . . . funny. He got famous and made that record. Can't think of the name of the record. Electric. He had that work, that electric guitar. He'd work it up to almost a perfection of that time. He come up to Harlem. They had about 30,joints where musicians, performers hang out. "Say that white boy's up here. " In Harlem. "That white boy's up here with that electric guitar. Have you heard him? " I said, "No. " Say where he's going to be? " I said such a place. And he would be there. They'd be running guitar players there, watching what's his name, Les Paul and Mary Ford just come and give a free concert. So you go with that. I'm with Benny Carter. Benny Carter's satisfied what I do. When he pass judgement on you, everybody in Benny Carter's band makes the transition to another band or a small group. You reach the major league level, because you're in Down Beat. They tell you what Cab Calloway's doing and who's in the band. You're making records with Cab Calloway. They got your name with them people, and they know you. But if you're not a soloist, the critics and the writers come around. They never come to me, because I'm not a soloist. I'm a rhythm. What they going to? They say, "good rhythm section" or something, but they never get the publicity like Cozy Cole would get or Milt Hinton would get, because they're out there going to jam every night somewhere, and they're the number two and number three in the level of the Down Beat polls. See their names up there. You don't see my name nowhere where the guitar's at, because all the guitar players is great soloists.