GOOD OLD DAYS:

His name may not be on the marquee of the Lighthouse Cafe these days, but Howard Rumsey has his own drink at his old stomping grounds in Hermosa Beach.

Rumsey, who turned 90 in November, said the life-size club photo in his Newport apartment continues to inspire him.

Taken by legendary jazz photographer William Claxton, the shot reminds Rumsey of his opportunity after the Big Band period to become a bandleader with a small group.

Rumsey said he started booking and managing musicians in 1948, when some of the greatest jazz players wanted to play music again.

“Guys were coming back from [WWII], and I’ve never seen a time when everyone was so ready to get back to living. They had the freedom to do what they wanted, and that was exciting.”

Rumsey studied piano in grammar school and played drums in high school, but switched to bass when he studied at Los Angeles City College.

During that time, he toured with bands fronted by jazz musicians Johnnie “Scat” Davis, Vido Musso and Stan Kenton.

When visiting his parents in San Diego, Rumsey considered joining their chicken pot pie restaurant business. But the band leader came a calling.

“Kenton talked to my mother for 15 minutes, and the next thing I knew my mother came in and told me I was going to be a member of Kenton’s Balboa Beach band.”

Kenton was the best salesman who ever lived, said Rumsey, who wasted no time grabbing his bass and heading out.

After Kenton, Rumsey played where he could, before beginning what would become a 22-year run at the Lighthouse Cafe.

When owner, mentor and friend John Levine, who had been like a second father to him, died suddenly in 1970, Rumsey left The Lighthouse. He took over as owner and manager of a club in Redondo Beach, where he staged “Concerts by the Sea,” featuring many of the newer breed of jazz musicians at that time, including Kenny G.

When wife Joyce died in 1997, Rumsey retired from the music business and moved to Newport Beach at the urging of good friend Nancy Simonian.

Once he wasn’t working, Rumsey said, he finally had the time to get out and hear some great jazz at local venues.

That includes yearly visits to the Lighthouse Cafe, where Rumsey knows his reputation precedes him.

“I’m told that at least one person every day asks, ‘Does Howard still come in here?’”

He was there Thursday night to hear friend and fellow bass player Luther Hughes perform with his group, the Cannonball Coltrane Project.

“You can’t be a jazz enthusiast unless you know all the great jazz players now, and there are many,” he said.

While Rumsey visited old friends at the Lighthouse, he was most impressed that every one of the five members in Hughes’ band is on the faculty of some university. Hughes is a music professor at Cal State Fullerton.

Rumsey has always believed that continuing to study music is part of the obligation musicians have to expand, and he shared that sentiment with the audience the other night.

“I wanted the people that were there to know they weren’t listening to just jazz players,” Rumsey said. “I told them if they had a daughter or son that was going to college studying music, chances are one of these guys, musicians of that caliber, are teaching them.

“I’m a better musician now than I ever was when I was playing, because I’m a more schooled musician.”

SUE THOENSEN may be reached at (714) 966-4627 or at sue.thoensen@latimes.com.