RETURN

Ms. Brock wrote with so many details about the Tucson music scene that we thought we should share them other visitors

Dan,
I sent the first email about Travis before I looked at your site. Now I realized you probably don’t know about Travis Edmonson. I’d recommend you go to his Web site, http://www.travisedmonson.com, and listen to some of the clips there. His Tucson Tapes First Set and Tucson Tapes Second Set CDs were recorded in December 1966 or 1968 (his Irish Webmaster believes it was 1968), reel-to-reel tapes given to Travis. Travis found them in his storage in 1999 and they have sold a lot. I don’t know the numbers, but I personally have sold a whole lot of them.
If you look at the Memories pages on his site, you’ll see many stories from his Tucson fans.
Another thing about Travis: wherever he traveled (and he did a lot of traveling across and beyond the U.S.) he always talked about being from Nogales and Tucson, and very often mentioned the University. Their Alumni Association lists him in a small group of their most notable alumni ( http://www.arizonaalumni.com/About/notable.shtml)
I know there was a Portofino’s Coffee House in Tucson in the early 1960s, only from the ads for Portofino’s in Scottsdale, such as this one:
Dolan Ellis was the regular performer at Portofino’s in Scottsdale and opened for the stars of the day: Bud & Travis, Katie Lee (who was from Tucson—I wrote about her in the attached Western Music article), Stan Wilson, Barbara Dane, etc. I asked Dolan whether he ever played the Tucson club, and he didn’t. In fact, his first gig ever in Tucson was around 1971, and that was the Ramada Inn. I have the Tucson Citizen article. But I don’t know whether you are interested in musicians who came to Tucson from elsewhere. Dolan was an original member of the New Christy Minstrels and was appointed as Arizona’s Official State Balladeer in 1966 (and just celebrated his 41st year in that position). I’m his Webmaster: http://www.dolanellis.net.
(I did notice you listed Joe Bethancourt who is from Phoenix.)
I also don’t know whether Portofino’s ever developed to be very big in Tucson. In Scottsdale, it was very significant, then converted to an adult movie house—timing was perfect for Dolan because it released him from his 4-year contract and freed him to travel and to join the Christies.
Back to Travis: I was at the Kingston Trio’s pops concert with the Tucson Symphony Friday night. As always with the Trio, the New Christy Minstrels, Dolan Ellis, the Limeliters, the Smothers Brothers, and many others, Travis was recognized from the stage as being in the audience. When I saw them in Yuma last summer, Bill Zorn said, “Were it not for Travis Edmonson there may not have been a Kinston Trio.” I’m learning more and more about the influence Travis Edmonson had on music.
I also noticed that Linda is the only Ronstadt listed. There’s a whole family of Ronstadt musicians. Bill, a cousin, is with two outstanding Tucson groups: The Desert Sons (http://www.thedesertsons.com) and Sarava! (http://www.arizonafolk.net/artists_sarava). Sarava! bills themselves as Brazilian Music in Tucson. They don’t have a site of their own—the page is from a site that I own.
The Desert Sons are a Tucson institution, going back almost 20 years. I think they started in 1989. Always a big hit wherever they play. I also covered them in the Western Music article.
John Ronstadt plays a lot of jazz around Tucson. I’ve only heard him once, with his wife and Bill, and I loved them. Bobby Ronstadt (all so far are cousins) plays piano and accordion and I think still performs sometimes with his wife. Michael, a brother, plays with Santa Cruz River Band (http://www.santacruzriverband.com) with Ted Ramirez, who is Tucson’s Official Troubadour and who wrote two definitive Tucson songs: My Beloved Tucson and El Presidio. Personally, I love El Presidio, but My Beloved Tucson gets a lot more attention because it’s written in Spanish, English, and the O’odham language.
Michael has sons named Pete (bass) and Michael (middle initial is different). Michael is a very seriously talented cellist.
There are other Ronstadts I have yet to meet, and they are all musical: Linda’s brother Peter (ex police chief) and sister whose name I think is Susie. There’s a niece named Mindy (Peter’s daughter) who I’m hearing a lot about; they say her voice is as strong as Linda’s.
You didn’t list Lalo Guerrero, who was known as the Father of Chicano Music. I’m enclosing some articles I wrote, including one about Lalo and another about his memorial services in Tucson. His son, Mark, who lives in Palm Springs, has an excellent Web site with pages about Lalo. There’s also a Lalo site, http://www.laloguerrero.com, but for now that is just a placeholder and has links to Mark’s shows on the Chicano Radio Network. Mark’s site is http://www.markguerrero.net.
And while we’re on Chicano music, please don’t forget the great Mariachi musicians of Tucson. The children’s group, Los Changuitos Feos, has existed for more than 40 years, and the boast many distinguished graduates, including Mariachi Cobre who have had the contract to play at the Mexican Pavilian at the Epcot Center for many years. Another graduate, Jeff Nevin, holds the only PhD in Mariachi and is working hard to establish Mariachi as an academic discipline (he’s in San Diego), and he wrote an acclaimed book titled Virtuoso Mariachi.
There’s a musician who has been in Tucson for about 6 years, Tim Wiedenkeller, who is also not listed. Tim is a genius, and is probably the most versatile musician around. And by versatile, I mean instruments (including his voice) and genres. The banjo is the instrument where he truly rises to the top; besides playing bluegrass and western and classic country, Tim composes and plays original classical banjo music. His site is http://www.timwiedenkeller.com. The site and even the presenter’s package on the site only scratches the surface of Tim’s capabilities. He is great!
Glancing through my articles, I see other names that deserve mention: Eric Hanson, Gerry Glombecki, Dean Armstrong, Ellen Edmonson (Travis’ daughter), Chuck & Mae Camp, The Sons of the Pioneers, Earl Edmonson (Travis’ nephew). Other names that come to mind: Earl’s Titan Valley Warheads (Bluegrass), String Figures (Greg Morton), Jo Wilkinson, Four Corners (Stefan George, Bobby Kimmel, Jo Wilkinson, Lavinia White), Way Out West, Due West, Rob Paulus (Ice House Lofts award-winning architect and a virtuoso on bass, classical guitar, and especially violin/fiddle). The third member of the Santa Cruz River Band is Gilbert Brown, an outstanding instrumentalist and also very good singer and songwriter. Their bass man, Arthur Miscione, passed away early last year and was a great humorist as well as musician.
I really applaud your efforts, and I hope an outcome is that people with the wherewithal will recognize the need to create venues to display the talent of the musicians.
I’m working with Dolan Ellis on his book, a sort of combination bio, song book, and photography book, maybe with commentary on changes in the music business. One thing that has really struck me: Artists used to play at a club for two weeks, or at least one week, on the road; and often for months or years at a time in the home town. Now the standard is one-night stands, and musicians need to string them almost non-stop in order to pay expenses.
Thank you,
Bonnie Brock
 

I wrote:

Hi Bonnie,
Thanks for writing. You obviously have a broad knowledge of Tucson music. I wish I had been here in its glory days of the 1960-70's.
Although I knew some of the things you wrote about, I did not include them for various personal reasons. For example, I have excluded all forms of Chicano music because it is, or could be, a separate area more voluminous than those I have assembled. I hope someone else decides to document that genre.
To some extent, I did the same for Bluegrass, Folk, Punk and Reggae groups.
I know I have some artists from those styles listed but they seemed to cross over from time to time- e.g. Stefan George and Los Lasers (I will probably drop Joe Bethancourt from the list)
I know of Travis and have a few of his Bud & Travis LP's. His work just doesn't interest me much. I enjoy the Country Swing bands and most of the groups/artists on my site fall into that genre. I'm not being 'snooty', it's just my taste. I'm sure you know how time-consuming projects of this nature can be and I have purposely tried to restrict the content to remain sane!
The biggest blank area on the site remains the places the artists performed. I'm sure I can fill in a lot of that information by making a trip to the newspaper archives but I won't find the background I would like to have about the owners. Dave Webb's story alone could probably fill a book! I suspect there were similar people in other venues, I just have no knowledge of them.

If you approve, I may post your letter on the site to provide some information that I will never cover on my own.
Again, I thank you for taking the time to write and wish you success with your project with Dolan
Warm regards,
Dan Dotson
 

Bonnie's Reply:

Dan,

You are more than welcome to use my letter. I reread it just to be sure I
wouldn't insult anyone, and decided I might do that, but only by omission.

Our interests differ in several ways. You are collecting popular songs that
have "Tucson" in the lyrics, whereas I'm more interested in songs that are
really about Tucson, such as the two that I mentioned by Ted Ramirez. Tim
Wiedenkeller also wrote a great Tucson song, "New Old Pueblo." Lalo Guerrero
wrote at least two Tucson songs, both of which can be found on this page:
http://parentseyes.arizona.edu/msw/mexican/lalo.html. "Tucson" is a sweet
little song. "Barrio Viejo" is another of the GREAT Tucson songs, and Ry
Cooder used it for a recent CD project, Chavez Ravine. Lalo, in his very
last studio recordings, also re-recorded one of his classic songs for Ry,
and one that he had written especially for the CD, "El Boxeo."

I understand your feeling about Chicano music. I've always loved it without
really knowing that I do, or thinking about it as a real genre. The more I'm
exposed to it, the more I appreciate it. For example, there's Mariachi
Batiz, a group of Tucson & Nogales "kids" ranging in age from 19 to 23, who
are absolutely incredible.

I suppose if you eliminate Mexican music and folk, you've eliminated much of
the Travis Edmonson repertoire. However, he did almost everything except
rock. And I've just been listening to a tape (not released) of a concert by
the Gateway Singers from 1957. I forget what song the group is singing, but
when it comes Travis' turn for a solo part, he blurts out: "You ain't
nothin' but a Hound Dog," and a mini comedy routine takes off from there.

I have a friend who has been working on a definitive Travis Edmonson
documentary for about 18 months, and I've been doing a little work on the
sidelines. The friend, Bill McCune (http://www.mccunetv.com) is finding more and
more how significant Travis was. So it's kind of hard for me to understand
why a Tucson music site would not include Travis. We are discovering
unpublished songs that Travis wrote, that would knock your socks off.

The notice on the TKMA (Kitchen Musicians) site refers to your site as
"Comprehensive Tucson Music History Website." Your site's mission indicates
bluegrass is a major venue, but you seem to be excluding bluegrass along
with folk in your message below.

If in fact bluegrass is your interest, then I'd strongly suggest including
the Titan Valley Warheads and Tim Wiedenkeller's bluegrass group, The Weeds.
Tim probably has one of the strongest bluegrass backgrounds of anyone in
Tucson, from the years in his late teens and 20s when he was really on the
bluegrass circuit. His original, Long Tom, is a great bluegrass tune.

He also has a strong background with classic country musicians and is very
close friends with Rusty Richards, who was a member of the Sons of the
Pioneers and wrote several of their songs.

Peter McLaughlin is also a well-known bluegrass musician from Tucson. And
String Figures bill themselves as Newgrass.

Bonnie