The Fourths are With Me

Independence Day is fully-stocked with memories from our touring years. It was a day on which we frequently traveled to interesting venues to play our tunes for assembled multitudes. For example..

1976 — We performed for the grand opening of…

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Now THERE'S a drummer!

Last week I was in a Zoom meeting when I got the message that Ron Tutt had left us. I was asked not to post anything right away on social media, leaving that to the family. I waited even longer…

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Cycle of Fourths

Ater the holiday I'm remembering a lot of Fourths of July from my checkered past. Here are a few. May the Fourths Be Witchoo 

1957 or so—I played at the Bloomington (Indiana) Country Club. It was an unpleasant evening. climaxed…

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What I've Been Up To

Okay, the last year and a half have not been exactly normal for most of us. The Diamondville crowd got a bit of a head start on that, since our leader had to retire at the beginning of 2018, so…

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500 Miles From Home, Again

The Indianapolis 500 is
(a) a really big band,
(b) a protest group soon to go on trial, or
(c) almost three dozen autos driving around in a circle for a few hours.

If you answered (c) then you are…

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Bluegrass Moment 

Here is a snapshot from April,1962. If your vision is keen, you can spot me hidden behind banjo player Neil Rosenberg with my bass. It’s a performance by our group, the Pigeon Hill Boys at the Ann Arbor Folk Music…

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Day After Dyngus

I meant to post this yesterday as an observation of Dyngus Day, but I'm a day late. So sue me. Actually, I haven't posted anything here lately, but there's a reason for that, and it's not a sad one, I'm

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Where were we 40 years ago?

Four decades ago, we were working hard, puttling together a piece of moviemaking titled "The Jazz Singer." There are a lot of stories about the making of the film, and many of them are true. But here's my favorite clip…

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RIP Mr. Simon Stokes

Sadness today, at news of the passing of veteran troublemaker Simon Stokes. Google him if you're not familiar with the name. I'm including a video I completed recently of a track we recorded together some years ago. Working with Simon…

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A Medley of Memories

It was nice to be confronted with this memory from 1986. Alan Lindgren and I were co-musical directors for the CBS special, which was done at Television City, at Beverly and Fairfax. I arrived early one afternoon for rehearsal, just…

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Glenda the Good

During our final tour, in April of 2017, we played Fort Lauderdale, Florida, never one of my favorites, but it's not my tour. And we weren't staying in Ft. La-di-da, we were up the road in Hollywood. Yes, there's a…

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Cher and Cher Alike

The picture shows an imagined visit of Kurt Vonnegut and Andy Warhol to the Hollywood Bowl, for no reason. This story is about an altogether different night, one when our band was hanging around backstage before a show at  the…

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