Music Before the Money

The small town, “amateur” musician is as different an animal from the professional as apples and oranges – but are joined at the hip. They both started out with the same dreams and aspirations but went separate directions at some fork in the road, one that almost everyone approaches early in a lifetime.

Almost every musician starts out as a “weekender,” a player who packs equipment into Legions, Elk’s Halls and church basements. For some it’s the icing on the cake for putting in five days in the mine or sawmill. For other it’s the first step to accepting an award for best guitarist or songwriter.

For most weekend players the sparkle is real and stays real. They might get the chance to play to a huge audience at a state fair once in a while and sample what it’s like to play the big venues. The name of the band is on the marquee in the same size lettering as the professional band from the state or provincial capital. And after the successful gig there’s the “twinge,” the urge to want to go on down the road and “make it.” Shania Twain was the “chick” singer in a weekend band in northern Ontario. She went on to become a megastar and her band still plays weekends.

For 20 years I played 5 and 6 nights a week. You could back then. The venues were numerous but even back then I would have preferred not to do it. Most of the jobs were lackluster and after ten years of it it begins to sap your will to perform. You live for the big nights with the two and three encores, the one’s where the manager has to threaten you to get you off the stage.

But through the 1980’s those became fewer and fewer. And although I can count the number of nights that I sloughed off on two hands, on many nights my head was far away. I longed for the feeling of playing a live dance even if it meant playing standards and polkas. I missed “the guys,” friends and acquaintances who were not only playing weddings but taking their kids to hockey.

On one night in 1982 I was playing at the Banff Springs Hotel when a member of the Mexican delegation, who was there for a conference, came up to me and asked if his friend could play a song. I don’t usually do this because you never know what you could get in front of a microphone. However, this time I said yes and the guy was a very good guitar player. Instead of thanking me the guitarist put down the instrument and waded into the adulation of the attendees at the conference. I just shrugged and took a break. As I walked over to the bar the Mexican gentleman who had first approached me was there. Noticing me he said, “And my friend isn’t even a professional.”

It was a shot, but my Mexican friend had awoken something in me. By downplaying my prowess he had suddenly reminded me of something I heard a long time ago. “A professional is someone who plays for a living.” A weekender has the luxury of picking and choosing the gigs. He or she would have been a professional except for that fork in the road: job, wife, family.

It’s a choice that some regret on both sides. There is the weekender who has been told for years that he or she could have “made it.” And then there is the professional who was always on the brink of a breakthrough and, after many years of pushing the envelope, longs for the normalcy of a domestic life.

Whatever the choice it was usually the right one. Because second-guessing a calling is not in our power. We usually do what we have to do and then, if we are lucky, have the luxury of looking back. Because it is only in times of reflection that the fog lifts a bit so we can realize that the choices made many years before were usually for the right reasons at the time.

For me, it was was like the Willy Nelson’s song, On the Road Again. The part about meeting people and seeing places I may never see again: Norway, New Orleans, Australia, Fiji. Nelson once said, “Any musician who can put gas in his car and food in his mouth every day is a success.” Okay, so I was successful.

But it sure nice to be a weekender again!

“Louie is the best person I ever met.” — Tony Bennett

Louie Bellson, a band drummer who played with Duke Ellington, Count Basie and Benny Goodman, died after a lengthy bout with Parkinson’s disease. The 84 year-old Bellson started in the bands over 60 years ago and racked up 200 record albums. Not only that he wrote more than 1,000 compositions and arrangements in jazz, orchestral suites, symphonic works and ballets.

In 1998, the six-time Grammy winner joined Roy Haynes, Elvin Jones and Max Roach being honored as one of the four Living Legends of Music. This was added to the American Drummers Achievement he received from the Ziildjan Cymbal Company.

But where did this guy come from?

He was born Luigi Paulino Alfredo Francesco Antonio Balassoni on July 5, 1924 and like most people of ethnic origins he “Americanized” his name to Louie Bellson. At 15 years-old  Bellson was precocious enough to engineer a double bass drum setup that is widely used today from jazz to metal drummers. When he was 17 he won a national drumming competition, the Slingerland National Gene Krupa drumming contest. He was one of 40,000 drummers in the competition.

During World War II is entry into the U.S. Army meant a diversion the the army band in the same manner as Danny Kaye, Louis Armstrong, Benny Goodman and Lionel Hampton. After the war he performed mostyl with Duke Ellington until 1952 when he married Pearl Baily and became her musical director. She predeceased him 1990.

In other areas of his life Bellson was a vice-president of Remo drums and wrote many books on drumming as well as tutorials that were highly acclaimed by drumming enthusiasts.

So how did he feel about the double-bass and other drumming accessories? Here is an except from his interview with Jazz Connection:

“I’ve been of the opinion that all a drummer really needs is one bass drum, a snare drum, some tom-toms, a ride cymbal, a crash cymbal, sticks and brushes. If you can’t do it with that, you better go back to the drawing board. The extra bass drum is frosting on the cake. It doesn’t mean that every drummer needs to play two bass drums. For me, it works.”

His double-bass was his trademark and that fit in with the rest of his showy act. This included  a mixture of energy, showmanship and drumming precision that made Bellson’s playing a perfect fit for the big-band era. Buddy Rich, his friend and a player with whom he sometimes had drum battles in heavily promoted spectacles, thought Bellson his peer.

As we lose people like Louie Bellson we sincerely hope that others with the desire to perfect their instruments will step up to the plate. These are musicians who not only play well but look for ways in which to improve both the instrument and the craft for the betterment of the music world.

Louie Bellson’s picture is from his website: Louie Bellson.

In the 1970’s a book came out on the shelves that took the past thirty years of music and put it into one concise, easy-to-read thesis. It was called “This Business of Music” and I studied it cover to cover because music had become a business for me and a very complicated business at that.

At that time the mega-stars were Fleetwood Mac (Version 2 with the girls) The Eagles, BeeGees and others who had every record pressing company ib the world working three shifts. It was also the time of excess: limousines, outlandish contract riders, hefty advances, designer drugs, etc. And it was the era of the music business lawyers and accountants, like the ones that almost drove Willy Nelson to the poor house and many other into bankruptcy.

The radio stations revamped their FM stations – the ones that played early Bruce Springsteen and Pink Floyd – into AM formats and refused to play anything but ‘the playlist.” So, unlike the 1960’s bands who took their records to the local radio station for a spin, it was now “formula.” Many great songwiters-in-waiting were told by record and radio people to “write something that sounds like . . . .”

Music went through the lean years when record companies had to cut back. However they still controlled things. The companies just kept getting bigger and buying out all the competition.  Their enemy, however, waited just around the corner in a little box called a MacIntosh.

Apple Computers not only came out with a great user-friendly computer for musicians they had cutting-edge people like Mar-of-the-Unicorn to write the software. A crack was finally made in the wall of the record companies. First, the company-owned recording studio, that charged young bands $150 an hour + tape, faded from existence as bands could record into this little box. Next came the bands’ ability to master their own recordings and market their CD’s.

The final nail in the coffin of the music business is digital music. Apple again started this craze with the iPod and now downloading music is killing off the music business. But not the musicians, just the people who had control. because they are the only ones complaining.

The future of music is through social media where a band or singer/songwriter builds up a following. YouTube is the perfect example. If “video killed the radio star” then inexpensive digital cameras are chipping away at the mastery of MTV.

So how do you make it in the music business today. I would think it would be the same way you made it 50 years ago: you promote yourself through all available social means. Back then you played every bowling alley, state fair, Legion and high school. This still holds but now you have Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to spread the word faster. And there’s not big retainer fees to music lawyers!

“I have been going to “Vintage” guitar shows for about 21 years. It seems to me that there are many more guitars available today to buy than there were 16 years ago. How can that be? I mean how is it possible for dealers to have 15 to 20 vintage Strats in 1999, when in 1991 there were only a few to be found. What’s up with that!!!”

- Ed Roman of Ed Romand Guitars, Las Vegas, 10 years ago

If you’ve been a guitar player for any length of time you will no doubt be aware of the Holy Grail of guitars, the Pre-CBS Fender Stratocaster. This guitar has the honor of being the most sought-after electric guitar in the world.

Almost anyone who has a band play knows that the the spacey guitar with the three pick-ups is Stratocaster model made by the Fender company. However, these guitars were hand-made under the supervision of the founder, Leo Fender, until 1964 when he sold the company to CBS. This meg-company then turned to making profits with the name and turned a fine instrument into a broomstick with strings.

For example, the headstock went from sleek to a large, clunky chunk of maple with the name “Stratocaster” in large capital letters. It was typical of a corporation that invested in mainstream television and road signs. The large neck was then relieved of one bolt and went to three to hold it on the body. There were other small changes that wouldn’t really bother you if you liked Fenders but loyal fans stuck with the oldies and this drove the price of these instruments up. And rarely do post-Leo Fender Strats carry the “vintage” persona.

Ed Roman also said this about “vintage”:

“It has come to my attention that there is a large cottage industry in Japan, Korea, Taiwan and even the Philippines that re-manufacture Gibson parts, Fender parts and even completely counterfeit 50’s & 60’s complete Fender Guitars.  I remember 25 years ago a company in the Philippines was producing a guitar that was almost exactly like a Stratocaster. It had Fenders Logo and patent numbers on the tremolo plate and it even had the big reverse “F” logo on the Tremolo cover plate (I have never seen a stock Fender look like this).”

Here’s another thing to remember about paying thousands for a so-called Vintage guitar. In may many years of playing I saw guys cut the front pickup out of a Telecaster and replace it with a Gibson humbucker,r change the Fender tuning pegs for Schallers and even replace the neck with Schecter. Now, the add-ons can be put back but the big hole in the Telecaster would be evident if the pickguard was removed.

In other cases the tuning head holes in a ‘59 Les Paul were drilled out to accommodate better tuning pegs and this would devaluate the instrument.

As for me, I have bought and sold some amazing electrics that would be worth a lot of money today. However, I do have “vintage” instruments and everyone of them has been refinished and new parts added. So my 1957 Gretsch 6120 has a new pickguard, new pickup surrounds and truss rod cover. And the guy that had it before me might have changed out a pickup. Who knows?

And the key of the post: Who cares? It still sounds like a ‘67 Gretsch.

“I had a girl, and Donna was her name
Since she left me, I’ve never been the same
Cause I love my girl,
Donna, oh where can you be?”

- Oh Donna by Ritchie Valens

I imagine Donna Ludwig thought of those lyrics almost every day for the 50 years since Ritchie Valens died. Because on that day her life became forever entwined with that of Valens, the teen rock-and-roll sensation whose memory will always be linked with Buddy Holy and J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson.

That’s quite a mantle to wear but Donna Ludwig, now Donna Fox, had a normal life and is now the manager of a mortgage company in the Sacramento, California.

As the movie La Bamba illustrated Donna Ludwig was caught between her affection for Valens, whose real name was Valenzuela, and the stigma surrounding going out with a “Greaser,” as people of Mexican descent were called. However it was not her that was bothered by it because she really fell for him. She also had to stand up to her parents and neighbors.

In her memoirs she recounts vividly how Valens sang Oh Donna to her over the phone and then there was the fairy-tale moment when she and her friends first heard the song on the radio.

She recounts this:  “The DJ said, ‘Ritchie Valens new record’ and it started out ‘Oh Donna’ and everybody in the car — I probably had six girls in the car, at least five — and they all started screaming so I actually didn’t really even hear the song the first time. I kept on telling everybody to be quiet.”

And when she heard the news about his death it was also at school. Nobody said a word and then one of her friends slowly walked up and gave her the story.

“It was kind of like somebody hit you in the mouth,” Fox said. “I was
16. I had never experienced death before in my whole life.” (Excerpts from http://www.contracostatimes.com/celebrities)

And as for the famous song American pie by Don Maclean?

“I love that Don McLean song,” Donna says. “Every time I hear it, it kind of, you know, makes your heart swell, and of course any time I hear Donna or La Bamba or Come On, Let’s Go, I just look up at the sky and shake my head and say, can you believe it Ritchie?” (An interview from KCBS Radio, Sacramento)

Donna Ludwig Fox is often invited to events surrounding Valen’s memory and was at the 50th Anniversary tribute in Clea Lake Iowa last week. She continues on with her mortgage job in a tough economy and is happy to spend as much time with her family as she can.