Courtesy photo

Because you asked…

The Celebrate Austin Music Festival at Zilker Park, circa April 15, 1984, was filled with Austin-based touring acts with generous sprinklings of up-and-comers. A lot of that information is in Rod Kennedy’s book, Music of the Heart, written many years before his 4-14-14 death.

It had been a long three-day event, and I was pretty well exhausted by the time to begin working with the Sunday night performers and logistics. You see, I primarily worked with all the “things that could go wrong (or right),” and let Rod be free to handle the stage and “be the good guy,” which he did so well. Musicians everywhere would do practically anything for Rod Kennedy — he treated them that well!

However, one that was a little cautious that night was the closing act, Stevie Ray Vaughan and his band, Double Trouble. Rod had made sure that everything in his, and all the other musicians’, contracts was in order. At the last minute, Vaughan’s road manager required one more monitor, saying it was necessary because of Vaughan’s hat that he always wore on stage. We were able to accomplish that.

But then, only a few short hours before Vaughan’s slotted time on the stage, that same road manager approached me, saying that he’d heard that sometimes Kennedy wasn’t able to pay his performers, and that Vaughan wouldn’t go on until all the money in his contract had been paid up front.

OK, that was several thousand dollars. But, to make it happen, I collected cash from every source — the tickets, the t-shirt sales, beer sales — and gathered up the cash. But, by then, I was a little ticked… like I said, it was the final day and I (as had everyone else) had worked hard and was really beat.

Also feeling a bit the need to stay in control…

I took the cash to town, and had it all converted into $5 bills, all several thousand dollars in $5 bills. Then, took it back to the road manager. OK, he was happy; but my Imp of the Perverse was still in charge… I told the road manager, “No, I need you to count it out and sign for it.” What? He asked.

I took him into our make-shift office trailer, and had him count every single $5 bill until it reached the required total sum. That took a little bit more than “a short while.” But he did, he signed the paper work, and then Stevie Ray Vaughan and his band did what they did best — totally great music and performance.

After the night was over, and as stage crews broke down the stages and sound and lights, etc., someone set up some music and many of us just made an after-party of it.

That road manager and I danced together several times— many times. He finally broke the ice, saying, that was the best gimmick he’d ever had pulled on him. He totally liked it. He also said that it was his job to be the ‘bad guy’ for Stevie Ray Vaughan, so that Vaughan could always be ‘the nice guy,’ and I laughed when I told him that I had that same responsibility to Rod Kennedy.

We left, he and I, complete friends.

And speaking of that friend, I wish I could remember his name — that was nearly 33 years ago, and I’ve slept since then. He probably has, too.

This was first in Buddy Magazine, August 2016 issue.

Me and the Dirty River Boys

People ask me a lot — why am I in the music business? OK, I’ll share the secret – it was a guy who got me into all this. While teaching school in El Paso, I met another teacher, a musician, out there and that chance meeting and subsequent (though long-since-dead) romance began it all, with working as volunteers at the Border Folk Festival, Chamizal National Park in El Paso.

He was accepted as a New Folk songwriting finalist at the Kerrville Folk Festival. And that introduced me to the Kerrville Festivals. That was in 1975. I began volunteering there in 1976, and jumped in with both feet in 1980, when I accepted the position of assistant to producer Rod Kennedy.

It was a year-round, full-time job in which, during festivals, I was

Me and the great Kent Finlay

responsible for overseeing 18 days of the big festival and at other events throughout the year, allowing Kennedy the freedom to host the stage with ease. Together, we also produced classical, bluegrass, folk, and country music festivals, and traveled and held festivals across Texas, the United States, and Mexico.

Even then, I couldn’t figure out just why I stayed in the music business — it certainly wasn’t for the money. As Bob Gibson (Abilene, Abilene) told me… “the music business, you can make tens of dollars every year.” Then I saw that movie, Amadeus, and the line hit me right in the third-eye: (Loosely paraphrased) “Why did God implant the desire for music like a lust in my body? And then deny me the talent?” I am no musician, believe me, but it occurred to me —I have talent. I can produce, I can organize, I can photograph, I can write, I can manage, I can book… I can show up, over and over.

In 1986, Texas Governor Mark White invited me, because of that earlier El

Me, Matt and Jamie

Paso/Chamizal affiliation, to produce the state’s 7-stage, 2-day official Sesquicentennial Festival at San Jacinto Battleground State Park. Egads, what a trip — literally. Folks from the governor’s office picked me up in a state airplane and flew me to San Jacinto, and we picked all the sites for the stages, then back to Kerrville to go to work. So much to remember, and it all wasn’t on the PBS documentary that followed. For instance, seeing Leon Rausch cry when 6-year-old fiddle students played “Deep In The Heart of Texas” along with the Texas Playboys. Or having Louise Mandrell lead “Happy Birthday” to Texas with thousands singing along. And the finale — Willie Nelson and his band with the Houston Symphony. Gov. White inducted me as a “Yellow Rose of Texas” and Texas Parks & Wildlife passed a resolution in my honor — I call them my “whereas-es…” “Whereas Mary Jane Farmer did… blah blah… ” A better word might be ‘references.’

I have also been a booking agent and office assistant for several performers including Steve Young, Allen Wayne Damron and others; finder of songs for Tompal Glaser’s studio in Nashville; and a record distributor (both independent and with Polygram Records), all while holding down “real” jobs, including delving into the newspaper reporting business.

In 1999, I became the police beat reporter for the area’s daily newspaper.

Me, Javier, Walter

Five years later, I convinced the paper to begin publishing more about live music, hence the birth of the “Texoma Live Music Scene.”

I had sat at home between 1996, when I moved to Van Alstyne (‘cause the grandkids were all up in North Texas) from the musically-active Kerrville, until 2004, not knowing there was so much incredible music in North Texas. There was no listing of nightly events, and creating a calendar became my focus passion.

The newspaper shrunk, as newspapers are doing, and it dropped the music page. Quickly, I established SceneInTown.com to take up the slack, not wanting to let the musicians and venues down.

I left the newspaper in 2012, and again began dedicating my time to the music business.

I consider myself an accomplished, though non-professional (as I’m still

Me, relaxing at Larry Joe Taylor festival — Really, I was just ‘resting my eyes’!

waiting on that first dollar to come in) photographer. I was the photographer for all KHYI events, including the Shiner Rising Star contests, and Texas Music Revolutions for many years; and am photographer for Choctaw Casinos‘ national music concerts; again at Kerrville Festivals, and this year at WoodyFest in Okemah, Oklahoma, and at CrudeFest in Midland.

I joined the Buddy Magazine staff in 2013, both a privilege and a pleasure. I began booking the live music for El Patio Escondido in Van Alstyne in 2014, and a portion of the Thursday night events at Hank’s Texas Grill in McKinney this year.

That man who got me into all this (I gotta remember to thank him some day) also wrote a song about me in those early years, centered on my trip to El Paso when, scared to death, I left my husband. “… ahead was only darkness, to her back there was a light, but she couldn’t turn around for all

Me and the Kentucky Headhunters

her fear and all her fright.” I am so glad I didn’t turn around. Life has been one long, bumpy/smooth/chaotic/exciting ride — much longer than that trip to El Paso — every since.

If there’s any one more important thing I love about being in the music business, it’s the musicians, no matter what level of notoriety they own. They are, beyond question, the kindest, most generous group of people in the Lone Star State.

The front gate to Quiet Valley wasn’t quite this grand in 1982!

(I’m sorry, but we got absolutely NO photos of these people.)

Ake Pecha — I was told this means “Start fresh, my friend.”

It was probably around 1982 when Kerrville Festival Producer Rod Kennedy took a trip to the southeast, where he met a group of travelers from the Scandinavian countries. This was the “International School Ake Pecha,” two men, teachers, and three students, Preben from Denmark, Marten from Norway, and Arne from Sweden. We learned that the boys were considered worse than incorrigible, and that the countries really didn’t want them there. Thus, the five-some was traveling the U.S. with dual purpose of presenting the students their academics while showing them that, if you treat the world right, it will treat you right.

Rod asked them to come to Quiet Valley Ranch, and they accepted. They drove up on three motorcycles, two of which had sidecars for the non-drivers. They stayed in the men’s bunkhouse for several months and Christmas was among that time.

I lived in the reconverted women’s bunkhouse, made into a home for me by several volunteers. Ten by 20 in size, but room enough for my bed, dresser, a chair, a small dining table, and an old love seat with the legs taken off, for my Great Dane, Mandy.

Jan, the lead instructor, and I decided to share our Christmas that year. We set up a Christmas tree on the stage, where we could pull that portable backdrop around us for protection against the chilling wind, while we sang carols and exchanged gifts. Jan and I went to H-E-B to shop for Christmas dinner. Two things: they had a special dessert called “rice cream” which Jan prepared and included a prize for the one person who got that bowl of the delicious confection. Another was his choice of veggies – little cabbages, he called the Brussels sprouts he said was traditional in their home countries. A friend from town cooked the turkey and dressing (as my cabin had no stove or oven, just a little propane-powered double-burner). We invited six people from town out for this special dinner. They all came, and contributed traditional American Christmas foods.

Preben, Marten, and Arne pulled all the furniture out of the cabin and installed two folding tables from the stage. Folding chairs, too.

Then, we prayed together and sat down to eat together, an international dinner, prepared and served and enjoyed by everybody from both sides of the ocean.

One of my all-time favorite Christmases, in spite of sorely missing my kids, who were up in North Texas with their dad.

I could tell you lots more stories about these wonderful people — and maybe I will. They did not always act 100% within the rules of “niceness;” but were wonderful, because they were learning how not to be incorrigible any longer.