About Me
My Dad had a country band when I was younger, so I grew up listening to the Grand Ole Opry every Saturday as we drove to a local dance hall where the band was playing that night. Dad wanted a steel guitar in the band so I thought if I could learn to play I could be in the band. I took steel guitar lessons for about 3 months and discovered playing by "ear" was a lot easier than trying to read diagrams. I spent a lot of time listening to country music records and finally discovered how chord progressions work. I was doing pretty well on my converted six string big body guitar, so my parents got me a brand new Sears Roebuck 6 string lap steel and amp. After a year of practice I was ready to play in the band, that was 1952. I played with Dad's band,The Oregon Blue Mountain Boys, and others through high school until I graduated in 1956. I supplemented my playing gigs by operating movie projectors at the State Theatre in Oregon City. The band played gigs with Shorty The Hired Hand from radio station KVAN in Vancouver Washington. Willie Nelson was also a DJ on KVAN and we played a few gigs with him.
Around 1955 I joined the Powder River Ramblers band in Portland, playing local events and dance halls. We also played a few gigs with Willie and one of those gigs was a TV show on KLOR channel 12 in Portland. It was this show in which Willie paid the band with checks that bounced. The check was for twenty dollars and I still have mine signed by Willie. Many years later, 1983 or so, I was able to get a picture of Willie holding the check. Willie offered to make it good, but I thought it would be more valuable to have a bounced check signed by Willie Nelson.. Another gig we played with Willie was at Bud Meadows Pontiac on Sandy Blvd, Willie and Jimmy Wakely were the headliners. We played on a flatbed trailer in the parking lot of the Bud Meadows Dealership. The Powder River Ramblers were the backup band. This event was during Rose Festival week and we had great crowds and a good time was had by all.
I enlisted in the Air Force in the winter of 1956 and was stationed in Okinawa, Japan and Rapid City, SD. I was able to hook up with a band during that time and took my steel with me throughout my four year stay in the Air Force. While stationed in Rapid, I got a job with a local radio and TV station, KRSD. During the day on the base, I was a weatherman so it was easy to stand in for the on-air weatherman at the station. My normal gig at KRSD was switching programs in Master control, running camera on live shows and was a DJ on Saturdays. In the summer, I was a projector operator at the Star-Lite Drive-In Theatre not too far from Ellsworth Air Force Base and also was the projectionist at a couple of indoor theatres in Rapid. My Air Force gig was during the day, so I had time for the TV station and the theatres at night.
After my discharge from the air force in 1960, I moved to Portland, Oregon, attended Portland State college for a year and moved to Eugene, where I got a job at a local TV station, KEZI. 1961-1978. I played music in Eugene with various bands, was a projectionist at the local movie theaters and the big one, got married. In 1978 I left KEZI and started my own appliance repair business; missed the fun of television, so In 1979 I moved back to Portland and was hired at KATU TV in April of 1979. I worked at katu until I retired in 2001 and I still work there part time.
During the Eugene years, I was fortunate enough to play with Billy McCoy's band, we backed traveling musicians such as: Lefty Frezzel, Bobby Bare, Hank Thompson, Moe Bandy, Ed Bruce and others.
In the Portland years I was able to play with a 15 piece band, Ranch Dressing, featuring some of the finest musicians I have ever worked with. This western swing band played Bob Wills type music, three fiddles, sax, horns, etc. the whole meal deal. We opened for, groups such as Emy Lou Harris and Dwight Yoakam. At one outdoor concert event we hired the Nashville group, Riders In The Sky and Johnny Gimble, what a fun time we had on that gig.
I am still playing gigs in the Portland, Salem area and really enjoying life. Music, travel, computers, video, audio, and sharing life with a great companion,(female in case you're wondering), two sons, five grandchildren and the music and fun goes on.
Presently I am playing in the Country Flash Band. Click here for info and schedule.