Blue-Eyed Soul in Pennsylvania

I exchanged some email this week with Justin Hopper of the Pittsburgh City Paper. Justin is working on a story right now about Chuck Corby, a Pittsburgh soul singer now working the lounge circuit, and he asked my opinion about why it is that so many highly regarded blue-eyed soul and r&b singers have come out of Pennsylvania (e.g., me, Jimmy Beaumont, Johnny Daye*, the Del Vikings, the Magnificent Men).

I am a relocated Jersey guy who moved to Pittsburgh largely because it was easy to get gigs playing the kind of music I liked when I got here. The fact that I am still in Pittsburgh suggests that the musical environment for blue-eyed soul was fertile when I got here. I think it would have worked just as well if I had gone east from State College instead of west, though.

Philly always had a strong white R&B tradition. I remember referring to soul fans from Philadelphia as "finger-snappin' Philly boys" when I was in college in the 60s and 70s. And there were a lot of them. The Soul Survivors from Philly were an outstanding band in the Young Rascals mode. The Ingui brothers, who were the main guys in the Soul Survivors, made a completely overlooked album for Gamble & Huff on TSOP with some studio musicians (under the name "Soul Survivors") that was terrific. And were the Vanilla Fudge from Philly too? I'd call that blue-eyed soul on acid. Or something...

The Magnificent Men were certainly a huge influence on me, and I played a concert with them at Penn State in 1968. They were everything I aspired to be, and the fact that they recorded a live album at the Uptown Theater in Philly gave them the imprimatur of authenticity (see Blue Chicago: The Search for Authenticity in Urban Blues Clubs by David Grazian on the subject of authenticity). My first band in college opened for them at Rec Hall at Penn State in 1968. We rented tuxedos for the gig, which cost us more than we were paid; but we didn't want to be outdressed.

But to get to the heart of Justin's question, the best answer I was able to give was, "Damned if I know." Is really objectively true that more highly regarded blue-eyed soul and r&b singers come out of our area than out of other areas? Before the Beatles, playing r&B and soul was about the only interesting thing there was to do, and my guess is that that interest and engagement went on in lots of places other than Pittsburgh, Philly, and Harrisburg. But I could be wrong.

* who makes a cameo on Robert Peckman's incredible new CD on Bonedog, Stirrin' Up Bees.

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Big weekend of festivals

Three great gigs this past weekend, beginning with the Pittsburgh Blues Festival on Friday night. Opening the show--we started at 6:30--is a challenging slot to get people moving, but I thought we did fairly well nonetheless. Here is one of several great photos that Glenn and Lisa Palm sent us from the show:


The next day, we traveled to Morrisville, PA and played at the Bucks County Blues Society, for their 25th annual R&B picnic. It was a beautiful setting at Snipes Farm, with plenty of room for people to spread out and be comfortable. We had a great time playing for old friends, and it was great to have a chance to mingle and say hello to our many loyal fans in that area. I sure wish we could find a regular place to play near Philadelphia; but in the meantime, I hope the folks in Bucks County keep us in mind for future events. Here's a shot of the stage that Gary Saretzky sent to us:



From there, we went on to Lock Haven, PA for another outdoor event in a great setting along the Susquehanna River.

A big thanks to Steve Delach, who filled in for us on guitar in Bucks County and Lock Haven on very short notice and did a great job!


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New Web Site Design

We hope you like the new design of our web site. We'll be working out some kinks during the next week or so, and you can help. If you see anything that looks funny or wrong, please send us an email.

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Penn State show

We played for the Central Pennsylvania Center for the Arts at Penn State last weekend, and I got this nice note from Jim Myers, who came up from Indiana, PA:

Very big show I must say. The band was so hot. I've never seen you into it as much as you were for Saturday's show. I thought I would miss that intimate "Moondogs" feel but you were killer. We all wanted more but I know there was a schedule to keep. I just can't say enough good about you and the band. Big, big ending with "Back from the Dead." Loved the drama.

Thanks to Jim for the great note.

The funny thing about this is that I didn't think I was really so hot last Saturday night--it felt like something was missing. Maybe it was that the set was so short, and the stage crew, in a classic State College "tail-wags-the-dog" moment, aggressively prevented us from playing an encore. The stage manager also delivered a little lecture to me as he was handing me my check about the need for punctuality, as if I were a student in his Bio class who had shown up late for a lab. Whatever...

I guess the lesson here is that I may not be the best judge of when I have it and when I don't. If Jim thinks I had it that night, who am I to say that I didn't?

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The artist who influenced me the most

In preparation for a feature on this year's Pittsburgh Blues Festival, Scott Mervis at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette asked me this question:

"We're previewing the Blues Festival and what we'd like to do is have the artists talk about the musician who influenced them the most -- what they loved about them, what they learned from them. Would it be possible to email me a few graphs* in the next few days?"

Here's what I wrote back:

On the first Billy Price and the Keystone Rhythm Band LP, recorded in 1979, we covered a song called "Is It Over?" that was originally recorded by Otis Clay. That was the title song of that first LP.

My manager at the time got in touch with Otis and, after much coaxing, he got Otis to agree to come east from Chicago to do a couple of dates with our band backing him up. We worked hard to learn all of Otis's material, studying his "Live in Japan" album carefully. At the first rehearsal for our first show at Desperado's in Washington, D.C., it was instantly clear that the band and Otis were perfectly matched. At the show, toward the end of Otis's great set, he unexpectedly called me up to sing with him. I will never forget the chills that went down my spine when I stood next to him--this was the real Otis Clay and not a recording in my living room--and improvised with him on "Is It Over?".

We've performed together many times since, and Otis was kind enough to make a cameo appearance with me on my Soul Collection CD in 1998. For many years, I copied Otis blatantly and shamelessly. I'm probably a bit more subtle about copying him now, but when I sing, he is always in there somewhere. From Otis I learned focus--the ability to block out distractions and enter deeply into a song. I also learned to approach every gig, no matter how few people are in the audience, with the same commitment to practice the craft of singing. I've seen Otis sing in a wide variety of settings and circumstances, and have never seen anything less than a transcendent performance.

This will be in the paper sometime this week. I'll add a link when it appears.

* "graphs" is newspaper jargon for "paragraphs."

UPDATE: Here's the article

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Re-post of Billy Price Summer Newsletter

Friends,

I expect that I will be blogging more frequently in the near future. We are almost finished with a complete redesign of our web site, and on the new site, the "BP's Blog" link is prominent on every page. That means that I'm going to have to get back in the habit of writing more frequently here; otherwise no one will ever bother to click these now-prominent links.

So, to get me started, I am re-posting the message I sent out to the email mailing list about a month ago. You'll note that all of the June dates I wrote about have already happened. But the July dates haven't, and they are pretty good. Anyhow, if you are reading this now, stay tuned--soon I'll be telling you about my upcoming trip to France in November and posting some pretty funny photographs of myself from long, long ago.

Regards,
Billy

*****

We have a busy summer planned. You may have noticed that over the past couple of years, we have been evolving into a community-celebration band, and this year is no exception, as you will see below. It may be time to embrace this niche in our marketing strategy. So, communities in the Western world, the next time you stage an event to celebrate your common bonds with one another by encouraging your youth to gorge on cheese-laden curly fries, funnel cakes, corn dogs, kettle corn, and hot sausage sandwiches--we're your guys.

Here are some of the highlights of our upcoming summer schedule, which begins on Friday, June 8 in Pittsburgh's Strip District at The Boardwalk (9:30 pm):

• June 9, Grove City PA Strawberry Days (7:00 pm)


• June 16, Fundraiser for The Children's Institute of Pittsburgh Amazing Kids, Palisades Ballroom, McKeesport, PA (8:00 pm)


• June 21, Wilkins Township PA Community Days (7:30 pm)


• June 30, Westmoreland Arts & Heritage Festival, Twin Lakes Park, Greensburg, PA (6:30 pm)


• July 14, Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts, State College, PA (8:00 pm)


• July 20, Pittsburgh Blues Festival, Hartwood Acres, Gibsonia, PA (time to be announced)


• July 21, Bucks County Blues Society Picnic, Morrisville, PA (3:30 pm)


• July 22, Lock Haven PA Summer Concert Series (6:30 pm)

In addition to these festivities, we'll also be playing a couple of club dates--June 29 at the Beach Room in Finleyville, PA, and August 10-11 at J.M. Randalls in Williamsburg, VA. All of the details on the gigs listed here are on our web site at www.billyprice.com/schedule.html. And while you're on our web site, please check out the latest rave review of East End Avenue at www.billyprice.com/bluesmatters.html.

Soulfully yours,
Billy Price

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