Where were you playing fifty years ago? (old picker subject

Jerry Hayes · Post by **Jerry Hayes** » 7 Dec 2016 1:46 pm

I was just looking at some of my old papers and trying to trace my music history and thought it'd be nice to see where some of the older pickers were playing a half century or so ago and also if you remember, who you were playing with.....

About this time in 1966 I was holding forth on lead guitar at the "King of the Bass" nightclub in Ventura, California with Jim Hendrix on rhythm guitar & vocals, Mert Cowden on bass & vocals and a drummer named Sam who's last name I can't remember. We were there from 9 till 2AM Tuesday through Sunday.

Also at the same time I wss doing Mondays at the Club Vegas in Oxnard, California with Clarke Rohn on rhythm & vocals, Bill Graham on bass & vocals and the same drummer (Sam?).... Where were you?..JH in Va.

Fred Justice · Post by **Fred Justice** » 7 Dec 2016 2:21 pm

Jerry, fifty years ago @ 19 I was playing Bass and singing in a little country band.
I didn't take up steel guitar till I was 23.
Its been a long wonderful journey Jerry, I loved every minute and wouldn't trade any of it for anything.

John De Maille · Post by **John De Maille** » 7 Dec 2016 2:51 pm

50 years ago, I was playing lead guitar in a country rock band, playing in a lot of local places. I was 17 at the time. Boy, that was fun!

gary pierce · Post by **gary pierce** » 7 Dec 2016 3:37 pm

I was 15 playing a Hagstrom guitar in a teenage garage band in Memphis. I bought my first steel in 1975.

Steve Pawlak · Post by **Steve Pawlak** » 7 Dec 2016 4:37 pm

I was 14 and playing the same Hagstrum in Connecticut

Frank Freniere · Post by **Frank Freniere** » 7 Dec 2016 5:27 pm

Jerry Hayes wrote: About this time in 1966 I was holding forth on lead guitar at the "King of the Bass" nightclub in Ventura, California with Jim Hendrix on rhythm guitar & vocals ...

Holy smokes, Jimi Hendrix??!!

Great thread idea, Jerry.

Jeez, I was in a high school psychedelic power trio, "Misty Daze," playing a funky cherry-red Epiphone Newport bass, driving it thru my Ampeg B-15. We played a bunch of places in northern Rhode Island and SE Mass at the time. What I wouldn't give for a picture of us back then...

Favorite memory was a gig at the "Holiday Inn" in Pawtucket, RI (BTW it's pronounced "pah - TUCK -et"). Yeah, we thought it was the motel chain too but it turned out to be a seedy gay bar that a 16-year-old had no right to be in. But we played and the guys danced and everything was pretty cool until one of the patrons crashed into our black light and broke it.

I was hot for that 8-string Hagstrom bass, too - supposedly Noel Redding had one.

I wouldn't get into steel guitar for another 15 years.

Jack Stoner · Post by **Jack Stoner** » 7 Dec 2016 6:06 pm

Early/mid 1966 I was the lead guitar player in the "Sonny Lee" band out of York, Pa. The steel guitar player in the band was Harry "Hap" Hatterer, who had a Fender 400.

Late 1966, I was working at the Ascension Island Air Force Eastern Test Range tracking station. I was playing bass in a band of "Range Rats" (RCA Service Company tracking station employees).

Skip Edwards · Post by **Skip Edwards** » 7 Dec 2016 11:03 pm

I was in New York, and had just gotten by first B3. At the time I wouldn't have been caught dead playing that country music that my mom was so fond of. Y'know...with that crying whaa whaa sliding steel thingie...
Little did I know...

Bill L. Wilson · Post by **Bill L. Wilson** » 7 Dec 2016 11:45 pm

I was 19 going on 20 playing guitar in the seedy private clubs of the Oak Cliff section of Dallas, Texas. But later our band moved up to the meaner clubs of East Dallas where gun fire sometimes occurred with the fights that happened. It would be 8yrs. before I took up pedal steel and started playing country music. Today at "70" I'm still cookin', playin' Hendrix, Skynyrd, Johnny Cash, George Jones, Pink Floyd...........

Larry Lenhart · Post by **Larry Lenhart** » 8 Dec 2016 3:08 pm

50 years ago, at 19, I was playing lead guitar in a rock and roll band, Rolling Stones, Animals, etc That was a great time and a lot of fun, just local high school and college dances, etc. I started playing steel about 3 or 4 years later, but then went into the USAF and didnt touch it again until the 80s.

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 8 Dec 2016 3:54 pm

I was 15 playing a Hagstrom guitar in a teenage garage band in Memphis

I was 14 and playing the same Hagstrum in Connecticut

I was 16 and playing a Hagstrom in Massachusetts!

Richard Sinkler · Post by **Richard Sinkler** » 8 Dec 2016 4:51 pm

Playing drums with an all black soul band. Played occasionally at a club in Oakland, a couple Black Panther gigs and school dances. For our ages, we were not so bad.

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 8 Dec 2016 7:10 pm

50 years ago I was playing classical piano. Hours of practice daily, formal recitals every few months, National Guild of Piano Teachers tests, all that. Mozart, Bach, Chopin, and Boogie-Woogie when they'd let me. My piano teacher was a Cajun who was a serious classical pianist. She could boogie on demand, but restricted it heavily, that was not "serious music" to her, or my family for that matter. Boston mainline.

Only started listening to popular music in about '66, but saw Bloomfield with the Flag in '67, had to get an electric guitar. I've been going down the drain ever since.

Brint Hannay · Post by **Brint Hannay** » 8 Dec 2016 7:38 pm

Another Hagstrom player here! I was 15, playing school and CYO dances. In '67 I graduated to a Mosrite Ventures Model (pre-Mark series), which I played when my band (The Clockwork Orange), did four weeks as the local opening act at the Ambassador Theater, Washington, D.C.'s short-lived psychedelic concert venue.

Jim Cohen · Post by **Jim Cohen** » 8 Dec 2016 9:14 pm

Let's see, 50 years ago I would have been just 14, probably doing this...

Ben Elder · Post by **Ben Elder** » 8 Dec 2016 11:42 pm

My driveway. And it was basketball. Too young to go out for the junior-high team and too lousy and under-equipped a musician to be in a band. Still too lousy to be in a band, despite a half-century's accumulation of instruments.

Bill Sinclair · Post by **Bill Sinclair** » 9 Dec 2016 6:27 am

50 years ago? I would have been nine. Wearing out 9 volt batteries as fast as my allowance would replace them listening to late-night DJs on my transistor radio under the covers. Beatles, Stones, Monkees, Supremes, Temptations, Johnny Cash, Petula Clark... all under one roof. I wasn't a big country music fan at that time but on a rainy Saturday afternoon, Porter Wagoner in his flashy suits was a lot more entertaining than "Bowling for Dollars". Besides, he always had some pretty girl with funny hair singing with him.
It would be another three years before I plunked down $2.25 in change at Sadowski's Music Store for a Hohner "Old Standby" harmonica and became a musician.

Larry Jamieson · Post by **Larry Jamieson** » 9 Dec 2016 6:51 am

50 years ago I was a guitar player/singer in a 5 piece rock band called the Mustangs. I was 17. We played Beatles, Beach Boys, Stones, all the pop tunes of the day, mostly at high school dances in my area. We traveled in two station wagons driven by two band parents. The 2 cars held 5 band members and 2 drivers, a drum set, 2 guitars, bass guitar, Doric combo organ, and four amplifiers. We did not have a PA, we plugged mikes into the 2nd channel on our amps. Pay for the average gig was $25 per man.

Donny Hinson · Post by **Donny Hinson** » 9 Dec 2016 8:20 am

Wow, that's half a century! Actually, it doesn't seem like it's been 50 years ago that I was on the road with this band.

Happily rumbling up and down the road on the east coast in a 1947 Brill, playing (mostly) NCO clubs.

Richard Lester · Post by **Richard Lester** » 9 Dec 2016 1:11 pm

I had to think about that for a minute. Yup, 50 yrs ago I was playing rhythm and singing with a group called "The Orbits". We were playing the rock n roll of that era and I would do some country when I felt the crowd was in the mood for some. We were playing at high school dances and started playing the bar scene. Did our first radio shows for the local radio station at that time. Sure was exciting.

Scott Duckworth · Post by **Scott Duckworth** » 9 Dec 2016 2:37 pm

In the living room floor.... at 6yo...

Alvin Blaine · Post by **Alvin Blaine** » 10 Dec 2016 11:01 am

Jerry Hayes wrote:I was just looking at some of my old papers and trying to trace my music history and thought it'd be nice to see where some of the older pickers were playing a half century or so ago and also if you remember, who you were playing with.....

About this time in 1966 I was holding forth on lead guitar at the "King of the Bass" nightclub in Ventura, California with Jim Hendrix on rhythm guitar & vocals, Mert Cowden on bass & vocals and a drummer named Sam who's last name I can't remember. We were there from 9 till 2AM Tuesday through Sunday.

Also at the same time I wss doing Mondays at the Club Vegas in Oxnard, California with Clarke Rohn on rhythm & vocals, Bill Graham on bass & vocals and the same drummer (Sam?).... Where were you?..JH in Va.

50 years ago I was also playing in Oxnard... Just in the bedroom of my parents house.

John Booth · Post by **John Booth** » 10 Dec 2016 11:15 am

50 years ago my mom was getting me gigs at the Eagles club in Columbus Ohio. She was the waitress, I was 12 yrs old

I knew about 5 songs and drunks kept paying me to do them over and over.

Haven't stopped since
Jb

Ken Lang · Post by **Ken Lang** » 10 Dec 2016 5:29 pm

50 years ago I was 24, fresh out of the army and playing 6 nights a week in Buffalo. NY. Fixin to get married and still am to the one I love. Time sure flies.

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Where were you playing fifty years ago? (old picker subject

Where were you playing fifty years ago? (old picker subject

Re: Where were you playing fifty years ago? (old picker sub

Oh, The Good Old Days.

50 yrs ago

Re: Where were you playing fifty years ago? (old picker sub