Canned Heat Adolfo Fito de la Parra

Canned Heat Adolfo Fito de la Parra

born February 8, 1946
Happy birthday
[Tommy Johnson – Canned Heat Blues (1928) – where the band got its name]

Canned Heat began its set at the Woodstock Music and Art Fair on Saturday evening around 7:30 after the Incredible String Band and before Mountain.

Canned Heat Adolfo Fito de la Parra

Nickname band

I suppose we could call them the nickname band:

Their set is not one of the most talked about sets that weekend. Unless you were there. And then you wonder why their performance isn’t ranked up next to all the many super sets.

Canned Heat Adolfo Fito de la Parra
from the film Woodstock
Canned Heat Adolfo Fito de la Parra

More

Here’s 10 minutes and 46 seconds of great music by a great band: On the Road Again. 

Unfortunately for Canned Heat, death dealt them a horrible hand. Just 13 months later, Wilson died. Hite died in 1981.

Canned Heat Adolfo Fito de la Parra

Mexico

The band continued and Adolfo de la Parra continued on drums. Born in Mexico, he had played in several bands there before moving to Los Angeles in 1966. Fito’s first gig was December 1967 and he’s never left.

In recent years he was the only member of the 1960s Canned Heat line-up that toured with the group, although in 2010 (and for most shows in 2009) Larry Taylor and Harvey Mandel rejoined the group and together with Fito. Currently Mandel is having medical issues and the band isn’t touring.

Canned Heat Adolfo Fito de la Parra

Livin’ the Blues

In 2000, de la Parra published Livin’ the Blues a book that (according to the site) …is the true story of the Canned Heat Band’s psychedelic hippie days as lived by Adolfo “Fito” De La Parra, a man who never forgot how to boogie and still escaped with his life! This is his story, journaling four decades on the road with boogie-blues music legends CANNED HEAT. This is a saga of hit records, world tours, drugs, sex, outrageous behavior, and death. From the heights of their world-wide fame during the Woodstock era, to the bands rebirth in the ’90s and thier continued success today ,this is the real story of the wild and excessive lifestyles of the music world!

Visit the Canned Heat site to see what is new and how you can help Harvey Mandel.

Canned Heat Adolfo Fito de la Parra

Woodstock festival Bert Sommer

Woodstock festival Bert Sommer

Remembering and appreciating
February 7, 1949 – July 23, 1990

Bert Sommer and his music were more part of the 60s than is at first obvious. He wrote songs for the Vagrants who later morphed into Mountain.

Bert Sommer became a part of the pop successful Left Banke and sang lead on their “And Suddenly.”

He had a part in the west coast production of Hair. In fact his hair graced the Playbill cover.

Woodstock festival Bert Sommer

Woodstock festival Bert Sommer

Artie Kornfeld

Artie Kornfeld, a Capital Records executive, and later one of the four organizers of the Woodstock Music and Art Fair, noticed Sommer’s songwriting and produced his first album, The Road To Travel for Capital.

And the connection with Kornfeld obviously helped get him an invitation to Woodstock.

Unfortunately, Bert Sommer never received one of that famous festival’s golden eggs, as Santana had for example.

Why he didn’t ride Woodstock’s coattails is likely due what label he recorded for and what label produced the Woodstock album. His was Capital. Its was Warner Brothers. And Bert Sommer did not make it onto the three-disc Woodstock album.

Neither did he appear in the movie.

Woodstock festival Bert Sommer

Woodstock

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CA-NPCq_Jd8

According to the Bertsommer.com siteArtie [Kornfeld] said “When Bert came up to perform at Woodstock, it was special because he was dear to me. I was a little nervous because I wanted him to do well. I was proud watching Bert. I got busy and went backstage and hung out to be closer to Bert and his band, which included Ira Stone (electric guitar), Charlie Bilello (bass), Ira’s wife Max…. When Bert finished his performance of Paul Simon’s “America” it was simply electrifying. Paul Simon later said that Bert’s rendition on record that I produced, was better than Simon & Garfunkel’s. I’ve been told that this performance was the only standing ovation at Woodstock. Shame on the powers that kept Bert out of the movie.

From the same site: Mr. Sommer settled in ­Albany, N.Y., where he played in local bands, his voice still strong, according to Mr. Kahn. Health failing, he died in June 1990, 12 days after a final performance in Troy, N.Y., about a two-and-a-half-hour drive north of Bethel. A year earlier, a ­special edition of Life magazine commemorating the 20th ­anniversary of the festival ­included a cropped photo of Mr. Stone and his wife Maxine. As if deemed irrelevant, Mr. Sommer was cut out of the picture.

Woodstock festival Bert Sommer

Ira Stone

In 2009, Ira Stone 2009 he gave an interview about his time there with Bert.

Woodstock festival Bert Sommer

Jesse Bert Sommers

In 2020, Something Else!  published an interview between Steve Elliott and Sommer’s son, Jesse Bert Sommers.

Elliott preceded the interview with this:

In the space of 10 years between 1967-77, singer-songwriter Bert Sommer released four studio albums, collaborated with the Left Banke and the Vagrants with Mountain’s Leslie West, performed in the first stage musical of Hair, appeared at Woodstock, and was part of Kaptain Kool and the Kongs on TV’s The Krofft Supershow for one season.

Sommer also continued to write, record, and perform music until his untimely death in 1990 at the age of 41. He was a phenomenally talented charismatic singer and songwriter, and was gone way too soon. I had the rare pleasure of talking with his son Jesse Bert Sommer for a Something Else! Sitdown focusing on father’s music and career.

By 2020 Rhino Records had included Bert Sommer’s complete Woodstock performance in its anniversary release. Asked about the release, Jessie Bert said, “It is a bittersweet accomplishment. To finally have the music and recognition be accessible to both new and old generations is great. My father not being around to enjoy it is not. In addition, the level of fame some rose to because of Woodstock and their inclusion in the film would have been a game changer for my father, and all his opportunities, fame, finances, offspring and his mark on music history. Who knows how far he may have reached if these songs had been included and enjoyed for the last half century? Nonetheless, I am glad it has been included by Rhino finally, and for all the efforts put forth by Andy Zax in the genesis of the true complete box set.”

Here is an observation by Zax about that performance:

Woodstock festival Bert Sommer

Righteous Brothers Lovin Feelin

Righteous Brothers Lovin Feelin

Righteous Brothers Lovin Feelin

Billboard #1

February 6 – 19, 1965: “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’” by the Righteous Brothers #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Righteous Brothers Lost Lovin Feelin
You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’
Righteous Brothers Lovin Feelin

Songfacts

The Songfacts site has this to say about this great song:

According to BMI music publishing, “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” was played on American radio and television more times than any other song in the 20th century. It got over 8 million plays from the time it was released until 2000. Note that this includes all versions of the song, not just The Righteous Brothers’.

The husband and wife songwriting team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil wrote this song at the request of Phil Spector, who was looking for a hit for an act he had just signed to his Philles label: The Righteous Brothers.

Before signing with Spector, the duo had some minor hits on the Moonglow label such as “Little Latin Lupe Lu” (#49) and “My Babe” (#75).

Righteous Brothers Lovin Feelin

Little Latin Lupe Lu

 
Righteous Brothers Lovin Feelin

Mann & Weil

Mann and Weil listened to these songs to get a feel for their sound, and decided to write them a ballad. Inspired by “Baby I Need Your Loving” by The Four Tops, they came up with this song about a desperate attempt to rekindle a lost love.

The title “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” was just a placeholder until they could think of something better, but Spector thought it was great so they went with it. With most of the song written, Mann and Weil completed the song at Spector’s house, where Phil worked with them to compose the famous bridge (“Baaaby… I need your love…”).

Wrecking Crew

Musicians for the song include members of the Wrecking CrewDon Randi on piano, Tommy Tedesco on guitar, Carol Kaye and Ray Pohlman on bass, and Steve Douglas on sax. Also Barney Kessel on guitar and Earl Palmer on drums.  

The background singers were mainly the vocal group The Blossoms [Fanita James, Jean King, and Darlene Love] and Cher, who did a lot of work with Spector early in her career. She can also be heard on background vocals near the end of the song.

Acolades

The song was the first Righteous Brothers release on Philles, and it shot to #1, giving both the duo and the songwriting team of Mann & Weil their first #1 hit.

In 2001, the Recording Industry Association of America and the National Endowment for the Arts ranked the recording at No. 9 in the list of Songs of the Century.

In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine  ranked it at 34 in its list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

In 2005,  the Songwriters Hall of Fame awarded Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil  the Towering Song Award for “the creators of an individual song that has influenced the culture in a unique way over many years.”

In 2015, the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress, which each year selects from 130 years of sound recordings for special recognition and preservation, chose the Righteous Brothers recording of the song as one of the 25 recordings that has “cultural, artistic and/or historical significance to American society and the nation’s audio legacy“.

In addition to it being the most played song of the 20th century, it remains the most-played song ever having accumulated almost 15 million airplays in the US by 2011. Today that honor belongs to Sting’s “Every Breath You Take.”

Righteous Brothers Lovin Feelin