BOBBY “BLUE” BLAND: DOIN’ THE BLUES HIS WAY

The blues.  Many say it began at the end of the 19^th century within African-American communities as a mixture of spirituals, work songs, field hollers and chants.

Since then, the blues has taken on many forms – Delta, Piedmont, Jump and Chicago are just some of the styles – with the basic lyric formation, grooves, shuffles and chord progressions taking on various sounds and feels, but always coming back to one thing: I’m feelin’ lowdown, and I need to sing about it.

Seventy or so years ago, a young boy in rural Tennessee discovered his own brand of the blues. It was a unique mixture of the gospel music he was singing in his church, the country & western music of the day, and that of some of the most popular musicians of that period. Along with some of his peers, he would help foster this new blues sound, one that would eventually take him around the world singing in front of millions, put him in not one but two Halls of Fame, earn him a Grammy Lifetime Achievement award, and place him in the pantheon of one of the most beloved musical forms ever created.

His name? Robert Calvin Bland, better known as Bobby “Blue” Bland, who is in no uncertain terms an American treasure. His “softer” style of the blues has enabled him to consistently stay on the blues circuit year after year, and remain in the hearts of blues fans for more than fifty years. This ongoing blues legacy will bring him to the Birchmere on February 4^th for an eightieth birthday celebration not to be missed if you have any bit of blues soul in your bones.

Bobby Bland began diggin’ the blues when he was singing gospel music and hanging with the now-famous Beale Streeters in Memphis, and he was able to take pieces of the other music he was listening to at the time and craft a blues sound the likes of which hadn’t really been heard before.

 “Spiritual and blues and country & western, they all go together”, Bland told me on the phone from his home in Tennessee. “You’ll hear some country and western songs by Ernest Tubb and Roy Acuff, they have the same type of feeling. Just different lyrics. So I started listening to country & western when I was quite young. Back then they had an amateur show every Wednesday night, and if you were pretty good you’d earn five dollars. So I got pretty good…five dollars was a nice piece of money back then you know.”

“But blues was hard thing to get across. Basically people would look at blues as a downer. It’s always had a kind of a sad type of approach. It was kind of not respected at all. I started listening to Blind Lemon (Jefferson), Big Boy Crudup, Big Joe Turner, people of that nature, and also BB King, and I kinda developed a spiritual blues type feeling. The things I learned at the church, the way I phrase, and it all comes from bein’ in the church.”

But like many God-fearing folks of the day, blues music was not something his mama and grandmama approved of. They were church women after all, and the blues…well, it was the devil’s music.

“You were always taught that in prayer meetings and in church on Sundays, so it was kind of a hard thing for me to get past my grandmother and my mother, because blues in the house was a no no. You couldn’t even think about that. So I started playing with a friend of mine and listening to Blind Lemon and Walter Davis, and I started listening to BB when he first came out with “Three O’Clock In The Morning”, that was a twist from what I had been hearing. The way that he approached the blues, him and Lucille. That was an upgrade there when B came out. That was the hard core blues that he was doin’ at that time.”

So Bland took this blues he was diggin’, and along with peers like Sam Cooke and Ray Charles, applied it to not only the gospel feel and country & western he knew, but also to the sounds of other musicians of the day that he enjoyed. Then a new kind of blues – a softer sound yet still blues through and through – was born.

“I started listening to Billy Eckstein, and I started listening to Nat Cole, I wanted a flavor that would kinda soften up things ya know. I was really carried away with Nat Cole’s diction, the way that he would sing, and the way he pronounced things, so I listened to a lot of his stuff, especially “Route 66″, and then I started listening to the softer stuff… (Bland sings a snippet of Cole’s “Too Young”)…so I gotta feel of that, and I took that from Mr Nat Cole and put it into the blues. Crazy, you know.”

Bland’s career would ebb and flow but his dedication to the blues would never waver.

He had some stiff competition in the 60’s – his highest-charting song on the pop charts “Ain’t Nothing You Can Do” peaked at #20 during the same week The Beatles held the top 5 positions – but his real success came from the R & B charts where he is rated as the 13^th best selling artist of that genre. But it was always the the blues that Bland is most known and beloved for. He remains pleased that the blues got a chance to make it as a musical genre despite it’s depressing reputation.

“I’m very happy that the blues had a chance to be heard. Because it was really a no no, nobody really wanted to hear the blues because they always classified it as a downer, something always sad. But you can’t be happy every day, so the blues came in, that’s how I characterized it; if you have a problem, if your girlfriend quits you, if something happens to you that’s sad, you cannot sing a happy song. The blues is the one that you would turn to whenever you have a bad feeling.”

So what was it like for a gospel-singin’ boy from Tennessee to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, illustrating a clear respect for his blues contributions from the rock and roll genre? His pride came through the phone like a freight train.

“A lifelong dream, man, I never thought that I would make it. I was very proud to prove those who never thought I could sing the blues, with that type of voice I had, that thought I would never make it, I was glad to prove them wrong. I listened to everybody that had a voice that I could learn something from, and just put a mixture together, the main thing I said before is the spiritual, the blues and the country is all together on the same page.”

But even a legend who’s collaborated with the likes of Van Morrison (“Van was a nice person to work with, man, he took a real liking to me”), BB King and other musical luminaries can still have a little bit of stagefright, and Bland is no exception.

“Even now, I’m nervous for the first five minutes or so when I go on stage. I’ve never gotten over that ‘cause you don’t know how the [audience] is gonna accept you, and you worry about your first note, at least I do. I always wanted to come out with a lot of flavor, and connect with the people that are standin’ out there lookin’ right up in your face. And I managed to do that over the years after I learned how. But it’s about five or six minutes before you settle down and be comfortable, because if I don’t, I have a problem. If I’m a little nervous, you can hear it in my voice. But I kinda got that under control. Gotta just have a little spirit when you go on stage. But I’m still nervous before I do my first tune. You never get over that if you’re concerned about the craft that God gave you.”

What does the great Bobby “Blue” Bland want people to remember when they think of him over time?

“I hope they speak about what they feel about the music I was able to put out there. And the stories, I had some good stories to tell. And I hope they see me as a person who was concerned about how I would sound, and how people would accept me. I appreciate my fans and the people that have been a part of my life. I’m very happy with where I’m at now.”

And as we ended this unforgettable call, Bland had a message for those who would be lucky enough to be in his presence at the Birchmere.

“Tell everyone in Virginia: don’t meet me there….beat me there.”

Oh, we will Bobby, we will.

MAKING MEMORIES

When I look back on Christmases past, mainly those of my youth, I can’t help but burst into a big grin.

I was an only child with two loving parents (sure I was spoiled but I wasn’t a spoiled brat), and for me, Christmas was a wonderful, exciting and memorable time. My Dad would take me Christmas shopping for my Mom and grandparents a week or two before, and we’d hit the same spots each year on our shopping trek – Lord and Taylor, Bob’s Sports, The Gallery Shop (where Mom modeled clothes for years) – and maybe even go out to lunch together, a big treat for a kid. It was just him and I, the man I loved most in the world, reveling in each other’s company amidst the glowing Connecticut Christmastime.

Christmas Eve would be a present wrapping fest, with mom and dad in their room and me up in mine, all of us wrapping and taping and writing the little cards, usually with a tiny hint as to what was inside. Then we’d each open one present after dinner, and sit by the roaring fire in eager anticipation of the next morning’s discoveries. I’d go to bed, let the visions of sugar plums dance away, and awaken to a veritable plethora (God I love using that term, it was always one of Dad’s favorites) of brightly wrapped presents so plentiful you could barely get through the living room. We’d tear through the first tier of gifts while eating some Entenmann’s coffee cake, and then open a few more before my grandparents arrived from upstate, carrying their own sleigh full of presents. Yep, it was a kid’s Christmas dream, and those memories are still fresh and full, and I relish every one of them.

Many many years have come and gone since then, and my parents and grandparents are gone, so it’s the memories I cherish that enable me to go back to that special time. I will also open a photo album or two in the next week and all the Christmas memories will come flooding back. But there’s another constant that makes those times resound in my mind the most: the music. Back then, particular Christmas albums by the Harry Simeone Chorale, Harry Belafonte and others would spin away on the turntable and fill our barn with beautiful sounds of the season, and my mom, dad and I would unabashedly sing along. When I hear the same versions of those songs these days, I am right back there.

Another oh-so-special sound of Christmas seasons past is that one-of-a-kind collection of  classical holiday masterpieces, Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker. My parents would put on the album, I can’t remember what conductor it was but it was the classic Tchaikovsky version, and we’d fall into the land of the dreams of a little girl and the fanciful world she conjured up in her Christmas Eve mind. The little mice first, then the sugar plum fairies, toy soldiers, and on and on. With the fire crackling away, my mom dancing around the room just like those fairies, my Dad looking at her with all the love a man could conjure, the world completely revolved around us and the warmth and peace and comfort of that house, with that sweet Nutcracker music being the centerpiece.

A couple of weeks ago, another lasting lifelong Christmas memory was made. But hopefully it wasn’t a memory just for me. Hopefully it was one freshly made for my sweet daughter Kelly Lynn. And it had those same sweet strains of The Nutcracker soaring all around it.

I took Kelly to see The Nutcracker at The Warner Theater, the first real top notch version of this classic ballet that either of us had ever seen. A friend gave me two tickets and Mimi said “Why don’t you take Kelly?” It was one of the best suggestions she’s ever made. I drove downtown and parked, then stopped at The Blue Point right next to the theater for a quick drink and a bite. In honor of my folks, I had their favorite drink: a martini, along with a cup of delicious seafood gumbo. Feeling fully satisfied and excited for this “date” with my little girl, I waited anxiously out front for Mimi to pull up, and when they did, Kelly’s ear to ear smile as she stepped out and took my arm said it all. We skipped down the sidewalk and right into the land of Clara, Fritz, their parents and the magical world that she created within her dreams.

But it wasn’t because of the sets, the dancing, the costumes, or the beautiful production of this classic holiday tale that made the tears roll down my face halfway through thinking of Mom, and the flood of memories from the barn in Wilton that would fill my mind. It was the music.  The music as the fairies danced, as the soldiers marched, as the Mouse King pranced, or as Clara and her prince sailed through the clouds of her dream. It was the music that took me back to our little Connecticut barn, and a time with little complication or worry.

And it was the music that I hope Kelly will most remember, hearing it in her mind for years to come, as she remembers the moment when she was 8, with her dad’s arm around her, as we sat under the golden ceiling of the Warner, and fell full fledge into Clara’s magical dream. I will never forget last night, and I hope Kelly won’t either.

So, may all of you find happiness in remembering your most treasured memories of Christmas this season. And as you remember the days gone by, may you also make many special new memories for you, and those you love. For it is those memories that keep the magic of your life sparkling forever. Happy holidays.

SHOW SOME RESPECT

Below in italics is the text of a letter I wrote today to the Times Herald Record, the local newspaper in Middletown NY, about the dismissal of my former co-worker Tracy Baxter, pictured above, who was let go this week after 27 years as news director and anchor at Cable 6, a small cable news operation in Middletown, which is in Orange County, about 45 minutes north of Manhattan. 

Cable 6 was where I cut my teeth, I started there in 1985 as a producer/director of promos and commercials, and soon after became production manager and the director of the station’s nightly newscast and it’s many sporting events as well as other station projects. The invaluable time I spent at Cable 6 not only introduced me to friends I will have for life, as well as the mother of one of my children, but it gave me the many tools I needed to create a successful career which I continue to have 22 years after I left the station. What happened there this week, or more the way it happened, has turned my stomach; despite hearing similar stories over and over during the past year or two, when it hits at the heart of where your career and many of your closest friendships were essentially born, it’s extra hard to just sit back and take.  The letter could only be around 250 words, too bad, I had so much more to say.

I know many of you have been hit hard by these times, and can sympathize with the feelings I have here. There may be a lack of money in our pockets, but we can’t also lose our sense of decency and respect.

To the editor: I recently found out that my former co-worker, Time Warner Cable 6’s news director & anchorman for the last 27 years, Tracy Baxter, was let go from his position at the Middletown-based TV news operation due to downsizing, along with other of his colleagues. I get the economic picture, I am in TV and have been personally affected by these times. But word has it that not only was Tracy let go, he was reportedly escorted out of the building carrying three decades of memories in a box, and because he drove a company car, went home in a cab, thus degradingly ending one of the most durable journalistic careers in the state of New York, and perhaps even the country. This is totally outrageous, and enrages many of us who cut our teeth with Tracy back in the ‘80’s. As one of the Hudson Valley’s longest tenured local journalists, is there no respect or common decency for anyone anymore, despite the need for economic restructuring? All of us who worked with Tracy, including his first Cable 6 co-anchor Marianne Worley, and former Cable 6 reporter and current ABC news correspondent Barbara Pinto and others, would sincerely hope that Time Warner will honor Tracy’s exceptional career in a much more respectful way. He deserves way more than being kicked to the curb so insultingly. All of us who worked with Tracy think very highly of his dedication and longevity, and congratulate him on his impressive career, one that should be applauded in this day and age, not dismissed so cavalierly. We also salute people like Tracy Baxter, who have dedicated their lives to responsible local journalism, and we sincerely hope he gets the respect and accolades he deserves.

MAE: MAKING MUSIC AND MAKING A DIFFERENCE

Funny how things work out sometimes. 

Take the altruistically-inclined Virginia-based alternative rock band Mae, for instance.

 It was a confluence of major band events that sparked what has now become an integral part of the band’s overall mission: to not only make great music for their fans and grow their base, but also to make a difference by encouraging that base to support their impressive variety of wide-ranging charitable endeavors, and thus, walk hand in hand with the band in their efforts. 

“In this relatively small pocket of time, we lost two original members and we were without a record label”, Mae guitarist Zach Gehring told me from his hotel room in Pittsburgh. “So we really had to sit down and ask ourselves why we were going to continue, what reasons do we have to go on. If you’re going to continue writing music that you think people should hear, we feel you have to have a reason to continue to do so, otherwise I think people can pick up on the ‘trite creativity for recreation’ kinda thing.”

So after splitting with Capitol Records in 2008, Mae, which stands for “Multi-sensory Aesthetic Experience”, a course taken by the band’s drummer at Old Dominion, found themselves with a startling, albeit daunting new found sense of freedom. And after a month of soul-searching, Mae’s core mission became clear: make a tangible difference in people’s lives while also continuing to create new music. 

“We found ourselves in this one moment where because we weren’t beholden to a record label, we were not only able to do whatever we wanted, but at the same time we recognized what we could do with our fan base and with our music, which is to use it for something good”, Gehring continues. “It’s all been a combination of us being in a position where we were able to do what we wanted to do with the music without answering to anyone, as well as harnessing the power of music and our fans and giving back as much we could.”

Part of this “giving back” is Mae’s current “12 Songs, 12 Months, 1 Goal” project, where all proceeds from digital downloads of one of their songs every month for a year go to whatever humanitarian-based cause they are funding at a given time. It’s pretty simple: you buy one of their songs online, you get some good tunage, and the money goes to a good cause.

But they aren’t stopping there. Mae won a contest on ideablog.com, with their fan base’s support, where the winner got $10,000 to put towards an “idea”, and Mae’s “idea” was to use the money to help build a home for a family in need in Newport News, VA in conjunction with Habitat for Humanity. Now they have another “idea” they hope to win with: “50 States, 50 Schools In Need”, which has the band working with donorschoose.org to help fund an educational project in every state, to give teachers the supplies they need to make a difference in their student’s lives. You can go to ideablog.com and see what it’s all about, and if you like it, you can vote for Mae’s “idea.”

And at a gig in Salt Lake City recently, Mae worked with The Road Home, a Utah-based social service agency, encouraging their fans to bring toiletries and other personal items with them to the gig so they could be donated to the homeless.

 But at it’s core, Mae IS a rock band, so how has this ‘feel good’ philanthropy affected their relationship with their fans?

 “I think what all of this has done is that it’s emphasized the symbiotic nature of the band/fan relationship,” Gehring said. “A band is often up on a pedestal and the fans are looking ‘up’ to that, looking for any scrap they can get from the band. We wanted to do away with those barriers, we really wanted to focus on the fact that without our fans, we couldn’t do what we wanted to do, with our music or the other things we do. We wanted to involve them in a way that makes them much more necessary in our process.”

 “We’ve had fans donate $500, we had a fan in Arizona fundraise and raise a thousand dollars. So to have your fans do that, and be that committed with you, it just shows how devoted and loyal they are, and how much they do care about things other than the typical ‘fan fare’ that happens between a band and their fans. It puts them right there with us, in our goals, and our motivations, and our mission.”

 Mae plays the Black Cat in DC on Sunday November 8^th.

 Check Mae out at http://www.whatismae.com.

A 21ST CENTURY RENAISSANCE…FOR RENAISSANCE

Renaissance's Michael Dunford and Annie Haslam circa their 1970's heyday.

The “reunion tour.”

The term can strike fear in the minds of true fans of bands whose best days are long since past.

Sometimes, reunion tours work. The bands still have the chops, and the songs take fans back to their youth and remind them of why they followed the band in the first place. It can even rejuvenate faded careers.

But sometimes, it can be a miserably embarrassing last gasp for a group of old musicians who are trying to hang on to glory days that simply can’t be conjured up, no matter how good they used to be. It can even ruin what’s left of a good thing.

For the folk-classical-prog-rock band Renaissance, whose heyday coincided with the 70’s heyday of FM radio, and whose original lineup included members of the famed Yardbirds, this “reunion tour” day of reckoning has arrived.

Annie Haslam hits just the right note in her early days with Renaissance.

Two of the band’s earliest members, lead singer Annie Haslam and guitarist/songwriter Michael Dunford, have decided to regroup and take their almost 30 year-old music out on the road for a nine-city tour of theaters, all to try and recapture the magic of the days when “Carpet Of The Sun” and “Northern Lights” were regular staples on the FM dial, and performed on Friday night episodes of “Midnight Special” (who remembers that age old live music TV gem?).

Deciding to do their shows in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic where legendary FM stations like WHFS in Bethesda, WMMR in Philly and WNEW in New York played them endlessly and helped them make their name, “Renassiance 2009” gets underway at the Rams Head Live in Annapolis on October 6th, and makes a stop at the Birchmere in Del Mar on October 12th.

Can they truly harness the magic of yesteryear with this 40th anniversary revisit? Guitarist Dunford thinks they are off to a very good start. “We’re coming up to the end of the first week of rehearsals and it’s going brilliantly,” Dunford told me this week from a hotel near the band’s rehearsal studio. “I must admit, it’s much better than expected. And judging by what we’re seeing on Facebook and myspace, the word’s really getting around, which is really nice.”

Check out the seventies British rocker and his social networking acumen.

After it’s best successes in the 70’s, Camera Camera was the band’s final album to chart in the US, where it reached a paltry #196 in late 1981. There were a few brief Renaissance machinations including an acoustic version of the band in the mid 80’s, a partial reformation in 1998, and a short full band tour in 2001, but there hasn’t really been a real Renaissance out there since then.

Renaissance’s Annie Haslam thanks the crowd during her 2005 solo tour with jazz pianist David Sancious.

So why do this now, when you run the risk of not being able to recapture the right sound and feel and possibly alienating whatever fan base they have left?

“Annie and I have always been in touch, we’ve spoken at various stages about ‘should we get Renassiance together,’’ says Dunford, “and it didn’t seem appropriate. I called Annie about year ago, and said hey look, you know, let’s see what we can do. She said she’d be OK with that, as long as we can get our former management company involved (led by the legendary music impresario John Scher) and they seemed responsive, so they did a bit of research, and said yeah, OK, let’s go for it. I think the timing now is right.”

Haslam and Dunford contacted some players that backed them on their brief 2001 tour in Japan, those guys contacted some players they knew who they thought would fit in nicely with the current lineup, and “Renaissance 2009” was born. According to Dunford, “it’s just going great.”

And what are they really trying to accomplish with this tour?

“What we’re trying to do is simply play some of the most popular songs that we did,” Dunford continues. “Hopefully the audiences are out there, and they like what we’re doing. It’ll obviously be a slightly different interpretation because there are some different players, but we’ll mostly be sticking to the original arrangements. And hopefully, the fans of the band will flock to see us.”

For a band trying to see if the ashes of a career from way back in the day are still burning, Renaissance has to be given credit for being gutsy enough to give it a shot.

WAITING FOR SPRINGSTEEN

Anticipation. We all feel it in some way, from the day we’re born.

My first real memory of anticipation is the kind I felt waiting for my father to get home from work. My dad – a man full of sweetness and fun – would drive in the driveway and I would be elated, running to greet him and his wonderful hug and fatherly smell at the front door.

As the years have gone by, I have experienced many different levels of anticipation – waiting to pitch in the big game, waiting to see the first sight of the beach on a summer vacation, and these days, waiting to see my wife when I return home from work.

And although the anticipation of the birth of my children outweighs every other form of anticipation I have ever felt, the anticipation I feel as Bruce Springsteen’s appearance here in DC on his current tour draws near is very exciting and special in it’s own unique way. 

Mr. Springsteen, who is 60 to my 48, is an old friend (not a personal one, but you know what I mean), and he has been by my side for over thirty years, longer than I have known virtually anyone I still keep in touch with or know today. He has seen me through the most joyful of times, and has helped me endure the most sorrowful ones. The emotions he conjures up with his words and music give me so much joy, that the level of anticipation I feel as tonight’s Verizon Center show approaches is simply exhilarating.

The experience of seeing Springsteen live began for me in the last row of Madison Square Garden in New York in 1978. Even high up in the rafters of that cavernous arena, he touched my soul with his evocative lyrics and exhilarating presence, and it’s been like that at every one of the many shows I have seen him perform since. It’s hard to describe a Springsteen concert if you haven’t seen him, or aren’t familiar with the power and glory of his music.

But deep down, it goes way beyond just a concert. In fact the thirty years of being a Springsteen fan have been about way more than just his music. It’s about the unique intimacy he feels towards us as fans, and what we give back to him.

“At this point, I’m in the middle of a very long conversation with my audience,” he said recently in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine. “It’s an ongoing dialogue about what living means. I can’t do it by myself. I need my audience. It’ll be a lifelong journey by the time I’m done.”

And that’s what it’s been, virtually a lifelong journey with Bruce at the wheel, and me riding shotgun, talking the whole way. And when he pulls into town tonight, it will be great to sit in the front seat with my old friend, and turn the radio up real loud again.  It might be the last time we ride together, there are rumors that this tour may be the E Street Band’s last. And if that is the case, he has given me some of the greatest joy I have ever felt in my 48 years. And I still have the upcoming show to look forward to.

Anticipation. Isn’t it great?

THIS GUIDING LIGHT KEEPS BURNING

This week, the CBS soap opera Guiding Light will fade to black after an unprecedented 72-year run that began as a radio serial in 1937 (it was first broadcast five days after FDR’s inauguration), and then moved to TV in 1952.  The show still gets around 1-2 million viewers per episode, but that’s not enough for CBS executives, and the residents of the fictitious town of Springfield are being asked to pack up and move on. The show’s last episode is this Friday.

Who do I think of most as this television institution is drawing to a close?

My mom, of course.

Lynn Houk was a Yale-trained actress who had quite a resume of leading performances in local and regional theater during her acting run, as well as an encyclopedic knowledge of movie history. And because of this acting base, one of her great joys was spending thousands of weekday afternoons, cigarette in one hand and often an iced coffee or tea in the other, watching the CBS soaps, with Guiding Light as the 3pm anchor leg to the 3 1/2 hour slate of programs.

For those of you who think soaps are vapid, overdramatic and ridiculous, well, given the outrageous plot lines, they often are. But especially on the CBS soaps, the acting is strikingly good, and that is often backed up by the many Daytime Emmys that CBS soap actors take home every year. It’s a fact that many well-known actors and actresses got their start on soaps, including the likes of Alec Baldwin, Meg Ryan, Kevin Bacon, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Mark Hamill, and many more; hey, even Leonard Nimoy was on a soap before he donned the pointed ears and played that guy on the Enterprise. Jonathan Frid, the vampire-like character on the ABC gothic soap Dark Shadows was one of Mom’s Yale classmates, and she had many other theatrical acquaintances that were soap actors.

And that’s why my Mom appreciated the soaps so much. Sure, she laughed and even cringed at some of the more outlandish plot lines, and the way characters could die a violent death only to return six months later to wreak havoc amongst the still-mourning survivors. Or maybe they were so disfigured from their “accident” that they would have plastic surgery and return as another actor.  Or how soap kids seem to grow three times as fast as real kids.

But it was really because of the acting that Mom watched Guiding Light every weekday that it was on from probably 1970 or earlier right up until around the time of her death in 2004. She developed her stable of favorite actors and characters, and was never shy about conveying her feelings about the characters, or the acting. Comments like “Oh no!” or “That’s not fair!” or “Come on!” would echo from the living room during the afternoon soapfest. Heck, she had a right to criticize, she could have played any one of a hundred of the soap divas she would cheer for or against. I remember thinking she could have assumed the role of Alexandra Spaulding or Vanessa Lewis, two of Guiding Light’s main characters, very easily.

Now it may sound kinda depressing that she spent so much of her time watching TV, inside, watching these soaps, and maybe, well, it kinda was. There were so many other things she could have been doing. But hey, it was a true joy for Mom to dissapear into the towns of Oakdale, Genoa City, and yes, Springfield, every day, analyzing the performances, becoming in tune with the nuances, watching the actors go through their paces. I’m sure she secretly wished she was down in NY or out in LA on the sound stage running through scene after scene as one of the cast.  In fact, I’m sure part of the allure of watching these shows was dreaming she was doing just that. And ya know, she woulda been great at it.

But part of it was also the comfortable routine of it all, her knowing that not long after the soaps ended for the day, and she did a little housework and made sure the cats were all fine, that my Dad, the love of her life, would come bounding through the door, mix the martinis and the next part of the day, the night, her favorite time of day, would begin. There’s something to be said for that kind of routine and comfort. Not for everyone, but it worked for my Mom.

So, as the hugs and tears intermingle between the members of the Guiding Light family this Friday, setting the sun on a 72 year tradition, I’ll think of my beautiful Mom, watching the closing credits, putting out her cigarette, taking a last sip of that iced coffee, shooing the cats into the kitchen with her, and waiting for her husband to come home, so they could be each other’s…..Guiding Light.

FRAMPTON STAYS ALIVE!

There are three words that most accurately sum up my high school years in the late ‘70’s.

Not “the big play.”

Not “the senior prom.”

Not even “the back seat.” Although it sure was fun back there.

No, the three words that bring back the most treasured and nostalgic memories from those formative years are: “Frampton…Comes…Alive.”

The British superstar’s momentous live album, released in 1976, is an infinitely symbolic soundtrack of those times for millions of us late-Boomers who grew up back in the post-Watergate years. For a lot of us, every song on the record is immensely evocative, and indicative of the spirit of the magical moments from way back when. When I play it now, I’m right back standing around the keg in Bob Funnell’s backyard junior year, or in the front seat of Johnny Kaz’s Dodge Dart, driving around the back roads of my home town, not a worry in the mind, or a care in the world, other than which party to go to. Yep, it brings it all back.

And thirty three years later, as “Frampton Comes Alive” sits as one of rock’s all-time top selling live albums with close to 20 million units sold, Peter Frampton, who appears at The Birchmere Sept 2^nd , is still yes, very alive, and very well, thank you. And he’s very happy to talk about things other than his landmark disc, which includes being invigorated by not only producing records for up and coming stars like Davy Knowles and Back Door Slam, but is also rooted in the reception for his brilliant instrumental record, “Fingerprints”, which won him a best Pop Instrumental Album Grammy in 2007.

“The fact that ‘Fingerprints’ has been accepted the way that it has, it’s made a huge change in my career for the better,” Frampton, 59, told me in an interview a few months ago. “It definitely gives me the feeling of acceptance as the musician, finally. ‘Frampton Comes Alive’ is an amazing legacy that seems to still be barreling on from generation to generation, which I am absolutely over the moon about, but we can actually talk about something else. I’m not putting it down at all, it’s a wonderful thing, it’s just I’ve got ‘Fingerprints’ to talk about now, and it’s wonderful.”

What does Peter Frampton feel about receiving his first Grammy so many years after the staggering success of “Frampton Comes Alive”?  ”Well in the end I’ve been nominated four times”, he said, “and most people probably thought I got one for ‘Comes Alive’, but the Eagles got it that year for ‘Hotel California’ which was right. But you start thinking because you haven’t got one, ‘Well they don’t mean anything’, and then you get nominated for one, and they all of a sudden start meaning something. Overall, it’s an incredible feeling. I’m humbled by it, not only the fact that I got a Grammy, but what I got it for, which is for my musicianship, and that probably means more to me than anything. My wife told me ten years ago, wouldn’t it be funny that when you finally get a Grammy, it’s for an instrumental? And she was right. She knew what it meant to me, what guitar playing means to me. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t dislike anything that I do, I just have a passion for guitar playing, I always have, and to get overlooked in the onslaught of ‘Comes Alive’ was a bit of a downer, there was so much other good stuff going along for me at that point. So it might be 30-plus years later, but yeah, I’ll take it.”

“Fingerprints” is a brilliant showcase for Frampton’s exceptional guitar work, which has grown even stronger since the days of “Do You Feel Like We Do.” He lists some top-shelf rock players as collaborators on the record, including former and current Rolling Stones Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts, Pearl Jam’s Mike McCready and Matt Cameron, and Warren Haynes, the gifted singer/songwriter and guitar ace from the Allman Brothers and Government Mule. How did Frampton gather such A-List talent for the sessions? Maybe it’s simply because he is who he is.

“It was all pretty much by accident, and a wish list, obviously. I knew of Warren, and we’d met a couple of times just touring and stuff. I knew how wonderful he was, and I just asked him and he said yes, and then we set up the session. He said ‘Come in a day early to New York because I’m playing with the Allman Brothers, you know we’re doing our yearly 13 or 14 gigs straight’, and asked me to come sit in. At the time I didn’t realize he was the bandleader of the Allman Brothers. So I sat in with them and did two numbers, and it was amazing. I’ve been a huge fan of theirs since their inception, from the first time I heard ‘Live at the Fillmore.’ And then the following day in the studio, he and I continued the musical conversation.”

With Pearl Jam’s Mike McCready and Matt Cameron,” Frampton continues, “I knew Mike as a by product of doing (the film) ‘Almost Famous’, and then they invited me to play when we were trying to get rid of our President mid-term on the Vote For Change tour (Frampton has been an American citizen since shortly after 9/11). So I’m up on stage with Pearl Jam, Neil Young and Tim Robbins, and it was amazing. And that next day, I asked them to play on the record, and they said ‘Yeah, alright!’ We were only planning on doing one number, and then we did end up writing one too, and that was fantastic.”

Frampton’s grandmother could certainly get extra credit for helping jump start his illustrious lifelong career. He found a “banjolele”, a combination banjo and ukelele, in her attic when he was six. “I think there was a method to her madness, I think she gave it to Dad and stuck it in the attic and said that maybe one day the boys will pick this up. The funny thing is, we’d always go up to the attic, my brother and I would, to get the suitcases down for vacation, and the first year I said ‘What’s that?’ and we opened it up and looked at it, and we closed it and left it there. The second year when I was seven, I said ‘You know what, I think I’ll take that down, Dad.’ He showed me a few chords, and the next thing I knew I was playing ‘We’ll be comin’ round the mountain when they come’, you know.”

As for the mechanics of learning how to play, he endured early lessons only to get some of the basics honed that would help him later on. “I learned by ear, as they say, and then after I’d been playing for about four years, my parents decided that this was obviously serious, and they said that I had to go take classical guitar lessons, so that’s what I did for the next four years. I hated but loved it at the same time. I felt it was a waste at the time, I was not able to use that time to play Shadows numbers or Ventures numbers and rock and roll, but I realized afterwards that it gave me the fundamentals of the guitar and to be able to decipher on paper, printed music for guitar.”

Frampton had astounding musical company early on in grammar school, counting David Bowie as one of his early school mates, and jamming with the future Ziggy Stardust on covers in the school cafeteria. He was influenced by not only the likes of The Beatles, Cliff Richard and Buddy Holly, but also by Hank Marvin of The Shadows, who also plays on “Fingerprints”, as well as the brilliant gypsy jazz of Django Reinhardt, the latter thanks to his late father Owen. In fact, Frampton dedicated the entire “Fingerprints” record, and two moving odes on it, “Oh When” and “Memories of Our Fathers”, to the artistic man who quietly supported his growing success.

“My parents never guided me musically, they did only when I showed interest early on, and I was pretty good from the start, and they would be very encouraging, but not wishing to push me into the music business, which I did myself. But my father…he was an artist, a painter and an illustrator, he did just about everything, and I guess I got his work ethic. He never stopped, and I don’t ever stop. But there was something special about the way he would encourage me…it wasn’t really spoken, it was just something we had together. I did play him ‘Black Hole Sun’ (the Soundgarden cover for which Frampton was nominated for a 2007 Rock Instrumental Grammy), so he did get to hear it before he passed, and he said, ‘Well, that’s very different!’ He never heard the finished ‘Memories of Our Fathers’, which is the very last track we did on the record. It was a labor of love for my father, that was. When I went over to England for his funeral, “Oh When” is the piece I played. I ad-libbed the piece on guitar, it was just a little instrumental intro that I did at the funeral, and I remembered it and recreated it as soon as I got back to the States. In fact, I got back, cancelled the sessions at my house and on the following Monday, I came down and said ‘Just stick a mike up, I gotta go do this now’ and then I did three takes, and then said, “Let’s all go home, I can’t do any more.” I just was fresh off the plane basically from England, but I got that down in the spirit mentally that I was in at that point, so it’s very important to me, that track, even though it’s so short.”

As for what caused his epic 1976 live opus to gain a place in rock and roll history, Frampton says it’s all about the live vibe versus the studio one. “Live is the perfect forum for me. I just absolutely love it. I think Elton John said it best, he said, ‘You never know when it’s gonna be a great show.’ Elton said, ‘I have been so well rested, exercised, eaten well, got on stage that night…and it sucked. I just didn’t enjoy it, nothing happened right. And then other times I’ve had 103 fever, felt like cancelling the show, went on stage, and it was the best show I’ve ever done, or I’d done in like six months.’

“When you’re in the studio playing something to a pane of glass, with people behind it, you pour your heart out, and then at the end of the song, whether it’s a solo or a vocal or whatever, you go ‘So what do you think?’ and they say ‘Well, that’s good, let’s try it again’, it sort of takes the excitement from it. Live, there’s no take two, it’s always take one, and it’s always different, every show is so vastly different, every audience is different. I think that’s what I like about it the most, is that anything can happen. Whereas everything’s so planned in the studio. I like things off the cuff, as much as possible.”

Do you feel like I do? It’s guaranteed you will, Sept. 2nd at the sweet Birchmere.

DAVY KNOWLES: A MANNISH BOY BURSTS FROM THE ISLE OF MAN

The Isle Of Man, located in the middle of the Irish Sea between Britain and Ireland and just below Scotland, is not a place where you’d really expect the next potential king of blues guitar to hail from.

Yeah, the Bee Gees were born there, so there is an iota of musical heritage, but after that, it’s certainly not a mecca of fame.

 But regardless of it’s remote location, music still made it’s way there like anywhere else, and about a dozen years ago when “Sultans of Swing” wafted through the car speakers and into the ears of an 11 year old, it sparked what could possibly become one of the most illustrious blues-guitar driven careers ever.

 “My Dad played it for me in the car and I got home and I asked my Dad to show it to me on the guitar, “says 22 year old blues prodigy Davy Knowles. “I mean, as soon as we got home. It completely and utterly blew my mind, it still does.”

 Well, whatever Mark Knopfler did for Davy Knowles that day, it was the catalyst of a talent that some critics say with time may even reach the level of the greats; names like Stevie Ray Vaughan have been bandied about, or as one critic put it after seeing him play, “I saw the spirit of Jimi Hendrix tonight.”

 Knowles’ staggeringly brilliant talents on the guitar, as well as a memorable blues-fueled voice that evokes many more miles traveled than a 23 year old might normally put forth, have gotten him rave reviews since his debut on the scene in 2003.

 Since then, he and his band Back Door Slam (taken from a song from one of his blues heroes, Robert Cray) have toured with rock greats, established a dedicated following, and just recently, they released Coming Up For Air, a collection of accessible yet grittily bluesy songs that will undoubtedly help Knowles reach an even bigger audience. Knowles and BDS are just now hitting the road on a headlining tour after a successful opening act run for the hard rock supergroup Chickenfoot, with a stop at the Birchmere in Alexandria on August 25th.         

 So with all the guitar styles he could master, why the blues?

 “It’s the freedom it gives you,” Knowles told me by phone recently. “There’s also something about being able to put your own stamp on something that I really love. It’s such a wide genre, and from a guitarist’s point of view there’s so much you can do. There’s a lot of room to express yourself within it. You just keep throwing our own ingredients into it. It’s always been evolving and adapting.”

 Knowles’ latest record was produced by the legendary Peter Frampton, who has called Knowles “the gunslinger guitarist of the 21^st century”, a major kudo considering peers like Derek Trucks, John Frusciante, John Mayer and the great Warren Haynes are out there wailing, too.

 Frampton and Knowles became fast friends during the recording process (Knowles calls Frampton “a lovely man and mentor”), and it was while recording the George Harrison-penned tune “Hear Me Lord” that Knowles felt the profundity of where he sits in his young career, playing and recording next to Frampton.

 “We were sitting in the overdub studio and he’s got his acoustic guitar and I’ve got mine, and we’re just about to go through doing an acoustic take, and Peter looks over at me and he goes, ‘You know Davy, 30 years ago I was sitting in a studio kinda like this, with a guitar kinda like this, and where you sat…was George Harrison, and we were doing the acoustic tracks to this song.’ And I look over at him, and say “Peter, how the hell do you expect me to play after THAT? You coulda told me afterwards!’ Gosh, it was wonderful.”

 And what about those comparisons to the greats like Stevie Ray and Hendrix?

 “It’s a really flattering thing. but it’s completely crazy. It’s really nice and they could be saying a lot worse things, but I found it weird. Those are the guys…damn, they’re the reason I’m playing. That’s a really strange kind of concept.”

 Get used to it, Davy.

http://www.davyknowles.com

CROSBY, STILLS and NASH: FROM ONE SWEET MEADOW TO ANOTHER, FORTY YEARS LATER

In August of 1969, right after the astonishing Apollo moon landing and right before the lowly Mets would shock the sports world with a World Series win, a half a million strong would converge along with some of the world’s greatest rock musicians (and musicians-to-be) on Max Yasgur’s 600-acre farm in upstate New York, to celebrate life, love and peace…oh yes, and to hear some really great friggin’ music.

The Woodstock Music & Arts Fair became a timeless symbol of the tumultuous yet hope-filled sixties, and along for the ride were four very talented young men whose acoustic and electric sets were a highlight of the famous festival; performances that were at the dawning of a multi-decade and multi-faceted career that would ultimately land them in the upper pantheon of popular music.

Almost exactly forty years to the day, on another August evening like that remarkable one so many years ago, three of those young men – Mr. Crosby, Mr. Stills and Mr. Nash – will make their way to another beautiful meadow when they play the Filene Center at beautiful Wolf Trap this Friday.

And if history is any indication, their unparalleled harmonies and timeless songs will once again send chills down the spines of those in attendance, just like they did all those years ago at Woodstock.

David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash are three names absolutely synonomous with beautifully written and performed, almost perfect rock music, and these days, forty years after they met, they aren’t slowing down, on the road or in the studio. In the midst of a worldwide tour, they were recently inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, to add to their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame laurels, are working on a brand new Rick Rubin-produced record, and recently honed a new collection full of CSN rarities simply called Demos.  

How did it all begin? Depends on who you ask. It was either in Joni Mitchell’s living room, or Mama Cass Elliott’s dining room, but wherever it was, something special, something profound, was definitely happening. CSN recorded their first album early in 1969, adding Neil Young later that year. The four would make history early on with their seminal album Déjà Vu, then play their stirring sets at Woodstock, and then over the years would bandy about between machinations of the four of them, solo and together, creating more and more classic music by the armload, and continually adding to their oh-so impressive canon.

Young would eventually make his main strides as a solo artist with his band Crazy Horse and without, and CSN would keep their own sounds alive, recording several highly successful records together over the years. The four would reunite once or twice for stirring reunion tours and a top selling record, but like Young solo, CSN together have stood the test of time, and continue to blow away audiences worldwide.

The key to CSN’s enormous success has been a mixture of both emotional magic as well as political consciousness, connecting to their audience in both the head and the heart. The three have championed many a cause during their many years in music, from protesting war to protecting the environment.

But it is those voices, those three amazing, unforgettable voices, that have found CSN a permanent place in the hearts and minds of millions over the last four decades. Do they have the same range as they did in their sixties heyday? No, who does?

But rest assured, when their wooden ship docks at Wolf Trap this week, those voices will still resound through the Virginia meadows with the same beauty and power they had all those years ago, in that other meadow, on that farm, up in Bethel.

Who knows…maybe Guinevere or Judy Blue Eyes will even show up.

CSN appears at Wolf Trap Friday August 14^th at 8pm. Tickets available at www.wolftrap.org