LUCKY MAN

Clearwater, Florida : August 1983 : I was a lucky man indeed I thought as I floated around on an air mattress in the swimming pool of my new house. It had been a while since I'd last owned a part of the American dream. On the radio the English band Emerson, Lake and Palmer were singing, Oooo what a lucky man he was ..... their tounge in cheek 13 year old hit. A lot of water had passed under my bridge since I'd been able to partake in the pride of home ownership. The last time was 10 years ago, 1,300 miles away and a whole other story.

In the midst of all that serenity and contentment my mind focused on one thought. A boy's name for the baby that was due to arrive in a month . My wife Anne already had Sara picked out , but we were having trouble with deciding on what to call it if we couldn't call it Sara. Though we were probably thought by some as unconventional, we weren't gonna go the Shel Silverstein , Johnny Cash route with a boy named Sara! And we'd have no part of yuppie names either, like Jonathan, Jason , or Jerbony. With me having already legally ditched the two names my father gave me , middle and last, and Anne having a Greek father named Vasilly, family names were kind of scratched.

I was and guess I'll always be, a guitar player. Now guitar players have some kind of strange undocumented history of naming their off- spring after their influences. There are probably thousands of Chet's, Les's, and Andre's and who knows what else running around out there 'cause their six string daddys thought that they might grow up into more than a hummer and a strummer if they carried a legends namesake around. Well Ry was on Anne's list for Ry Cooder, a great guitarist. Ryland Spooner hmmmmm ...I wasn't convinced. Leo was also at the top of the list, for Leo Kottke who was at that time a pretty good friend of both of us. As much as I liked Leo as a person and guitarist, I thought maybe I shouldn't name my kid that , because he already had a profound effect on my playing. After playing guitar for nearly 20 years with a flatpick, I switched to fingerstyle and 12 string became my main direction. All because I had heard Leo in concert in 1973. Then I thought about Merle Watson, not as a name choice, but having his legendary father Doc, naming him for legendary Merle Travis. I wondered if he liked or disliked it and planned to ask him next time I saw him. We were booked to play a concert together in October, but that would be too late. .By then my daughter or son would be settled into diapers and ruling the new castle I had just purchased for her or him to grow up in. It was a nice place for a lucky kid to grow up. There was a screened in pool that took up a lot of the back yard but we had a large tree for a tire swing and a future treehouse. Instead of someone's house backing up to the property there was a nice little lake. Lake Patricia was the official name, and the nearest house was across the shore about a quarter mile. The lake had bass in it, big suckers, and a father would be able to take his son or daughter fishin' there in a few years, either in a rowboat or off the dock I was planning to build off of the gazebo I had plans for. Yes, life was good.....OOOOO WHAT A LUCKY MAN I WAS...

It was time to focus on a name. Hell no big deal the kid's only gonna have it for the rest of his life, unless he's a chip off the old block and goes and changes it when he's 30. But I had no plans to piss him off. This fatherhood deal was settling in real good and I was glad that Susan my first wife and I were too busy with our music careers (we had a band) to have children. As unconventional and free spirited as I am, I believe in two solid parents for a child's well being. Focus Ken focus....nothing to it after all I was a songwriter, even though it had been a while since I had anything to do with lyrics. Another of Leo's influences. I was into writing instrumentals then. Leo was probably too much an influence but I enjoyed hangin' out with him when the occasion came up.( We did our share of concerts together) He also used to give me advice, though I never followed up on it like I should of. He told me I should concentrate on my seven string guitar, because "It fits your personality like a glove" . He even told Anne, "If Ken concentrates on that 7 string and ever decides to get back to full time performing, he could write his own ticket". Leo's advice was as good as his playing and he was trying to steer me into developing my own style. He has a strong style in both playing and personality that I gravitated towards. By the way did you know that Chet Atkins named his daughter Merle?

Leo Spooner did not sound that good together though. The syllables just didn't flow. If there is one thing I know about, it's feel and flow and it would come to serve me well later on in Nashville as I produced my own song demos. Everyone said, that demo sure feels good. Something I learned from another great guitarist, Guy Van Duser: If you play with great rhythm and feel the listener relaxes and enjoys it even more. Ironically timing is my weakest link as a musician. I rush too often, but I knew how to get the feel right on tape. Nashville had the best musicians I would ever hear, living there ever ready to help out. OOO what a lucky man I was.... But I still didn't have a name, What about Joe? Leo's son was named Joe. Nah....besides my original last name was Joseph, and it never felt right. Then just like a song idea, a name came bolting through the air. OH YEAH!..... I like that. So I walked into the kitchen, dripping pool water on the terrazzo floor. Anne and my mom were wallpapering as I so casualy announced.....LADIES...... ERIK IS HERE!. They both stopped what they were doing and said Eric? YES ERIK ....with a K a good strong Scandinavian name. "After who?" my mom asked. AFTER NO ONE ...ERIK SPOONER it rings ladies, it rings....... WHADDA YA THINK?.... Well, Anne was smiling, she has a great honest smile that comes from within, Eyes, lips and her whole face lights up. "Hmmm" , she said, "Erik I like it." My mom kind of agreed. "Does that mean he'll have Rick as a nickname?" she asked. "NO NICKNAMES", Anne sternly replied. Rick Spooner I mocked, sounds like a Jet Jockey to me . "Or Ricky, my mother rambled on like Ricky Nelson......." Ricky Nelson......gosh hadn't thought about him in years. His full name was Eric Hilliard Nelson. Little did we know then, how prominent a role Ricky Nelson was to play in the future lives of Anne, Ken and Erik Basil Spooner.
*Basil is the American spelling of the Greek name Vasilly

Ricky taken backstage at P.J.'s Alley in Guntersville Alabama Dec 30th 1985. Within twenty four hours the world would be remembering him

SHAKE, RATTLE & ROLL

Music seemed to catch my ear at a pretty early age. When I was around two and a half, I was crazy about Leadbelly's song "Irene Goodnight", that the Weavers had out all over the radio. My mom realized this and bought the record. I made her wear it out playing it for me. She also got several more Weavers 78's "On Top Of Old Smoky", "Shenandoah" etc. It was my introduction to folk music, along with some Burl Ives children's songs like "Big Rock Candy Mountain" and "The Gray Goose". As an infant I called our kitchen radio "YA YA" My folks figured that out when I accidentally touched a hot radiator in the living room and began yelling "YA YA DAY!!" . My early exposure to live music was confined to the infrequent visits to my grandmothers house, usually around the holidays. She had a piano and both my mother and father played "by ear". My dad had a repertoire of home made songs with a humorous twists, my favorite was " Oh Gosh....Oh Gee... They're Gonna Build A Monument For Me " I was the youngest of the three. My sister Gerry became a teenager at the dawn of Rock and Roll. Her radio station was WINS,1010 Wins. After school she'd tune in Jack Lacy, "Listen To Lacy / A Guy With A Style / Spinning The Discs With Finesse (Yes Yes) You Just Set Your Dial To 1010 Awhile / TO W I N S / You Should Listen, You Should Listen Every...DAY..../ When Jack Lacy Comes Your Way. Well faithfully listen she did During the night, we got to hear the man who gave this new big beat music a name, Alan Freed and he called it.... ROCK & ROLL.

Radio back then was pretty loose and they played everything, Alan Freed's favorite music was Rhythm & Blues and he favored black singing groups and doo wop. But he also played the stuff that was fermenting out of Memphis. ..... Rock A Billy. I really liked that. Radio played this hodge podge along with the dying white bread pop because two real ugly words had not been coined yet. Format and Demographic,... two of the most unmusical terms these ears have ever heard. How they got mixed up in music is some else's sinister plot. Why I'd bet even the lyric master Cole Porter,who rhymed over 101 species in his classic copulation composition , "Lets Do It", couldn't do anything with those two ugly words.

We had moved seventy miles out of the city when I was around four. It was a sleepy little summer resort town called Mastic Beach on the south shore of Long Island. There were maybe a thousand people living there in 1951. The house was small, but real neat. It sported a knotty pine living room, that resembled a hunting lodge with a stone fire place and two stained glass windows on each side of the chimney. Above it was an L shaped balcony loft. It served as two of our three bedrooms. My brother Butch and I shared the larger one that was above the staircase. Mom was very bullish on getting us to bed early. She was still sending us to bed at 8:30 when I was eight. That had to be even tougher on Butch, as he had three years on me. We never went to sleep right away and would talk, carry on, play games and listen to the TV that was just down below us. I heard shows like Milton Berle, Sid Ceaser, Mama, Phil Silvers, Waterfront, Dragnet, and dad's favorite Navy Log. (He was a Navy Sea Bee in WWII) One night I remember hearing my mother yell, ... "WALLY COME HERE QUICK....YOUR NOT GOING TO BELIEVE THIS! " I guess my dad was out in the kitchen getting a snack, or in the toilet, 'cause I don't remember if he ever did get to see what she was yelling about. Butch and I did though as we knelt on top of the cedar chest and peeked over the balcony wall. There just fifteen feet below us and in the far corner of the living room , our 17" Halicrafters was beaming out a living black and white image , of a guy singin', shoutin' and shimmyin' for all America to shake their heads and hips at.... ELVIS... HAD ENTERED THE BUILDING!

DON'T BE CRUEL

1955 and '56 were years of big changes for the world and for me. Butch opened up that cedar chest in the fall of '55 to show me what was stashed under some blankets. A set of orange and blue boxes marked Lionel Trains. When he closed it, it was as if he closed the lid on Santa's coffin. I also skipped over the fourth grade, 'cause the principal told my mother I got my work done way too fast. "Kenneth needs new challenges or else he will be getting into trouble down the road." Well they sure were new challenges, especially a few years down the road when everyone but me hit puberty. I dealt with that as I did with most crisis in my early life, I turned to music.

I was listening even closer and really getting turned on by the new sounds that were exploding on the airwaves. There was of course my favorite Rockabilly, with Scotty Moore's guitar licks and Sam Phillip's slap echo and that great big bass. I love upright bass and still use it about 90% of the time on my song demos. It's as much a feel as it is a sound. Just listen to the bass player on Sam Cooke's "You Send Me" or Loyld Price's "Personality", not to mention Bill Black .

For my sisters 15th birthday she got her own record player. It had Three Speeds! The traditional 78, the fairly new 33 and a 1/3 and the most important speed of all 45 RPM. Along with it she got several of those new 7" vinyl discs, to break in the only speed she ever used. They sure looked small but the hole in 'em was as big as the sound that came out their grooves. I remember one of her birthday records. It was on the Decca label. One side had the title "Thirteen Women and Only One Man In Town". That went right over my head, and maybe a lot of other folks too, because it was what was on the other side that shook up the world with as much force as the Atomic Bomb had ten years prior. It was a combination of big band, r & b, and new lyrics, from a group that had changed it's name from The Saddlemen, which was in keeping with the western swing stuff they played, to The Comets which was in keeping with the new "Rocket or Atomic age". The song was of course...ROCK AROUND THE CLOCK

In the fall of '56 my mom asked me, "What would you like for Christmas?"It was the first time the word Santa had been excluded. I always felt Santa didn't get too nice a send off thanks to Butch. "A GUITAR" , I shot back. "A guitar ?....... really... you want a guitar?" "Yep , sure do" "Well how about a uke?.....did you know I used to play one in the '30's, I could teach you what I remember".... Now Carl Perkins, the Everly Brothers, Jimmy Rodgers or Elvis did not play a uke. The only guy I knew with a uke back then was Arthur Godfrey. I didn't care too much for Arthur Godfrey, nor did my grandfather Jack Spooner (Mom's father) who said, "He's the cheapest bastard I ever met" Jack was in position to know as he met everyone who was anyone. He was in the nightclub and society cafe biz, in its glory days (20's -50's) He knew celebrities of all types, FDR, Joe Kennedy, Cary Grant, Bob Hope, Cagney not Lacy, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig. In fact Jack Dempsey, the heavyweight champ of the world was a partner with him in a restaurant on Broadway. Gramps spent most of his years at the famous and posh Stork Club. He was on a first name basis with everyone. Mike Todd who was one of Liz Taylor's husbands, once gave him a hundred bucks to get him a good table. "He was a swell Son Of A Bitch". This was around 1953, so that was a nice tip back then....... "MOM..... I REALLY WANT A GUITAR."

My dad worked his entire life for the New York Telephone Company. He'd never get rich there, but it was secure. Mom did some part time stuff when we were young, including a stint as a telephone operator. But most of the time she was home for us. I think she spent the bulk of my fathers pay on food. She was a tremendous cook and should've had her own restaurant. It was discussed at the dinner table many a night, but was probably tabled for lack of capitol. When I got to high school she became a sort of pro cook for others, including cooking for a convent serving several full course gourmet meals each day to the Sisters of Mercy.

Well Christmas came and I got a uke....It might of been the Joseph food budget that shrank my dream, but nonetheless I had something and something is always better than nothing. In my eyes it was a guitar and I was playing guitar stuff on it. No hulas for me... no sir. My mom showed me what she knew. She didn't even know what it was, but it was a chord progression. G,GM7th, G7th,C, E7th, A7th , D7th, and back to G. I learned to resolve early on. In a short time I was figuring out the songs of the day on it using those chords and other ones I 'd find. It was an excellent course in early ear training that I'll never regret. Years later when I taught guitar, I'd get frustrated by the students who were taking everything for granted. MAN... I had to struggle to find this stuff. I dropped my share of "students".

Before long I was toting my "little guitar" to school. It was there I found out I could impress girls! In the fifth grade, my class room was on the 2nd floor, just across the alley from the single story cafeteria. It was a new school and they built on to it in stages. The highest grade that year was 9th, but they added on each year till it was K-12. The highschoolers were playing records during lunch and the sound just drifted right up. The windows were open most of the time, no air-conditioning back then. Well somewhere between The Great Pretender and Day O , I heard one that really sucked me in. It was probably during math too, as math would dog me in the years ahead. The song was "Don't Be Cruel" and man I had to have it! So much so, that my mom had to drive me to the closest town, Center Moriches, about twelve miles, to spend 59 cents of my 50 cent allowance on it. But what a bargain it was cause there on the other side was another great record, "Hound Dog", with two count 'em , TWO, RED HOT guitar breaks.

Who would've guessed that thirty five years later I'd be working with the Jordanaires in Nashville on a soundtrack for the ABC -TV Show ELVIS. Gordon Stoker and Neal Matthews reminisced with me about the Hound Dog recording session in New York. Gordon: "We were there to do the Ed Sullivan Show and we used the RCA Studio In New York. They had to work in Elvis' recording schedule around his exploding appearances. Well we must of done close to thirty takes of "Hound Dog" and we were worn out. Neal: "That AHHH in the middle of the instrumental we did was awful. Apparently Elvis knew what he was looking for, as he just kept on going take after take, Scotty Moore thought we had it about take number 12. " Gordon: "I believe it was take 17 or 18 that Elvis used. Now "Don't Be Cruel" went down much easier. We got the arrangement together and the whole thing was recorded in about 20 minutes." Whew 20 minutes I thought, to create one of the greatest records ever. To my way of thinking everything is in perfect balance on that production. I know they sampled Elvis' tapping time on his guitar to add to the soundtrack for the TV show .

Well I definitely had an ear for hits and "Don't Be Cruel" and "Hound Dog" both went to number one. "Don't Be Cruel" which was slated as something to put on the other side held the record of staying at # 1 the longest for over 30 years. I think it stayed there for 13 weeks! What should've been causing great joy for everyone involved in the project, was causing ulcers for "The Colonel" Elvis's manager. Tom Parker was furious over the production and success of what I feel is a landmark recording. "YOU IDIOTS JUST WENT AND GAVE AWAY A HIT RECORD". From that point on it would be nothing but junk for Elvis' B sides. A lot of his A sides weren't that much better either in the years to come. " Do The Clam Baby" *

One day my dad had installed the telephones in a new store in Patchogue, the closest big town to us. It was Patchogue's first record shop and the owner gave him a handful of promo records. Now promo records were clearly marked A side and B side.. Well most of the ones he got were forgettable, but one caught my ear really good. The A side was "I'm Looking For Someone To Love" an up tempo twangy number, by a group I never heard of. The B side was a similar tune but I played it a lot more. I guess a lot of DJ's did too, because it became a hit, a real big hit. It seemed to have something extra. It might've been that signature guitar intro that let you know that the first words coming out of the singer would be "WELL....THAT'LL BE THE DAY"** I'd find out years later that like "Hound Dog" , The Crickets had spent about seven hours on recording "I'm Lookin' For Someone To Love" and about twenty minutes on "That'll Be The Day". Years later to enforce this PLAY THE A SIDE mentality, labels issued promo copies with only one song on them. You've got to wonder how many "Don't Be Cruel's", "That'll Be The Day's," or the Five Satins biggest ,In The Still Of The Night *** were never heard 'cause a jock with ears couldn't turn the record over.
* Just could be Elvis's worst tune...TUNE?^** Carl Perkins used to say " Ever notice how many records started with WELLLL back then" *** The A side for In The Still Of The Night was The Jones Girl

I was an overnight fan of the sound of the Crickets and got real upset when Buddy Holly started issuing records under his name on Coral. The Crickets were on Brunswick. I thought it was the end of the group and I sure didn't want that to happen. I'd find out later on, they did that so they could put more product out. Little did anyone know then that "The Day The Music Died" was not too far away.

Wish I could say everything in my childhood went great. My father was a manic depressive. My mother put up with it all her life. When it got too bad she'd leave. Well, it was around Christmas 1957 and it was the first time she'd left since I was born in '47. My sister had just graduated high school and stayed at her fiance's parent's house. But Mom packed up everything she could fit into a friend's station wagon, and we drove off into the city to live with my grandmother. The only thing that helped me get through that was I had my new guitar, a blonde flattop off brand called Serenader, that she spent $17.00 for. It felt like a million bucks to me though. The first song I learned on it was "Singin' The Blues".

Making new friends was not too hard and I fell in with a kid named Everett, who came from a broken home too. His home life was pretty miserable and he spent most of his time on the streets. He could get into trouble, petty stuff , but trouble. One day he said to me "Want to see the Alan Freed Show?" "Sure, I said but I'll have to ask my mom first". " Well go ask her today's the last day." Oh ", I said kinda downhearted, "She don't get home from work till after 5. "Well", he said no problem, ya got any money?" "Not much.... maybe a buck." "Come on then, follow me." We went to a park and he took an ice pick out of his coat. He opened about a half dozen parking meters in no time and filled my pockets and his with nickels and dimes. Then it was hop a subway, and thirty minutes later I was in line at the Paramount Theatre about to see something that changed everything for me. Alan Freed, the New York disc jockey, had holiday package shows at Christmas and Easter when the kids were out of school. The bill was heavily packed with Freed favorites that I think he had a piece of. Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers, The Spaniels, The Harptones, The Jive Five, but one group that really stood out,.... The Crickets.....OH BOY did my pulse rise. I loved the whole show. The black groups had the moves. Sam The Man Taylor had a cookin' house band and the energy level was at a frenzy from both the acts and the crowd. There were a lot of dangerous looking hoodlums there, but I'd take my chances against all of them at once, verses a stranger of any age approaching me at an ATM today. Then it happened, Alan Freed had a resonant, raspy voice and he said "Ladies and Gentlemen ... BUDDY HOLLY and The FABULOUS CRICKETS." Maybe it was 'cause they were self contained, though Buddy sure had a lot of energy too! Maybe it was the sound of Fender guitars, they cut right through the screams. Maybe it was me, but whatever it was baby.... It was life changing. The hard part was keeping it quiet for years as I would of got killed for going off without permission. I couldn't even tell my brother, who I was sure of would of squealed. Ironically it was Butch who told me the news and showed me that awful picture in the paper, of a Cadillac ambulance parked near a pile of rubble that once was a plane, that once held my first guitar hero.

* I got together with the Crickets in Nashville in 1987, they remember that time as one of their best shows they ever gave. NOT FADE AWAY!

ALL I HAVE TO DO IS DREAM

A week later we were back home in quaint little Mastic Beach again. It felt both strange and good to be home. My father had drove into the city and convinced my mother to return home. He must of done some smooth talking to get her back, but things were never the same.

It was awkward and embarrassing for me, but my old man probably saved me from a life of crime on those city streets. He also gave me a record album as a kind of a welcome home gift. It was called Mellow Guitar by George Van Eps. It had a nice photo of a sunrise over a swamp that may have been the deciding factor of why he bought it. It sure wasn't rock and roll. George, who has always remained obscure except to serious guitarists, was a master of harmony and chord melody style of guitar playing. To further this he designed a seven string guitar with a low A string, that allowed him to play bass lines at the same time. I listened but made no attempt to try. Heck, I was having a hard enough time adopting to the two extra strings on the guitar. Little did I know there was a seven string guitar in my future 31 years later.

Going back to school felt awkward, just like when you start in the middle of the term. As it turned out my teacher had a talk with the class before I arrived. I don't know if that helped or hindered, but back then domestic trouble of any kind was dealt with totally differently. Today its probably close to 50% of kids with single parents. In the seventh grade two classmates of mine, they were brother and sister, lost their father in an auto accident over the weekend. I remember when they returned to school a week or so later people just didn't know what to say to them. In my own way, I could really feel for them.

I got an Everly Brothers EP around this time. That was a 45 with 4 songs on it. It had their first two hits "By By Love" and "Wake Up Little Susie" on one side and their B sides on the other, "I Wonder If I Care As Much" and "Maybe Tomorrow." Both could of been A sides too. Ricky Skaggs put "I Wonder If I Care" out 30 some years later and just lifted the whole arrangement. Both of these were ballads written by Don & Phil, they could write as nice a melody as their main song suppliers, the husband and wife team of Boudleaux and Felice Bryant.

Around that same time my sister had taken up singin' and was working with a lounge act. Mom and I went to see her one night and when the guitar player heard I was learning, he let me try his. It was a Les Paul gold top and I had never held an instrument of that caliber before. I was totally overwhelmed and completely forgot the little I did know. Embarrassed I handed it back but it left an incredible thirst in me for an instrument like that.

A few days later my mom came in the living room where our Grundig -Majestic Hi Fi was. She saw tears in my eyes and asked me if that record was that sad. It was the Everly's singin' "Maybe Tomorrow". "No", I choked up, "It's the sound of those electric guitars on there." I just couldn't come close to it with my little flat top guitar and had been feeling sorry for myself. Now many a night she had found me asleep on the bed with my guitar in my hands, but I think from that time on she knew what it really meant to me. She gave me a kiss and said, "You'll have an electric guitar someday soon, I promise."

A short time later my brother got a new kid in his class. His name was Doug Percoco and he lived just up the street. Even though he was my brothers friend first and Butch was getting to the age where he wanted his own friends, Doug and I would be brought together by music, and stay friends for a much longer time. For Christmas, Doug got a Sears Roebuck Silvertone solid body electric guitar, the ones that DanElectro made. I think they sold for $59.00 and a small amp, but it was an amp. The guitar was gold and I was green. Heck, he couldn't play a lick, and I still had my little finger buster flat top. While tuning it up for him on Christmas Day the 1st string snapped and he naturally got upset. There was this little violin shop in the neighborhood and the guy had guitar strings. Karl Heckel opened up for us on Christmas day and sold me a Black Diamond string in a red envelope. I put it on and Doug calmed down. I can still recall how good it sounded to my ear. You'd hit a note and it would just keep going. That's what Les Paul had in mind when he designed the solid body. The only time I got to play Doug's guitar was when he wanted to me to show him something, but he learned quick. Then he started to take lessons and was passing me by. I asked my mom but the $3.00 a week was $12.00 a month more than she could swing. One thing my father had a habit of doing when he went OFF, was to spend a lot of money that he didn't have. He had really put us in the hole as he would many times in the future.

Doug started taking lessons with another kid in the neighborhood, Joey Castelano. Now it was pretty well known that Joey was a " Spoiled " kid. That's what all the other kids said about anyone who got whatever they wanted. Joeys drove a new '59 Olds Convertible for his first car at 16. I rest my case. He got the top of the line 3 pickup Silvertone guitar around $129.00 plus their biggest amp, another $125.00. plus a teacher to come to the house. In the summer he and Doug and another kid Manny Cordeiro took their lessons out in Joe's garage and I started hanging around trying to absorb what I could. But the old man teacher (Mr. Becker) was pretty cagey about letting any of his knowledge escape for free.

The times were really changing and changing fast. Kennedy got into office, Sheppard got into space, and I got into trouble. I was playing a whole lot of hooky because I felt I just didn't fit in, and I loved the freedom of doing what I wanted and being out of school. At one time in the 7th grade I went to homeroom in the morning and afternoon and disappeared the entire school day, I got away with it for three months straight. The end result when they finally caught on was, a demotion in the 8th grade as I went from 7-2 to 8-4. The higher the number the "DUMBER" the students. That's how they dealt with it then. When I got into 8-4 I felt out of place with those kids too. Most were not dumb, just had problems or attitudes that kept them from learning. My counselor wanted to see me in 8-1 by the end of the year. I got to 8-3 and started in skipping school again. By now I had two distractions guitars and cars. But come 8th grade graduation time my Mom came through with a new Kay Archtop with a DeArmond pickup. She had bought it on layaway for me. I finally had an electric guitar now all I needed was an amp to plug it into.

Another major event occurred in the process of my getting my first amp. My grandparent's rented house in the city was sold and was being torn down to make room for an apartment. So my mom convinced them to move in with us. To do that we had to add on to our house. The extension was almost the size of the original house. Well when they moved in they brought their fairly new TV that replaced our old 1952 Halicrafters. The Halicrafters went into the bedroom, I still shared with my brother. I remembered a jack in the back that my dad had hooked a phonograph up to once. I tried my guitar in it and WOW! It worked.... I had an amp of sorts, I just couldn't haul it around (It was a console ) or play electric guitar when my brother was watching Rocky & Bullwinkle or The Three Stooges.

One spring day in 1961 Doug called me and said want to join a band? He was going to a Catholic high school, and several of his buddies wanted to start one and a singing group too. We had our first practice at one the guys finished basements. Our drummer, Eddie Ianetto, didn't have a drum set just his parade drum from the Mastic Beach Volunteer Fire Department

Our sax player was Pete Morano a classmate of mine. Doug and I shared his Silvertone twin 12 amp, and Adolph Almasy another classmate played accordion. There were three singers with Gino being the leader and chief hustler of the whole aggravation. The first practice was more or less a
train wreck, but none of us had ever been in a band before, so we were just sorting it out best we could. Between the few instrumentals Doug & I knew, the street corner stuff Gino knew and some Combo-Orks books that
Pete and Adolph had, we scraped together a set to play for Judy Mezzapelle's 13th birthday. She was holding it at her house, and there was one big problem at least for me... her father Pete. No it's not what your thinking, Pete was a good guy, too darn good. He was a semi pro musician and an awesome guitarist to Doug and me at that time. Well, he planted himself firmly on the couch and seemed to scrutinize us. I thought I was gonna throw up, and could not turn around to look at the audience. I looked at the drummer the whole time. It would take two or three "gigs" before I could even turn sideways.

Then something happened, it was our first PAID gig. Doug's school was going to pay us to play at their spring hop By this time about a month after our first appearance the band had changed. The singing group disbanded and we added an alto sax player. Billy Clausing was another schoolmate of mine. Billy had been studying for years and was an excellent reader and a decent player. So our repertoire was made up of guitar instrumentals like "Walk Don't Run", "Stick Shift" and "Apache" and for the songs that had singing in them, we played the melody on the saxes. We chose a name 'The Islanders". I never was crazy about it, but went with the crowd. The six of us piled into Moms '61 Falcon station wagon and the Morano's '60 Galaxy and off we went, to perform at the Mercy High School Spring Fling. It was May 10th 1961 and we were paid the magnificent sum of $30.00. I got $5.00 to spend the next day for my 14th Birthday. I think I had a resume or press kit somewhere that says I turned pro at 13. I don't know about pro, but I turned around finally to face the folks who were paying me.