Tag: music

Posted on

Ain’t Dead Just Quite Yet!


American Classics playing our acoustic set at The Georgetown Winery, Georgetown, Texas 2012. L to R: John Payne, Jordan Welch on drums in the window, Danny Goode, and myself.

My back is killing me, and my left hand and fingers may never be the same, but damn, it was fun. Last Saturday, my friends Jordan, our drummer, and his wife, Jonelta, hosted a Mardi Gras party in their home. Jordan is a certified Coon-Ass from Louisiana, so he always makes two types of gumbo, shrimp and sausage, which I love both. Add homemade bread, cajun cake with a baby inside, pralines, wine, and a good group of friends, and you have the perfect setting for an impromptu reunion of the American Classics Band. We haven’t played together since April of 2019, and since then, our good friend and lead guitar and fiddle player, John, has passed away, so now we are three old guys wondering what happened and who’s next. We had a good run of it, the same four pickers playing together since 2001.

After eating ourselves into a Gumbo-induced coma, the three surviving members of the band took the stage in our old practice room. This is not a cheesy garage band setup; it’s a large room in Jordan’s home with a stage, a kick-ass recording studio sound system with a board, and speakers mounted on aluminum trusses suspended from the ceiling. My pal, Jordan, didn’t hold back in giving the band a good practice room.

Not me, but very close….

After a mic and instrument check, we kicked off some of our old tunes that we could play without a lead guitar. Our vocals were always the strongest part of our music, and we missed John’s third harmony voice and his guitar and fiddle. It was a bit of a sad shock at how different our songs sounded, with a large part missing, but we made the best of it and played for two hours without a break. After that, we collapsed in a heap. Voices shot, fingers on the verge of falling off and Jordan, behind his drum kit, was huffing and puffing. We all agreed that for us, men in our middle and upper 70s, any gig outside of this practice room would not happen.

We hope for a repeat performance soon because we ” Ain’t dead just quite yet.”

Posted on

Born On A Mountain Top In Tennessee…


Christmas, 1955, and I found this under the tree: my first stringed instrument, made by my Coonskin cap-wearing hero, Davey Crockett. My father, a musician, tuned it up and put it in my tiny hands. I must have been a musical savant because I played and sang, with no mistakes, the theme song to the Disney show Davey Crockett. My parents, flaber and gasted, grabbed the Brownie Box camera and took my picture while I was wailing on my miniature ax, mailing it the next day to The Arther Godfrey Talent Hour in New York City. I continued to give impromptu recitals around the neighborhood for my buddies until Georgie accidentally sat on my Davey guitar and crushed it to splinters. After that, I couldn’t remember the words to the song and forgot how to play, and wouldn’t you know it, a week later, Arther Godfrey called my folks for an audition. I could’a been a contender!

Posted on

Christmas Tuneage, Demanding Birds, and Deer Zombies


I ran into old buddy Mooch at H.E.B. on Christmas Eve. I stopped by to pick up a few things Momo forgot: Eggnog, Milk, Cedar Fever Elixer, and more birdseed. Our Avian friends have been a demanding lot as of late since the flock of Crows moved in. They sit on the fence and Caww-Caaww until I load the flat feeder with peanuts, their favorite. The poor Cardinals and the Dove have to wait until the big boys leave. The Crows like shiny trinkets, so I left a quarter in one flat feeder and a Crow took it. The next day, there was a dime in the feeder. I have no idea what the Crow spent the other fifteen cents on.

After fighting off the food sample ladies, I spotted Mooch staggering around in the frozen food aisle with a hand-carry basket full of Red Baron pizzas, his favorite. I eased up beside him and wished him a Merry Christmas, but no response. I tapped his shoulder, but no acknowledgment. I stepped in front of him and gave him a friendly stare, glazed eyes, and a stream of slobber on his chin. In desperation, I shook his shoulders, and he snapped back into the moment.

” Sorry old buddy, I’ve been drifting in and out of it for a few days,” he says.

I am worried, so I ask, ” Don’t you think a visit to Doc Bones is in order, I thought you might have stroked out on me pal?”

” He was apologetic and explained, ” Nawww…I went Deer hunting last week and shot me a big ole Buckster. We ate some Deer chicken fry steak yesterday, and now I think I’ve got the Deer Zombie disease. Mrs. Mooch is convinced I’m a Deer Zombie but without the ten-point rack of horns.”

Momo requested some Christmas music this morning so I dug around in my vinyl stash looking for my Elvis Christmas album; I couldn’t find it… must have given it away. I did run across a Perry Como and a Sing Along With Mitch Christmas, but I couldn’t bring myself to spin them, and I have no idea why they are in my collection. I streamed some Vince Guaraldi Charlie Brown Christmas tunes, which did the trick.

Posted on

One More Semester, Please! I Promise I’ll Do Better!


To all of you, parents and grandparents, who are totally paying for or supplementing your children’s and grandchildren’s college education, In case you haven’t heard, many universities in the Northeast and Washington State are offering accredited classes on “Taylor Swift.” yes, that one. There is no planned curriculum or testing, just hysterical discussions and listening to her screeching music. Students must bring their own auto-tune devices so the rest of the class can understand the coded “swift-ease” language. As for the folks paying for the little darlings’ education? Well, your daughter is a moron and will likely be living at home in her childhood bedroom until you pass on and leave her the house and your 1996 Buick. At least the Dixie Chicks and Alanis Morrisette could actually sing.

Posted on

Tuesday, October 3rd Update On The Future Saint Swift


Not In My Lifetime, Kiddo!

The Question Everyone Wants To Know…

Doe’s Taylor Swift use Autotune when she talks?

Posted on

A 70 Year Lesson


Today, September 17th, 2019 is my 70th birthday. I knew for a decade or two that it was coming but never expected it to show up so soon. It’s like an irritating distant relative that uninvitedly knocks on your door while you’re watching a good movie and now you have to entertain them, share your cheese and crackers, and miss your show. We are courteous in Texas. That’s what we do; even with birthdays, and relatives.

Birthdays, at least for me are personal, and I am often reluctant to share what I write with my followers and friends on social media. People need their privacy. Social media platforms allow and encourage you to give large pieces of yourself away to strangers. It’s too easy to write things you shouldn’t and hit the post button. It allows us all to make fools of ourselves in HD and living color. Hold my beer and watch this.

I convinced myself a few days ago to purchase a manual typewriter and spend less time on my laptop. Hemingway, Harper Lee, Capote, and Steinbeck all wrote longhand then completed their work on a typewriter. I am regressing but I feel in a good way. I am on a mission to complete numerous short stories and a children’s book before my batteries run down. Time is of the essence.

Ken Burns is the best documentary filmmaker in the business. If there is one better in some remote region of the Amazon or the mountains of Tibet, let them come forth. His latest effort on country music is a masterpiece in American history and the way our nation evolved to what we are today.

I love country music. I bleed three chords and a yodel. The old callouses on my fingers remind me that I am a musician and will be until the end. It’s my legacy and I fiercely protect my inherited history.

I grew up the son of a western swing fiddle player in Fort Worth Texas and watching the documentary film and seeing the faces of the people I knew as a child, renews my pride in what I was a part of.

Musicians playing instruments in our home was part of our everyday life. The guitars, fiddles, and banjos warmed the cold walls in the winter and floated on the summer breeze through our open windows to the delight of our neighborhood. I was a child in a crib, absorbing the notes. How could I not become a musician?

The men I knew that played their instruments and sang their songs are gone from this life and have been for some time. I watched them grow old and struggle to play until they couldn’t and graciously accepted their fate

I grew old with them. I walked and carried some of them to their final rest. I am humbled to have been part of their journey. It never occurred to me until decades later, that their journey was also mine. It was much more than classroom learning; it was life lessons. I am a better man because of my father and his country musician friends. The Light Crust Doughboys are on the air.