All posts by Woodstock Whisperer

Attended the Woodstock Music and Art Fair in 1969, became an educator for 35 years after graduation from college, and am retired now and often volunteer at Bethel Woods Center for the Arts which is on the site of that 1969 festival.
Birthdays, Music of the 60s, Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Rock Star Steve Katz

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Rock Star Steve Katz

Happy birthday

Rock Star Steve Katz

Steve Katz was born in Brooklyn on May 9, 1945. His music career began in the late 50s when he appeared on a local Schenectady, New York television program called Teenage Barn. Accompanied by piano, Steve sang hits of the day such as “Tammy” and “April Love.”

Rock Star Steve Katz

Greenwich Village

Like so many young musicians of the early 60s, Steve Katz gravitated to Greenwich Village. There he listened to and played with others such as Dave Van Ronk (“The Mayor of MacDougal Street“), Stefan Grossman, Maria D’Amato (to be Maria Muldaur), David Grisman, and John Sebastian. With a number of those and others, he would become part of the Even Dozen Jug Band [Wirz  article] which released an album. A guitarist among many guitarists, Katz played washboard.

Rock Star Steve Katz

Danny Kalb Quartet

Next came the Danny Kalb Quartet. Still not confident enough as a guitar player, Steve Katz kept his amp turned down low for the audition and passed. Soon Al Kooper joined the band and it became Blues Project.

Rock Star Steve Katz

Blues Project

It was the music of Blues Project that I first heard Katz. I had never heard music like that or an album like Projections. It was so different than anything I’d heard, it sometimes confused me. Yes rock and roll. No, not rock and roll. It was also likely the first time I’d heard electric blues, albeit, white electric blues.

“Caress me baby…you can make love to me like the soft summer breeze.”

More than just hair-raising music. (“There’s something happening here. What it is ain’t exactly clear” spoke to much more than just some Sunset Blvd event.)

All Music’s Richie Unterberger stated in his review that the band, “offered an electric brew of rock, blues, folk, pop, and even some jazz, classical, and psychedelia during their brief heyday in the mid-’60s.”

Rock Star Steve Katz

Blood, Sweat and Tears

The next thing I knew, Blue Project had become Blood, Sweat and Tears and Child is Father to the Man became another album that I couldn’t stop listening to and often wondering what the hell I was listening to.

Even without Al Kooper for BST’s second album, Katz was there and all was fine. Not so much blues, but all that jazzy brass opened up new doors for my ears.

Rock Star Steve Katz

Steve Katz

Rock Star Steve Katz

Quietude 

And then things faded. Certainly Steve was still around, but I could’t seem to find his oasis.

His path occasionally crossed with Kooper’s, but Katz found himself as an engineer and producer. One of the most famous albums he produded was Lou Reed’s Rock N’ Roll Animal. A secret Katz recently revealed in his autobiography, Blood, Sweat, and My Rock ‘n’ Roll Years: Is Steve Katz a Rock Star?, was that the great audience sound on that album was not from the Reed show. Technical issues resulted in a poor quality sound for the audience, so Katz “borrowed” an audience sound from another RCA record artist: John Denver.  Apparently Reed died never knowing.

You will see Steve Katz’s name all over rock and roll:

  • Lynyrd Skynyrd
  • McKendree Spring
  • Dion
  • Joni Mitchell
  • Elliot Murphy
  • Horselips
  • David Sanborn
  • Quincy Jones
  • Carol King
  • Stephen Bishop
  • Jon Anderson
  • Jaco Pastorius
  • Donovan
  • The Who
  • Danny Kalb
  • George Harrison
Rock Star Steve Katz

Still active

Rock Star Steve Katz

Steve Katz continues to play music and promote his wife Alison Palmer’s ceramic art. According to his site, “As time passed, Alison’s craft achieved popularity and recognition. Alison and Steve soon found that they had a thriving small business. Steve still performs [and]…is a professional photographer….”

Keep the Dream Flowing

Keep the Dream Flowing is a Woodstock-inspired podcast begun by three “young” (i.e., non-Boomers) Woodstock-enthusiasts. They have interviewed scores of people, all of whom have some kind of connection to the festival.

In 2023, KTDF released a two-part interview with Steve Katz. Here’s the link: Steve Katz on Keep the Dream Flowing.

Rock Star Steve Katz
Fear of Rock, Fear of Rock, Music et al

Johnnie Ray Banned

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Johnnie Ray Banned

May 8, 1954

BBC Bans Ray’s “Such a Night”

Johnnie Ray Banned

Even though rock music was just learning to walk in 1954, we could see its future youthful swagger.

Johnnie Ray Banned

Drifters

Lincoln Chase wrote “Such a Night” in 1953. The Drifters, with Clyde McPhatter, released it in January 1954. It was a hit despite its “racy” lyrics. At least that’s what some listeners thought.

It was a night, ooo what a night it was
   It really was, such a night
   The moon was bright ooo how bright it was
   It really was, such a night
   The night was alive with stars above
   And when she kissed me I had to fall in love

It was a kiss mmmm what a kiss it was
   It really was, such a kiss
   How she could kiss ooo what a kiss it was
   It really was, such a kiss
   Just part of her lips that sets me on fire
   I reminisce and I feel desire

I'd give my heart to her in sweet surrender
   How well I remember , I'll always remember
   Ooo that night, ooo what a night it was
   It really was, such a night
   Came the dawn and my heart and my love and the night was gone
   But I'll never forget that kiss in the moonlight
   Ooo such a kiss, ooo such a night

Now she's gone, gone gone
   Yes she's gone, gone gone
   Came the dawn, dawn dawn
   And the night was gone
   And my heart was gone
   And her love was gone
   But before the dawn oo oo oo oo such a night 

The Drifters had a hit despite the fear, but as often happened in early rock, Johnnie Ray, an American white singer, covered the song the same year. He too ran into issues with the lyrics, On this day, May 8, 1954, the BBC radio banned the song after listener complaints.

Johnnie Ray Banned

Johnnie Ray

Johnnie Ray had first become a sensation with a two-sided-hit that reached No. 1 on the pop charts. The record, ”Cry” backed by ”The Little White Cloud That Cried.” It sold more than two million copies.

Ray continued to have hits during the 50s and was particularly popular in Great Britain. According to a 1981 New York Times article stated that, “…it was his [Rays’] rhythm and blues style of singing that help lay the groundwork for the rock-and-roll that turned Mr. Ray’s entertainment world around. Recently, Ringo Starr of the Beatles pointed out that the three singers that the Beatles listened to in their fledgling days were Chuck Berry, Little Richard and Johnnie Ray.” 

Johnnie Ray Banned

“Ridicule as well as popularity“

Johnnie Ray died on February 24, 1990.  He was 63 years old. His animated showmanship had been both a boon and a curse to his career. Again the New York Times, “His mannerisms earned him ridicule as well as popularity, and he was a favorite subject of impersonators.“

Johnnie Ray Banned
Birthdays, Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Dead Drummer Bill Kreutzmann

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Dead Drummer Bill Kreutzmann

Dead Drummer Bill Kreutzmann

Happy birthday to you!

William Bill Kreutzmann was born on May 7, 1946 in Palo Alto, California. Despite early criticism, Bill loved playing the drums.  Before he was legal, he, Jerry Garcia,  Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron “Pigpen” McKernan formed a band.

Of course that band evolved into the Grateful Dead. Later Mickey Hart joined the Dead and he and Bill (“the rhythm devils”) drove the Dead’s beat.

Dead Drummer Bill Kreutzmann

All for one, one for all

Though there were sometimes solos during a show, it was never about an individual. Jerry Garcia may have been the axle  of the band’s wheel, the band  was greater than the sum of its parts.

Robert Hunter knew of what he spoke when he said in “Truckin'” What a Long Strange Trip It’s Been. That, of course, is a shibboleth for the Grateful Dead and many of the bands that the 1960s produced.

Dead Drummer Bill Kreutzmann

Always there

Bill Kreutzmann was there for all the Dead’s shows. The good and the bad. The ethereal. The cosmic. The highs and the lows.

In 2015, he and Benjy Eisen wrote about it in Deal: My Three Decades of Drumming, Dreams, and Drugs with the Grateful Dead  [NPR article].

The book begins with a story about Jerry Garcia and Bill going scuba diving in the late 80s. Touch of Grey, the Dead’s only big commercial hit. Like anything that brings public attention, Touch of Grey brought the good and the bad. Scuba diving in Hawaii seemed like a good place to get away from it all. No drugs. No attention. Turn off your mind, relax and float down stream.

Then a scuba instructor swam up to Garcia with a waterproof notepad and asked for his autograph.

Dead Drummer Bill Kreutzmann

Dead End

When Garcia died in 1995 [NYT obituary] the Grateful Dead did, too.  Without Jerry, the axle gone, the band could light a spark, could start a fire, but never burn as brightly as those previous 30 years.

Of course Bill Kreutzman has continued to play music. It is, it was, and always will be what his life is about.

Dead Drummer Bill Kreutzmann

Lifer drummer

He had helped form bands (The Other Ones, The Dead, The Rhythm Devlis, 7 Walkers, and most recently, Billy & the Kids) and has sat in at concerts (with Journey, Warren Haynes, Phish, David Nelson Band among others).

In 2015, a Grateful Dead formed to perform a series of concerts commemorating its 50th anniversary. Bill Kreutzmann, of course, was there and wanted more.

Also in 2015, he with Benjy Eisen so published a book: Deal: My Three Decades of Drumming, Deals and Drugs With the Grateful Dead.

Glide magazine wrote: During the course of the first person narrative of Deal, founding member/drummer of the Grateful Dead Bill Kreutzmann shows he’s (almost) as skilled a storyteller as he is a drummer. Particularly in the early going of My Three Decades,  his informal style lends itself well to the increasingly fast pace of his life as he discovers the pleasure of music, his passion for playing and his abiding devotion to the Dead as they coalesced in the mid-Sixties.

PBS NewsHour interview by Jeffrey Brown 

But in 2023…

Though Dead & Company embarked on their final tour, it was  without Kreutzmann.

Dead & Company announced: “After many long discussions and some good old-fashioned soul searching, we are letting you know that our brother Bill Kreutzmann will not be joining us on our final summer tour. Bill wants you to know that he is in good spirits, good health and he is not retiring.”

The band added, “This is the culmination of a shift in creative direction as we keep these songs alive and breathing in ways that we each feel is best to continue to honor the legacy of the Grateful Dead. The final tour will go on as planned with Bill’s full endorsement and support.”

Dead & Company’s farewell tour began in May and included a benefit show at Cornell University’s Barton Hall, set for 46 years to the day since the Grateful Dead played a legendary set at the venue.

Dead Drummer Bill Kreutzmann