King Records

Classic recordings live forever, but the labels and studios that produced them typically don’t. Syd Nathan, a former pawnbroker, created King Records in 1943 and over the next 25 years, the label prolifically waxed R&B, soul, and country music in this complex on Brewster Avenue in the Cincinnati neighborhood of Evanston. James Brown was the marquee act, but dozens of other King performers, such as Bull Moose Jackson, Hank Ballard, Wynonie Harris, Cowboy Copas, and the Delmore Brothers influenced the music scene in the 1950s and 1960s. When Nathan died in 1968, the label soon followed suit. The King buildings have been empty for years in full view along Interstate 71. All attempts to revive the deteriorating complex have failed, but a multitude of King records live on through CD compilations and Internet downloads.

The Comet Bluegrass All-Stars

The Comet Bluegrass All Stars are named after an old, funky bar (The Comet) in Cincinnati where they've held court on Sunday nights since 1996. Their resume includes opening for big acts like Ricky Skaggs and Sam Bush, but in the bar's intense intimacy, they create the real magic. The photo's blurred images reflect a band in constant motion on the cramped stage as they trade vocal solos or team on harmonies. Their string playing is otherworldly. The band's four CDs are an eclectic mix of bluegrass, old country, blues, and rock that spans the decades. The members, left to right: Brad Meinerding, Artie Werner, Tim Strong, Jeff Roberts and leader Ed Cunningham. (A sixth member, John Cole, was MIA on this night.)

Dan Faehnle

Though best known as a sideman with Diana Krall and with the group Pink Martini, jazz guitarist Dan Faehnle is perhaps at his finest while stretching out with the Hammond organ masters like Lonnie Smith, Tony Monaco, and Joey DeFrancesco. In Cincinnati during late December, Faehnle was found expanding the boundaries of the Christmas songbook with local Hammond organ master Steve Schmidt, who is decked out in full holiday regalia at his annual extravaganza at The Comet bar.

Bill Bartlett

Reclusive rock guitarist Bill Bartlett struck gold twice: In 1968 as a
Lemon Piper when "Green Tambourine" topped the charts, and, in 1977, when his band Ram Jam recorded "Black Betty," among the most covered songs in rock history. For many years, Bartlett has lived quietly outside the college town of Oxford, Ohio, and has rarely played in public. In fact, he hadn't sung "Black Betty" in decades when he appeared at Cincinnati's "Summer of Love" music festival on August 15, 2009 to deliver a blistering version of his classic. "Everybody wants to know who Black Betty is," Bartlett yelled from the stage. "I think she's Bettie Page, with that black hair and those straight bangs. If you never heard of her, go to Google."

The Blue Wisp

Like the wooden barns with big tobacco ads, the all-jazz club is
vanishing from the American landscape. The Blue Wisp Jazz Club in Cincinnati, Ohio, created in 1977, is among the nation's oldest. Since
2000, the club has been in a former cellular telephone storefront on Eighth Street. The club's co-founder, Marjean Wisby, was a club fixture
until her death in 2006. For almost 30 years, the club has housed the venerable Blue Wisp Big Band, led by former Stan Kenton drummer John von Ohlen. Over the decades, the club has mirrored the economic changes in jazz. With few touring jazz acts these days, the Blue Wisp maintains a close relationship with the jazz faculty at the University of Cincinnati.

Blues on the Porch

This blues mural from 2009 on a porch on Fourth Street in Richmond, Indiana, is three blocks away from where country blues legends Blind Lemon Jefferson, far left, and Charley Patton, far right, recorded in 1929 at Gennett Records.  At Patton’s recording date, he debuted his classic “Spoonful Blues.”  In the 1960s, as guitarist with British rock trio The Cream, Eric Clapton, center mural, recorded “Spoonful” (a version modified by Willie Dixon in the 1950s).  Three months after Jefferson recorded in Richmond, he died in a Chicago snowstorm.

The Incredible Scotty Anderson

Unknown to the public, Scotty Anderson has a global following with guitarists, thanks largely to sound and video downloads on the Web.  The late Chet Atkins once quipped, “Scotty plays Chet Atkins better than I do.”  For 30 years, Scotty’s blistering country-rock technique has drawn the praises of such guitarists as Brian Setzer, Eric Johnson, John5, Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and the late Danny Gatton.  A Kentucky boy who grew up in a family of mountain pickers, Scotty shies away from touring opportunities, but attracts the faithful where he’s most at home - in small bars and outdoor venues around Cincinnati, Ohio.

Christmas at The Comet

The Comet is a tiny, century-old bar in Cincinnati’s eclectic neighborhood of Northside where every December since 2002 local keyboardist Steve Schmidt holds his “Christmas Extravaganza.”  For decades, Schmidt has been a Cincinnati jazz fixture on the piano, but for this event, he puts his C-3 Hammond organ in the Christmas spirit.  Most years, Chicago saxophonist Scott Burns and drummer Mark Wolfley (both pictured) have joined the packed festivities. The annual extravaganza has its origins with Schmidt’s CD “Merry Christmas Baby.”

Lonnie Mack

Lonnie Mack is one of the great roadhouse warriors of early rock’n’roll, and considered a father of blues-rock guitar. A small-town Hoosier native, Mack made his break in the early 1960s with the guitar solo recording “Memphis,” and his first album “The Wham of That Memphis Man!”  He has inspired legions of guitarists, from Duane Allman to Stevie Ray Vaughan. Illuminated by a single lamp in the back of a Cincinnati club, Mack holds his 1958 Gibson Flying V guitar, the seventh off the production line, and his principal ax all of these years.

Stevie Ray Vaughan

You don’t see this every day: Legendary blues-rock guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan without his trademark, black bolero hat.  Among the most distinctive guitarists in blues history, Vaughan pulled off his hat and winked at the ecstatic crowd at Riverbend Music Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, on June 24, 1990.  His sweet gesture to say goodbye proved to be a final farewell.  Two months later, the 36-year-old Vaughan was killed in a helicopter crash in Wisconsin. Even though the Texas native was a major music act for only seven years, he left a breathtaking body of recorded work that grows in stature – a legacy much like his guitar idol Jimi Hendrix. 

H-Bomb Ferguson

Flamboyant blues singer H-Bomb Ferguson was a mainstay in Cincinnati bars for decades until succumbing to emphysema in 2006.  His act included grass skirts or an assortment of wigs, or he wrestled with a boa constrictor on stage, and played a mean piano with his nine fingers.  A record deal in the late 1950s with Cincinnati’s King Records led H-Bomb to the Queen City, where he eventually settled. 

Pat Metheny

From rural Lee’s Summit, Missouri, guitarist Pat Metheny burst onto the jazz scene in the mid-1970s with a fresh new sound, and has been a leading voice in the music ever since. Also consistent over the years are his trademark striped shirt and the unwieldy hair, captured shimmering in the lights at the Victory Theater, Dayton, Ohio. Metheny is one of the most commercial viable and prolific jazz artists today.

Loretta Lynn

Country queen Loretta Lynn steps out of her tour bus at the Preble County, Ohio, fairgrounds, passing a row of elderly people and handicapped children in wheelchairs waiting for a greeting from their hero. 

Charlie Daniels

Country-rock fiddler Charlie Daniels held court with area radio stations and newspapers in a 4-H building at the Darke County, Ohio, fairgrounds.  Note the vintage cassette recorders and microphones.     

John Mellencamp

One morning in 1993, John Mellencamp visited the Cincinnati rock station Q102. A native of Seymour, Indiana, who now resides in Bloomington, Mellencamp was in town to bring awareness to a Farm Aid benefit concert.  Teamed with Willie Nelson, Neil Young and many other musicians, Mellencamp has raised millions of dollars for the American farmer.

Jaco Pastorious

Perhaps Jaco Pastorius is the most influential electric bass player ever.  Here, he played with the jazz group Weather Report at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana.  He died in 1987 from injuries sustained during an altercation with a bouncer at a Fort Lauderdale nightclub. He was 35.

Leon Redbone

For years, when fans took vaudeville-style singer Leon Redbone’s photo during shows, he’d react by snapping Polaroid pictures of his audience.  During a backstage encounter at Bogart’s in Cincinnati, Ohio, Redbone consented to this portrait with a stipulation: “Just one picture.”  Immediately afterwards, he sought details about the camera.

Chick Corea

On a 1982 tour with drummer Roy Haynes and bassist Mirslav Vitous, jazz pianist Chick Corea arrived at Gilly’s Nightclub in Dayton, Ohio, in no mood to be interviewed or photographed.  Before the show in the empty club, he practiced classical pieces on the piano while the photo was taken.

 

Jerry Gillotti

Since 1972, Jerry Gillotti has reigned as the “godfather of jazz” in Dayton, Ohio, as owner of the venerable Gilly’s Nightclub.  “I do it for the love,” he says.  The Dexter Gordon and Hank Crawford posters behind him at the club’s entrance help to date the photo for you.

Andy Simpkins

Bassist Andy Simpkins was a driving force in jazz for four decades with everyone from Gene Harris to George Shearing to Carmen McRae.  Before dying of cancer in Los Angeles in 1999, he toured for several years with Sarah Vaughan. Andy is captured in his hometown of Richmond, Indiana, for a benefit concert at Earlham College.