A Legacy Project

What was the background music when you were growing up? When and where did you hear it? Maybe you had musical instruction and learned to play. If so, you might recall a performance. Or maybe you were a listener, a fan. Recall an experience in which music was important.*

Young adult nightclubs were a thing in the late 60’s. In Midland there was The Blue Light. At the edge of Bay City, along the river, was Band Canyon. In Saginaw, Daniel’s Den hosted all the popular groups, some of national fame–Sonny and Cher, The Byrds, The Young Rascals, The Electric Prunes, The Box Tops, The Human Beinz; some with local following–Bobby Riggs ad the Chevelles, The Rationals, Shepherd and the Flock, Brownsville Station, Plain Brown Wrapper, Teegarden & Van Winkle, The Bossmen, The Woolies. In 1969 I was a junior in high school. My leg was in a cast from a skiing accident. I was a pretty good guitar player, so when his band’s guitar player had to be away for some reason, my friend Brian asked me to sub. I played two gigs with the band, called the Cherry Slush. They had a record, so this was big time for me, sitting onstage in a chair, with my guitar and my broken leg. I felt pretty ridiculous. The second of the two gigs was a New Year’s eve party at a young adult nightclub in Traverse City. We drove up there from, I should say we rode, all of us in the back of a rented truck full of the band equipment. The club had a dressing room for the band, with a narrow spiral staircase leading to it. Wow, I thought, a dressing room. Somehow I got up there and then back down to the stage. It would have been cool if I hadn’t had a cast on my leg, I would have felt like a celebrity if I hadn’t been walking around on crutches. On the tv shows at the time, like Shindig, Where the Action Is, and Hullabaloo, I’d never seen a performer with a broken leg. After the gig, which must have gone until at least midnight, we rode home in the back of that truck. The temperature was 10-15 degrees below zero that night. Yes, we froze our asses. That’s the closest I came to being a rock star.

*For the above example, I went online and found the names of a number of musical groups that I had forgotten. It was fun to find and remember them. Sometimes a little research is useful when you’re writing.