The Bands

I grew up in the 1960's. I also grew up with music. Mostly thanks to my Mother. She loved music and gave that love to me. She loved show tunes and The Beatles. We watched Perry Como on TV early on. Later, it was Tom Jones. We watched "The Ed Sullivan Show" every Sunday night. It was a musical time. So, it would be a natural progression for me to play in a band. I couldn't really play an instrument, but I could sing pretty well. My first band was in the Boy Scouts. We met at St. Martin's in the Fields Episcopal Church in Columbia. Our group consisted of 7 boys. We didn't have a name, but we played during our meetings. I played the harmonica, but I didn't know how to play and breathe at the same time. We were playing the song "Flowers on the Wall", and I hyperventilated and passed out. That was the end of my harmonica playing. My next stab at a band was in a youth group at First Baptist Church. It was around 1967. There were 3 guys in the group--Dick Edwards, Jimmy Coleman, and me. Dick (later Richard) played guitar. Jimmy played drums. And, I sang. We formed the group at a youth social at Mr. Cloyd's Lake Murray lake house. He was our Sunday School teacher. There was a band on the top 40 called Dino, Desi and Billy. We decided to name our group--Dickie, Dirty and Jimmy. I was Dirty. We took a couple of publicity shots at Lake Murray that I have. Our biggest song was "Twist and Shout". We practiced it in Mr. Cloyd's car, coming back to Columbia. I don't think he cared for the music. We did some rehearsing and were actually booked to play at a skating rink, but it never happened. We broke up. I don't know whatever happened to the other two. I think Dickie went to work in television in Colorado. But, that was sometime ago. So, if anybody knows, let me know. My parents bought an acoustic guitar for me. I tried to learn how to play, and I actually did okay. After all, I could play the Davy Crockett theme with a ukelele which was color coded. One thing happened with the guitar. I broke two strings and didn't know how to restring them, so the guitar sat in the corner of my room, never to be picked up again. I gave it to my songwriting partner Chris years later. It was made in Poland. Our youth group at Kilbourne Park had a choir. We had a lot of talented people in that group. I wanted to form a group called the Principal Voices. It was designed to be like Chicago or Blood Sweat & Tears. Sort of a big band feel with male and female singers. The idea was to have a set of songs to sing, and then take requests from the audience. The tag with the band was that we could sing anything. And with 20 people in the group, someone was bound to know a song, even if it was a few lines. Unfortunately, that secular group never really got off the ground, but we did do religious songs through the choir. Our last production was a musical called "Life". I had gone to college during rehearsals, so I recorded the rehearsals on cassette and played them while I was in school, so I could learn the music. It was performed in the fall, and we did great. I have a tape of the performance. I hope to convert it to cd at some point to save it. That was a good time. When I went to First Baptist, and we formed the One Voice choir, we did do some secular music at some venues, but nothing too rock n roll. I also did a terrifying solo in a play at Columbia College, which I won an award for. I think they gave it to me out of pity. After my experience being in the freezer, and blowing out my voice, I never could really sing very well anymore. But, if you catch me at an unguarded moment, you may hear some notes and be surprised. Rock on.