A Beautiful Song: A Musical Soul Story

by Michael Cantwell

  One day I asked Scott, “Hey Scotty, are you ever going to schedule a day to look above the Drama Queens shoulders to see if she actually has eyes.” I knew what the attraction was, but he could not appreciate my humor either. All I knew was, every time I looked at her eyes, all I saw was ice. She later went on to be the villain on a long running soap opera based in New York. It was the perfect role for her. There was no acting involved at all.

  My date was a violin player from school. She was a cute girl, but I thought in the back of my mind I wanted to date her because she had actually performed the 1812 Overture. I wanted to tell my dad that even though I still had not played it, I was dating someone who did. None of them actually believed I knew the entire band; I had jammed with them at Gordy’s shop long ago. They started to believe me when Skunk shook my hand and said hello on his way to the stage.

  From the moment the house lights went down and Skunk played his first solo, I was mesmerized. Skunk was a long lean man, who let his yellow with hints of grey hair grow well past his shoulders. He had a huge bushy mustache. When the white hot spotlight hit him for his solos, there was no doubt he was in control of that arena. I was watching the audience in the front rows, who were swaying back and forth in rhythm while they sang the notes from Skunk’s guitar. His fingers danced like individual ballerinas along the neck of his guitar. He was always the best player I knew, but all that work on the road had made him into an incredible live performer. His body barely moved as his fingers ran across the fret board up and down and all around it like he was in a trance. The crowd roared after each song and each solo. I now understood why he practiced those long tiresome hours. I also now knew why Gordy always told me that the day I could match Skunk, would be the day he would consider me a world class musician. Skunk was the big time. I also realized now why Gordy let him hang around the store and show kids like me some lessons. The guy was a true rock and roll star.

  The first year at Julliard was almost over. I really didn’t want to go back home and teach ten year old beginners how to play scales all summer. I knew my parents were expecting me home, but I really didn’t want to do that. Scott was going back to Ohio for the summer. My girl friend Elise was in an orchestra put together by the school. They would tour the country for a few weeks while on summer recess. So she was not going to be around much either. After that, Elise was going back home to North Carolina for a few weeks. In the end, I reluctantly returned home. The day I arrived, my grandmother passed away. I had seen her over spring break and she looked a bit stronger, but her heart finally gave out. In her Will she left me a ring that was my grandfather’s that was inscribed underneath “Be True”. I would guess she was trying to reinforce her lesson to me one last time.

  We talked very briefly about putting the band back together for the summer. Brian said he had stopped playing and Kevin didn’t want to do it either. Debby and I picked up a Friday gig playing three, forty- five minute sets at a new coffee house in town. It really didn’t pay well, but I had to play a certain amount of hours in public to graduate. I called my school administrator and this counted. Besides it gave me one night a week I hang out with Debby again and perform.

  We added new songs to our sets since her voice had improved. We even played two songs that Scott and I had written, and one I wrote myself. I wrote it with Debby in mind, so she sang it beautifully. I never told her it was about her, but I suspect she knew by the passion she used when singing it.

  I worked part time at the guitar shop which gave Gordy some time off during the week. I think he had some health issues, but didn’t want to tell me. He only said he could use one afternoon off to do some errands, so I sat in charge of the store. He had another part time guy for a while, but I think he got caught with drugs in the store. Gordy quickly banished him forever. I wrote a few songs, but overall it was a very quiet summer for me. I helped in getting my grandmother’s house cleaned out and put up for sale. Her old dog died a week after she did. I don’t think he enjoyed living at my parent’s house.

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  Chapter 6

  During my second year at school, it was required everyone join a school band. They wanted me to play in a classical orchestra, but I begged and pleaded to be put in a more jazz oriented band. I wanted to learn to be more improvisational, and not be restricted to what was always on the sheet music. Scott and I also found a few other guys from school to play together with on weekends. We hoped maybe it would lead us to a paying job later in the year. New York was filled with so many talented groups that it was near impossible to land a paying job.

  I kept my grades up, which pleased my dad. I also kept developing my craft as a songwriter and player. Elise and I started to grow closer even though I didn’t get to see her that much during the week. She was usually at the opposite end of the campus, but we managed to see each other a few minutes each night for dinner. Her orchestra practiced a lot in the evenings, so it was hard to see her on a regular basis. My jazz band met in the late afternoons so our times were just not matching up.

  Elise Andrews was a really great person who I really enjoyed being around. Scott finally broke up with the drama queen, well that’s his side, truth be told she had found a guy who drove a corvette. Believe me, he might have been heartbroken at first, but he was far better with her gone. He could do so much better than a future soap star with a sour attitude and bleached hair.

  Elise Andrews on the other hand was a quiet unassuming southern belle who was maybe as shy as I was at times. She came from a low income family from the hills of North Carolina. Her entire family for generations played either the banjo or the fiddle. She was a deeply religious person, who while in high school, was lucky to have a classically trained music teacher who put her on the path to classical music. She had the same issues with her dad in that he didn’t understand how anyone could be paid for playing an instrument. Here skills did pay enough for her to get a fully paid college scholarship. She was a fairly tiny girl with bright green eyes that made me crumble every time I looked deeply into them. She would every now and again take advantage of that fact by getting me to attend church service by her side, or be her escort into the city to visit museums. She was a huge history buff. Maybe her favorite quote was “Listen here Stu my boy, if you don’t know your history you are doomed to repeat it, now let’s go learn something today.”

  Skunk got a hold of me at the school and invited me and Scott over to a recording session for Dr. Wu. I had been in a recording studio for school, but not with a professionally working band. I got to hear a track that later became one of their biggest hits as they were working it out in the studio. We were supposed to all go out for dinner after the session, but Don Brecker was such a stickler for every note being perfect he would not leave the studio until the sound was perfect. So by eight in the evening we decided to head back to the cafeteria before it closed. Overall it was a great experience.

  I think what really happened was that Mr. Dobbs my admissions director, talked Skunk into letting us come over for the day, but I was not going to complain. It was the first time I really got to see a band work out a song with a producer in a real recording studio. The first time I heard that song a few months later, I was smiling the rest of the day. It’s funny but what I remember most about that day was how Don Brecker was in the face of Walt Farner and Skunk had to get in the middle to keep them from punching each other right inside the studio. Then not ten minutes later, they were all joking about it and acting like brothers. Skunk Baxter was not only a first rate musician, I was finding out that he was a great mediator as well.

  As my second year was coming to a close, I was asked by a classmate to join a band which had a full time job being a house band down the Jersey shore for the summer. It was from the last weekend of May until the first weekend of September, six nights a week performing four hours a night.We would all share one apartment a few blocks from the beach. The band had been the house band for the previous year as well, but the lead guitar
ist from the year before moved to California to work in his dad’s wine business. I thought that was a great idea. My mom and Debby were not exactly thrilled. I didn’t know any of the other guys, but we met on weekends for a few weeks before the summer break, so I could learn the songs and practice with the band. Scott and Elise were both going home for the summer. If I heard Scott say “Ohio is my home” one more time, I was going to throw up. The guy hated to be away from home, and called his parents at least twice a week to check on the family farm animals. Having grown up in the suburbs I didn’t understand. Maybe that’s why Scott and Elise got along so well, she understood him.

  The first day we moved into our Jersey shore apartment, I knew I was in big trouble. All guys in the band were heavy pot smokers, and to this point I had never tried it at all. I didn’t know that before we all moved in. I had seen it around campus a few times, but had always excused myself when I knew what was going on. Billy Potts was the leader of the band, and the first time they started to get high, I excused myself. He let it be known to the other guys that “Anyone who won’t share a joint with his band mates can’t be trusted.” The place constantly smelled like someone had poured beer all over the furniture as well.

  It took some adjusting to playing that many sets in one night. I was clearly the best musician in the group, and I think the only one who took it seriously. We were close to getting fired after two weeks because Billy was obviously stoned before the first set more than once. The owner was not pleased, and the others had to convince him to stop getting stoned before the sets each night. Within a few days it was apparent that he didn’t like me, and I had no desire to be near the guy except for when we had to perform. I spent most of my days sleeping on the beach, while the rest of the band would be sleeping or getting high. On our days off on Mondays, I would go home to see my family.

  There were three good things about that summer. One was that I started to learn how to work an audience. I remembered that night watching Skunk at the Garden, and on a much smaller scale I did that to the nineteen year old girls in the audience. There were several beach goers who were there for the entire summer, so some would come and see us more than once a week. I tried really hard to get the band to change the sets from night to night because of the repeat audience. I wanted to keep it fresh, but I think Billy fought the idea mostly because I suggested it. I also think he was too lazy or too stoned to bother.

  I think Billy really lost it just past midsummer when the second good thing that summer happened. For one week Debby’s parents rented a place nearby. That meant Debby was in town for a week. I talked to the owner of the club Johnny G, into allowing Debby and I to do a twenty minute set each night before the band started. Billy got so mad; he would intentionally try to get me to screw up at least once a night. I didn’t care about his childish behavior. Debby and I killed it, and the owner loved our duets and chemistry on stage. It meant an extra set for me, but I didn’t care. I loved playing with Debby. During the day we would walk the boardwalk then lay on the beach till it was almost time to go on stage. One day at the end of boardwalk there was a billboard sign advertising Fats Domino and Little Richard playing at the Atlantic City Convention Center and Debby declared, “One day our names will be there.” I smiled and thought to myself that was not the worst idea she ever had.

  Debby had developed into a beautiful, if not stunning woman. She was nearly six foot tall, blue eyes and soft red hair. She was full of freckles on her arms, but only a few on her face in all the places to make her smile shine. It was rare when I ever saw her down or upset. She was maybe the most positive person I had ever met in my life. I didn’t realize till that week how much I missed her. That week I was feeling very guilty because for the first time we acted more like boyfriend and girlfriend rather than classmates and band mates. All I could think about was Elise back in North Carolina playing in some barn for the pigs and cows, or so I pictured it in my mind. Debby and I kissed on the beach after my last performance, under a full moon with the ocean water touching our feet and ankles. It was our very first kiss. I never knew how soft her lips were until that first kiss. I knew it would not be the last time I tasted her strawberry lipstick, or smelled the scent of shampoo in her hair. I wished that week would never end but it did, far too quickly.

  After the week with Debby, the summer could not end quickly enough for me. I would only be in that apartment long enough to sleep about five hours before heading to the beach for another two hour nap. I would go back for a shower, a quick change, and meet the rest of the band on stage. I did get a kick out of the young girls in the audience, who would toss their phone numbers or an occasional bra on stage, at my feet. Billy was the lead singer and bass player, and never once did that happen to him. I made sure he knew it every time it happened too. I would pick up the phone number, or clothing, between songs and say “Thank you to the cute girl in the pink top, you made my night” or whatever she was wearing at the time. I would then turn and look at Billy and strike my finger in a downwards manner like, there’s yet another one for me, asshole.

  I signed my first autograph that summer. It was on the left breast of some really hot looking woman who looked to be about ten years older than me. I later found out it was her bachelorette party.

  The third good thing that happened that summer was I contacted Gordy about an electric guitar. Gordy was still using that old strat for lessons, so I traded in my old Gibson acoustic and got a Gibson Les Paul. I had to pay the balance I owed on credit, but I needed a good electric guitar. The only catch was in order to get the store credit for ninety days; I had to promise Gordy that one day I would do him a favor. Gordy told me that was his “Marlon Brando moment like in the Godfather.” There was no way I would tell Gordy no at that point, even if he had refused to let me pay off the guitar over time. He told me that “You and I would know when the time was right to cash in the favor.” I really never gave it a second thought, and took the guitar and ran. I gave him some money every week when I went home on Mondays to see my family. By summer’s end I now had a Martin guitar for my acoustic sets with Debby, and my Les Paul for electric sets. I didn’t think I would ever need or buy another guitar in my lifetime.

  My dad wanted my brother to come and spend the last week of the summer with me, but I had to make up an excuse as to why he could not come. I told him the landlord would only allow five sleeping in the house at one given time. It was in our lease. I don’t think he bought it, but I could not take the chance my band mates might get the kid high or have my dad find out what environment I had lived in all summer. He was so set against drugs. I knew he would never approve of me being there, even if I was living on the beach to avoid it. The morning after our last set, I packed up and went home as quickly as I could armed with about twenty girls phone numbers, a pink bra and a few addresses. I only kept them to prove to Scott or “Mr. Buckeye” as I now called him, my stories were all true. He was given that nickname since Ohio is nicknamed “The Buckeye State”, and he never wanted to leave his home state.

  When I got back to school I was not expecting the wrath of Elise. She was pissed at me. Granted she had written me every week, and I had only written her maybe once a month and only called her once all summer, but I had no idea she would be this upset. I got the cold shoulder for weeks. She even told a few people that we were no longer together. I finally broke down and took her out for a nice dinner and Broadway show to soothe hurt feelings. I also had to promise that it would never happen again. I think Scott got a big kick at all my groveling to Elise and for a few weeks he called me his “drama queen roommate.” I was not amused, but I guess I had it coming.

  Since I had promised my dad I would take some business classes, this was the semester I took marketing and finance. I think I was more inquisitive about the business side of music now. Johnny G taught me a few things about how he ran his club. Also, I didn’t like the fact that he sold T-shirts all summer with our bands name and his club name on it, and we didn’t get eve
n a penny for the use of our name. That was another example of why I didn’t really care to see Billy Potts every again. He granted that right in our contract. I don’t think Billy ever bothered to read the contract other than check our fee, nor have someone else read it on our behalf. I learned a lesson watching Johnny sell a few hundred shirts with my name on the back, without my permission or royalties.

  However what really struck me the most was how much I now missed being up on stage, any stage. It had been over a month and I really needed an audience. It was my drug of choice. I started taking my guitar to every open mic night I could find in the city on the weekends. I didn’t care if I won or not, I needed to play in front of a crowd on a semi regular basis. One night some young guy came up to me after the performance and asked me if I had a manager. I told him I really had no reason for one. His next words will always stick with me, “Then go ahead and play open mic nights the rest of your life, see if I care.” Maybe he had a point. Carl Peterson was now my manager. That was of course after I called my dad and he ran it by his attorney. I was not going to make the same mistake Billy Potts had made in entering into a bad agreement. Carl talked a big game in stating he knew all the big wigs at a national record label. He claimed he knew all the local club owners and assured me of getting in front of an audience, and soon.

  Carl was a brash loud mouthed twenty five year old just out of Fordham Law School. He had not passed the bar exam yet, but seemed hungry and talked a good game. He was dirt poor and owed the government a ton of money in school loans. He needed to work hard and fast. He was offered a position at a local law office once he passed the bar exam. Carl said it was his goal to always be a manager for entertainers. I was now his first client. He of course really didn’t know all the big wigs with the record labels. It turned out that his dad was a regional salesman for Yale Records. That was his “inside connections”. I didn’t care really, he seemed like he could sell ice cubes to an Eskimo and I liked his charm. If he was that good with others as he was with me, I was going to be in front of an audience again very soon.