Category Archives: Music et al

Birthdays, Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Mitch Mitchell

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Mitch Mitchell

Mitch Mitchell

July 9, 1947 – November 12, 2008

Were you experienced?

Mitch Mitchell

The first time I saw a picture of Mitch Mitchell was simply because he was to the right of Jimi Hendrix on the cover of the Experience’s Are You Experienced album.

In my simple teenage view, simply looking at that cover made me experienced. Those colors with that oddly bulging picture and unnaturally colored trees. After listening to the album, I thought for sure I was experienced. Of course Hendrix’s guitar was the star. I’d never heard anything like it, but the drumming (“What’s his name? OK, Mitch Mitchell.”) was equally unearthly.

John Ronald “Mitch” Mitchell

Like many drummers before and many drummers since, Mitch Mitchell played in a variety of bands in a variety of ways before hitting the spotlight with Jimi Hendrix.

Even a step further back in his life, Mitchell was a child actor in several British productions.  It was while still in school and working in a drum store that Mitchell began playing what became his life’s work.

He worked with bands as a member and worked with bands as a studio drummer. He even played with the Who between Doug Sandom’s departure and Keith Moon’s arrival. Part of his early experience included developing a love of jazz drumming, particularly that of Elvin Jones, who was John Coltrane’s.

Jimi Hendrix Experience

That developing ability attracted the attention of others. particularly Chas Chandler, ex-Animal bassist and the person who brought Hendrix to England to create a band around him.

Mitchell was part of the Experience throughout it’s brief time. He became a part of the band on October 6, 1966 and stayed with them until it’s dissolution in June 1969. Mitchell remained with Hendrix when Hendrix developed the ever-changing line-up and band names until Hendrix’s death in 1970.

Mitch Mitchell

Following Hendrix’s death, Mitch Mitchell remained active as a drummer, but never again would the spotlight be upon him.  His credit list after 1970 are mainly on Hendrix recordings that obviously preceded Jimi’s death.

In 2008, he was part of the Experience Hendrix Tour that featured  Billy Cox, Buddy Guy, Jonny Lang, Robby Krieger, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Eric Johnson, Cesar Rosas, David Hidalgo, Aerosmith’s Brad Whitford,Hubert Sumlin, Chris Layton, Eric Gales, and Mato Nanji.

Mitchell died in his sleep in Portland, Oregon five days after the tour ended.  He is buried in Seattle.

Baron Wolman, Music et al, Today in history, Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Photographer Baron Wolman

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Photographer Baron Wolman

June 25, 1937 – November 2, 2020

Photographer Baron Wolman

Being in the right place at the right time is luck. Being talented and in the right place at the right time is fortune.

Baron Wolman was the very talented photographer whose pictures help us know American life far better than had he not taken them.

Photographer Baron Wolman

Rolling Stone magazine

After getting a taste of photography while in the Army, Wolman lived in (the right place) San Francisco. Wolman was no Boomer (he was born in 1937), but Jann Wenner was when the two met in April 1967.

The 21-year-old Wenner wanted Wolman to be the photographer for a rock music magazine Wenner had in mind. Wolman said he’d work for free if he could keep ownership of his pictures. A wise quid pro quo.

Cover after cover

Rolling Stone magazine would not have been the same without Wolman’s pictures.

Photographer Baron Wolman

Baron was Rolling Stone’s photographer from 1967 to 1970, a  short time, but perhaps no better stretch to be a part of the scene Rolling Stone wanted to cover. He says that he “shot his best stuff in ’68 and ’69…those were the halcyon days.”

Photographer Baron Wolman

His photos graced cover after cover of the magazine revealing the famous, the emerging, and behind the scene.

Woodstock Music and Art Fair

He photographed, not surprisingly, the Woodstock Music and Art Fair and those photos are perhaps the best of any taken there. While shooting Santana that hot Saturday afternoon, Bill Graham took Wolman’s camera to shoot a picture of Baron. No selfies then.

Photographer Baron Wolman

Photographer Baron Wolman

“True fashion starts on the street“

Photographer Baron Wolman

After Rolling Stone, Baron Wolman changed direction slightly and started to concentrate on fashion with his Rags magazine. As many knew, fashion trends often begin outside of actual fashion studios when someone decides that “others may think this combination odd, but it looks good” and a year later models are walking the runways with it.

Photographer Baron Wolman

Embedded photographer

He followed the Oakland Raiders in 1974 and produced Oakland Raiders: The Good Guys.

Learning to fly

Wolman learned to fly and took pictures of California from his plane ( California From the Air: The Golden Coast (1981)) or pictures of Israel (The Holy Land: Israel From the Air (1987))

Santa Fe/Passing

Wolman settled  in Sante Fe, New Mexico and continued to photograph and be a beacon of light both toward the future and from the past. He regularly posted on his musings and observations on his Facebook page as well as Instagram.

On October 4, 2020 he posted “Sad to say I’m now in the final sprint to the end. I go forward with a huge amount of gratitude for the many blessings bestowed upon me (family, friends, travels and more), with no regrets and appreciation for how my photographs — my life’s work — have been received.”

Less than a month later, his rep, Dianne Duenzl, announced his death: “It is with a sad heart that we announce the passing of Baron Wolman on November 2, 2020. Baron died peacefully at the age of 83, after a battle with ALS. Baron’s pictures gave us a rare, comprehensive, and accurate reflection of that time executed by a gifted artist whose visual intelligence is unsurpassed.” [Rolling Stone obit]

Photographer Baron Wolman
Music et al

Don Sugarcane Harris

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Don Sugarcane Harris

June 18, 1938 — November 30, 1999
Don Sugarcane Harris
Don Sugarcane Harris

I’m Leaving It Up to You #1

Just before the Beatles arrived in the US and changed the course of pop music history and the lives of Baby Boomers and just one day after the assassination of President Kennedy, “I’m Leaving It Up to You” by Dale (Houston) and Grace (Broussard) hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100. It would stay there until December 6, 1963. And if the Beatles hadn’t arrived, yet, neither had Don Sugarcane Harris.

But first…

Like many Billboard hits for white performers, “I’m Leaving It Up to You” was a song already written and recorded by black artists. In this case Don (Harris) and Dewey (Terry).

Harris was born in Pasadena, California, and studied classical violin. He also learned guitar, harmonica and piano. He started the Don and Dewey act with his childhood friend in the mid-1950s, and although they released several singles, they had no hits.

Other artists did with such Harris and Terry co-authored early rock and roll classics as “Farmer John”, “Justine”, and “Big Boy Pete.”

The name Don Sugarcane Harris should strike a familiar bell with some Boomers because Harris later became THE rock and roll electric violinist (OK, tied with Papa John Creach).

He played with John Lee  Hooker, Little Richard, Johnny Otis (Otis nicknamed Harris ”Sugarcane,” reportedly for his reputation as a ladies’ man), John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers, and most famously with Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention.

On Zappa’s Weasels Ripped My Flesh album, Harris played and sang “Directly From My Heart to You.”

His personal discography is relatively short (AllMusic), but his credit list overall is a lengthy one.

After a lengthy battle with pulmonary disease,  he was found dead in his Los Angeles apartment at the age of 61 on December 1, 1999. His obituary appeared in the NY Times.

Don Sugarcane Harris