Daily grist; there is only one good thing about old-age. It doesn’t last long. JDRhynes
Back in the middle 1970s,on July 4th, the San Francisco Chronicle put on a food and fanfair that was free to the public at Fort Mason on the beach. They had scores of vendors selling everything from tattoos, to ocean voyages, as well as a plethora of different ethnic food vendors. The National Park Service also brought in a portable stage that was state-of-the-art for the time and there was eight different acts of ethnic music, and each act played for 50 min. The Vern Williams band was the bluegrass portion of the program that day. I know you’ve all heard the old saying, it’s who you know that get you to the end-of-life’s road, and that proved to be true in this instance. A friend of ours worked for the National Park Service and he loved bluegrass music, particularly Vern’s so that’s how we got hired. He also slid us 100 bucks under the table for gas and eats, and I think we were the only band that got this perk as well. It’s who you know.
Oh yes, did I mention that there was about 80,000 people there? About 8 to 10,000 of them were gathered in front of the stage to listen to the music, hence enter the elevated”pucker factor”for the “green”bass player! Up to that point the only time I had picked up a bass was at different jam sessions, when the real bass player took a break, either to rest, to refresh their libation, or answer nature’s call. I had never dreamed of playing the bass on a regular basis until Vern came over to my house one day and asked me if I would like to play bass in his band? I tried to beg off by telling him I didn’t know anything about it, but he said that’s a bunch of baloney because I have heard you play the bass several times over the years, and you keep perfect time not to mention the kick ass volume you put in each beat. How could I argue with Vern, so I told him I would start looking for a bass and that’s how that came to be. A bout a week later I ran into an old friend of mine who played bass with the same dance band for 35 years. I asked if he knew anybody that had a bass for sale, and he said I do, so that’s how I bought his original 1951 Kay bass that I nervously carried onto the stage that day to play in front of 10,000 people. But that’s not the end of the story. That morning when we left Valley Springs to head to San Francisco, it was about 100° in the shade. When we got to San Francisco it was foggy and overcast and the temperature was about 65°. Not good conditions for acoustic instruments to adjust to abruptly, and to multiply my pucker factor by another thousand percent due to the fact that the gut strings on my bass would not stay in tune.Delbert’s guitar, Keith’s banjo, and my bass had to be constantly tuned for the first 30 min. of our set, but Vern’s mandolin was fine until the last 15 min. of the set, when the weather finally got to his instrument as well. By then our instrument that settled in and we were fine for the last 15 min. of our set, all except for the mandolin. Four years Vern said that was 15 min. of pure tuning hell !
Looking back on that gig about a week later, I figured there was maybe one or two people in that crowd of 10,000 that may have suspected I didn’t know squat about playing the bass, but I was not going to own up to it. I also knew that any gig I played after that would be a piece of cake because I had already been through the”terminal pucker factor”gig of my life. You know want folks? I was right. So that’s the other side of the story.
