My musical history is so long and varied (spanning 40 years now) that I'll be breaking this information up into sections. Have patience. :)
When I leave this world I will likely be remembered because of and through my music. Music doesn't completely define me, but music certainly is a major part of my life and without it, I would be a shell of the human being I am today.
Picture if you will a small house on a small, dead-end street, the lady of the house cooking and cleaning. Her husband is looking over bills while a black and white TV churns out the drivel of the day. The telephone rings, and the woman of the house picks it up. The conversation goes something like this:
"Hello?"
"Hello Loretta - Ruth Junker here."
"Hi Ruth - how are you?"
"I'm fine - Jim is over here"
"Is he behaving himself?"
"Well, yes - when did he learn how to play the piano?"
"What?!?"
My parents walked over to the neighbor's house and listened as I picked out the songs I heard being played by my teacher in kindergarten. Shocked and astounded, my parents decided this was a talent that needed to be nourished and developed.
They picked up a cheap Magnus Chord Organ for my birthday, complete with a 12 song songbook. I learned all 12 songs in a month, and wore out the organ in 6. Fully intent on purchasing a piano that Christmas, my parents took me to the Wurlitzer store in Tri-County Mall. While they were talking to a salesman about pianos, I hopped up on the largest organ in the store and started playing with both hands on both manuals. My legs were too short to reach the pedals, but I stood up and played them too as best as I could. Thinking, "You can make a lot more sounds with an organ than you can with a piano," my parents bought the smallest organ in the store...
That organ came with a 36 song song book and three cassette tapes. I drank up the books designed for an adult like a hungry baby gobbles mother’s milk and had them mastered in less than 6 months. By the time I was 6 years old, I started performing for others besides my parents.
I was "discovered" by Bob Braun, a local television celebrity who hosted the "50/50 Club" for many years in the 60's and 70's. He was at the Tri-County Mall where I just happened to be playing the organ to a throng of people who packed the front of the store to see this little "toe head" of a kid making music. Braun approached my parents and within 30 days I was to make my first of 3 appearances on his show. From that point up until high school I was to perform on every television station in Cincinnati (only 5 of them at the time), and even nationally as a "Showtime" guest on the New Mickey Mouse Club in Anaheim, California. And that's while also performing a rather demanding schedule of personal appearances for music stores, shopping malls, restaurants, conventions, etc.
At the age of 9, my parents answered an ad in the newspaper - producers looking for talent. Gene Hughes from the Cincinnati do-wop group The Casino's and Snokkie Lanson from the Lucky Stripe Hit Parade were the two people who sold my parents on financing a recording that would likely catapult their little boy from obscurity to super-stardom. Several thousand dollars later I found myself in a recording studio laying a lead instrumental organ track to the original background of The Casino's "Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye", and then an original instrumental composition entitled "Chicago Line." I even worked out the chord charts with the studio musicians in the room so we could bust out my song in about 45 minutes.
While the experience in the studio was very cool, the financial burden and inability (unwilling may be a better word - you choose) of the promoters to keep their stated promises took a huge toll on my Parents, and in particular my father who suffered his first of 3 heart attacks and the first of 3 strokes in the months thereafter.
During my 4 years at Roger Bacon High School I played drums and percussion (to the dismay of my parents of course - by the way, the parents curse works...), not only becoming section leader my senior year, but writing and performing my own musical compositions. After spending a summer with Amelia High School as their drum instructor I was done with marching percussion, but not with performing.
Next up - Rock & Roll Part I
When I leave this world I will likely be remembered because of and through my music. Music doesn't completely define me, but music certainly is a major part of my life and without it, I would be a shell of the human being I am today.
Picture if you will a small house on a small, dead-end street, the lady of the house cooking and cleaning. Her husband is looking over bills while a black and white TV churns out the drivel of the day. The telephone rings, and the woman of the house picks it up. The conversation goes something like this:
"Hello?"
"Hello Loretta - Ruth Junker here."
"Hi Ruth - how are you?"
"I'm fine - Jim is over here"
"Is he behaving himself?"
"Well, yes - when did he learn how to play the piano?"
"What?!?"
My parents walked over to the neighbor's house and listened as I picked out the songs I heard being played by my teacher in kindergarten. Shocked and astounded, my parents decided this was a talent that needed to be nourished and developed.
They picked up a cheap Magnus Chord Organ for my birthday, complete with a 12 song songbook. I learned all 12 songs in a month, and wore out the organ in 6. Fully intent on purchasing a piano that Christmas, my parents took me to the Wurlitzer store in Tri-County Mall. While they were talking to a salesman about pianos, I hopped up on the largest organ in the store and started playing with both hands on both manuals. My legs were too short to reach the pedals, but I stood up and played them too as best as I could. Thinking, "You can make a lot more sounds with an organ than you can with a piano," my parents bought the smallest organ in the store...
That organ came with a 36 song song book and three cassette tapes. I drank up the books designed for an adult like a hungry baby gobbles mother’s milk and had them mastered in less than 6 months. By the time I was 6 years old, I started performing for others besides my parents.
I was "discovered" by Bob Braun, a local television celebrity who hosted the "50/50 Club" for many years in the 60's and 70's. He was at the Tri-County Mall where I just happened to be playing the organ to a throng of people who packed the front of the store to see this little "toe head" of a kid making music. Braun approached my parents and within 30 days I was to make my first of 3 appearances on his show. From that point up until high school I was to perform on every television station in Cincinnati (only 5 of them at the time), and even nationally as a "Showtime" guest on the New Mickey Mouse Club in Anaheim, California. And that's while also performing a rather demanding schedule of personal appearances for music stores, shopping malls, restaurants, conventions, etc.
At the age of 9, my parents answered an ad in the newspaper - producers looking for talent. Gene Hughes from the Cincinnati do-wop group The Casino's and Snokkie Lanson from the Lucky Stripe Hit Parade were the two people who sold my parents on financing a recording that would likely catapult their little boy from obscurity to super-stardom. Several thousand dollars later I found myself in a recording studio laying a lead instrumental organ track to the original background of The Casino's "Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye", and then an original instrumental composition entitled "Chicago Line." I even worked out the chord charts with the studio musicians in the room so we could bust out my song in about 45 minutes.
While the experience in the studio was very cool, the financial burden and inability (unwilling may be a better word - you choose) of the promoters to keep their stated promises took a huge toll on my Parents, and in particular my father who suffered his first of 3 heart attacks and the first of 3 strokes in the months thereafter.
During my 4 years at Roger Bacon High School I played drums and percussion (to the dismay of my parents of course - by the way, the parents curse works...), not only becoming section leader my senior year, but writing and performing my own musical compositions. After spending a summer with Amelia High School as their drum instructor I was done with marching percussion, but not with performing.
Next up - Rock & Roll Part I
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