for pics, google .... "janis joplin nashville"
*********************************************************************************
The concert, at the old Tennessee State Fairgrounds Coliseum in Nashville, December 16, 1969, headlined JANIS JOPLIN on her Kozmic Blues album tour with Rotary Connection with MINNIE RIPERTON as the opening act, and was promoted by Wired Dragon Efforts, Inc .
Back in 1969, I WAS the Wired Dragon .... well, that was the name I picked for the production company ...
But this concert almost did not happen.
I was first informed by her booking agency that they were not taking any more dates for her current tour. But they called back and told me that when Janis heard it was NASHVILLE, she instructed them to find a date and add it to the tour, she didn't care if it was the night before or after a scheduled date, she wanted to come to Nashville ... BECAUSE, if possible, she wanted to see if I could arrange for her to meet Skeeter Davis and Kris Kristofferson. Kristofferson makes sense to most people because of "Me and Bobby McGee", but Skeeter Davis, the country music artist, was a big voiced female singer like Janis. Skeeter did come, and it was hard to tell which one of them was more excited about meeting the other. Kristofferson in those days was often in his regular booth at Melfi's, an Italian restaurant near Music Row, high on peyote buttons, thinking up that Rhodes Scholar grade poetry he turned into songs, but we were unable to find him there. I was also more than pleased to book as the opening act from the same agency Rotary Connection with the great Minnie Riperton. I liked the idea of a concert with women fronting both acts.
The Fairgrounds Coliseum was an old brick structure, configured like a big hockey rink with elevated permanent seats all around the sides and an open floor for rodeos, ice capade type shows, a circus, etc. For concerts, one had to rent folding chairs to put on the main floor. I had a stage set up at one end of the floor area, and behind it were three rented trailers to serve as dressing rooms... one for Janis, one for her band, and one for Rotary Connection and Minnie Riperton.
Many of my "hippie" friends served as ushers and event staff, and were of invaluable help with a myriad of pre-concert tasks, which they all did for free, their only compensation was being part of the promotion and free admission to the concert. I cannot remember whose idea it was, but I rented white high-collar Busboy jackets for them to wear at the show where they served as ushers, stage "security," and happy gofers backstage for Janis and the musicians. The white jackets basically meant you had free run of the arena. These jackets in their inappropriateness for a rock concert (in Nashville seen almost exclusively worn by young black males serving white folks) worked rather well in creating an ambience unusual for Nashville concerts at the time, especially since this concert featured two powerful female singers, one a flamboyant white hippie and the other a black diva. We thought we were making a small statement with the white jackets since in Nashville they were traditionally a uniform of subservience for minorities but at the concert they were privileged personnel. We were young, naive and idealistic.
I had the hottest DJ in Nashville, the "Super Shan" Scott Shannon to be the MC; he came with the advertizing package for the concert on his station, WMAK. Later in his broadcast career, he was a morning drive time institution in New York City, and a member of a broadcasters hall of fame. He was dressed as what he thought was "hip" at the time, a flowery shirt, tight pants with a scarf tied above one knee. He wanted to meet the artists of course, and be sure just how they wanted to be introduced. We first went to Rotary Connection's trailer; when I opened the door a thick cloud of weed smoke billowed out as we stepped up into the trailer.
I could tell the band members were wanting to have some fun with this local DJ in the South trying to look cool, and one of the band members came up to Shannon with this joint the size of a Cuban cigar in his mouth and then held it out right in Shannon's face. Now, in 1969 in Nashville, weed was a radical, dangerously illegal thing for most folks, and for a sense of the cultural times, Martin Luther King was dead less than eighteen months, there were still "White Only" signs on some public facilities, so a joint offered directly from the lips of a black man to a white man in the South was way outside the box in many ways for those days.
But old Shan did step up and took a short hit. He tried to hand it back, but the guy said "C'mon man, you can do better than that, this is some righteous shit, man, hit it a good one." Shannon did take another deeper hit and did not cough. The black musician was right about the righteousness. These were Chicago-based musicians, they had been around, they just exuded oceans of "cool."
I do remember they told him they did not want any pompous intro ... just ... "from Chicago ... Rotary Connection" and no need to mention their record label ... real musicians usually despise record label execs and the business bullshit which consists primarily of cheating the creative artists. I have no recollection of Minnie Riperton sharing in the "righteousness," perhaps to assure her vocal performance's integrity. Riperton that night was indeed Amazing in her range and control, the band super tight. Her flame of talent was extinguished by a fatal disease way too early (FYI, Riperton is SNL's alumna Maya Rudolph's mother). They wowed the almost entirely white audience, many of which I am sure had never heard of them before that evening. I remember feeling proud of my home town audience for the warm reception they gave her and her band.
Earlier in Janis's dressing trailer, she told me her famous chinchilla coat had been sent unsolicited to her by the Southern Comfort folks in appreciation for the huge increase in sales of their product which she had unintentionally made famous. She giggled that infectious high pitched laugh when she told the story, picked up the coat and held it out to me and said "Just Feeeeel that motherfucker .. rub your face in it .... if it had a dick, I'd marry it" and her infectious giggle filled the trailer again.
I did NOT see Janis drink any alcohol nor consume any drugs before her set. The only thing she would accept were UNopened cokes ... she said she could not take the chance someone might spike one with acid (do I need to say LSD?) or something before she had to perform.
The audience was still jazzed up from Riperton and Rotary Connection while the roadies set up for Janis's set, then the house lights went down, and after a few moments Shannon appeared in a tight spotlight center front stage, making the introduction. When he finished, the spot goes out, and he gets the hell out of the way as he had been instructed, and the band began laying down a funky beat. Janis was crouched behind the amps, bouncing in a kind of squat position, like a sprinter getting ready to run ... then she opened a full pint of Southern Comfort and killed nearly half of it in one swig then chased it with some orange juice from a glass container she had brought herself. She bounced up, out into the spotlight, and literally killed the audience of about 2,500 .... so much energy, so much brass, giving all of herself into her performance.
She would hit the Southern Comfort and OJ throughout the show. As I am writing this, I am getting little chills remembering her nailing "Ball and Chain" and "Piece o' my Heart." It was a very, very cool night musically in Nashville, and to my knowledge, the first time a San Francisco spawned rock act of Joplin's stature had been brought to the Music City.
Janis Joplin and Minnie Riperton on the same stage on the same night in Nashville in 1969, two icons who died too young .... it was special.
But, I was also a young and dumb kid then .... I did not think to have anyone take any pictures of me with Janis or the other performers. I had also neglected to notify or offer passes to either of Nashville's two daily newspapers, or any of the TV stations, so the press coverage of the concert was minimal. A lady reporter from the TENNESSEAN newspaper was at the airport when I met Janis, but her article stated she was surprised no promotion staff had met Janis. I called her after the article was published and informed her I was right beside Janis and her road manager as she asked questions while we all walked through the concourse. She refused to write a correction, saying she thought I was one of the musicians because of my youth and long curly hair!
All and all, I was just stereotypically a young person, infatuated with being in the presence of true female rock icons, consumed by the exciting moment, with no idea what would be really valuable decades down the road. Perhaps it was amazing enough I had gotten the date, the venue, the stage erected with a tarp stretched tight over it, and UNION electricians to lay the drop boxes required for the stage equipment, got the proper array of UNION stage lighting and crews specified by the performance contracts, the dressing trailers delivered and hooked up to electricity, a couple of thousand folding chairs set up on the floor to correlate to the printed tickets and the permanent seats. Thanks to all my hippie friends helping, the evening went off without a glitch. This still amazes me, that essentially a bunch of kids pulled off this concert.
Sadly, the old Coliseum burned to the ground not long after this concert, and with it, my rock concert promoter dreams .... the venue was riculously cheap .... 250 dollars while at the same time the newer downtown Municipal Auditorium would take a significant percentage of the total gate while being guaranteed a fee in the thousands of dollars to be paid in advance. And since this rock and roll stuff was considered so "dangerous," the Municipal Auditorium had a strict policy of everyone remaining in their seats which was vigorously enforced. And I was told they would NOT ever book the Municipal Auditorium for The Doors or Sly and the Family Stone. No such restrictions applied at the old Coliseum and the crowd quickly left their seats when Rotary Connection began to play and gathered close to the stage. One could tell the performers liked this intimacy with the audience and it gave a special atmosphere to the evening not then common in the South. Janis even invited one of my Busboys (who happened to be the one who had offered her an opened Coke and was blonde and handsome) up onto the stage to dance with her. The crowd went absolutely wild at this. Maybe it was because they felt this superstar validated the hipness of this audience in a country music town by having a local onstage with her, however briefly, and it was something not seen in other Nashville venues. Perhaps it is just as well the Coliseum burned .... had I gotten into that world big time, I might be dead now.
Since the flight for Janis and her band out of Nashville was a take-off the next day, most of the band members accepted our invitation to party at my hippie pad in an old house on Blair Avenue ... they were genuinely surprised the promoter asked them to party since apparently promoters tended to be more established and much older people than my young dumb ass. Nashville was, and is, the capitol of redneck super-patriotic country music located on the Buckle of the Bible Belt, and it was the peak of the Viet Nam era and Civil Rights tensions, so I guess this mixed race band was pleasantly surprised by their treatment from the locals.
I was not personally at the band party at the beginning, because Janis's road manager invited me and my lady to accompany them back to the hotel bar club. Imagine the ego-rush for this kid from Nashville, being invited out with Janis Joplin !!! Just how fucking unbelievable was that ?!?!?!?
At the booth in the bar, I soon realized I was not with Janis Joplin, the rock icon, but Janis, the girl who had been disrespected in Port Athur, Texas .... the brassy confidence was no longer evident. Janis slammed screwdriver after screwdriver, and she constantly asked if the "kids" really liked her. The talent which had just two hours before had dominated the stage and enthralled the audience was now replaced by an almost palpable personal insecurity. The woman on stage who had been the sexual fantasy of so many young males in the audience was gone, replaced by someone who did not think of herself as desirable, but rather someone who knew she had imperfect skin, someone who had been ridiculed in her youth. So, when less than a year later Janis was dead from an overdose, I was, sadly, not that surprised. But I will always have my memories of My Night with Janis Joplin and Minnie Riperton, two stars whose light disappeared too early, one from a path of self-destruction, the other by a fatal disease.
(more articles for your entertainment or irritation available in BLOG ARCHIVE near top right of this page.)
*********************************************************************************
The concert, at the old Tennessee State Fairgrounds Coliseum in Nashville, December 16, 1969, headlined JANIS JOPLIN on her Kozmic Blues album tour with Rotary Connection with MINNIE RIPERTON as the opening act, and was promoted by Wired Dragon Efforts, Inc .
Back in 1969, I WAS the Wired Dragon .... well, that was the name I picked for the production company ...
But this concert almost did not happen.
I was first informed by her booking agency that they were not taking any more dates for her current tour. But they called back and told me that when Janis heard it was NASHVILLE, she instructed them to find a date and add it to the tour, she didn't care if it was the night before or after a scheduled date, she wanted to come to Nashville ... BECAUSE, if possible, she wanted to see if I could arrange for her to meet Skeeter Davis and Kris Kristofferson. Kristofferson makes sense to most people because of "Me and Bobby McGee", but Skeeter Davis, the country music artist, was a big voiced female singer like Janis. Skeeter did come, and it was hard to tell which one of them was more excited about meeting the other. Kristofferson in those days was often in his regular booth at Melfi's, an Italian restaurant near Music Row, high on peyote buttons, thinking up that Rhodes Scholar grade poetry he turned into songs, but we were unable to find him there. I was also more than pleased to book as the opening act from the same agency Rotary Connection with the great Minnie Riperton. I liked the idea of a concert with women fronting both acts.
The Fairgrounds Coliseum was an old brick structure, configured like a big hockey rink with elevated permanent seats all around the sides and an open floor for rodeos, ice capade type shows, a circus, etc. For concerts, one had to rent folding chairs to put on the main floor. I had a stage set up at one end of the floor area, and behind it were three rented trailers to serve as dressing rooms... one for Janis, one for her band, and one for Rotary Connection and Minnie Riperton.
Many of my "hippie" friends served as ushers and event staff, and were of invaluable help with a myriad of pre-concert tasks, which they all did for free, their only compensation was being part of the promotion and free admission to the concert. I cannot remember whose idea it was, but I rented white high-collar Busboy jackets for them to wear at the show where they served as ushers, stage "security," and happy gofers backstage for Janis and the musicians. The white jackets basically meant you had free run of the arena. These jackets in their inappropriateness for a rock concert (in Nashville seen almost exclusively worn by young black males serving white folks) worked rather well in creating an ambience unusual for Nashville concerts at the time, especially since this concert featured two powerful female singers, one a flamboyant white hippie and the other a black diva. We thought we were making a small statement with the white jackets since in Nashville they were traditionally a uniform of subservience for minorities but at the concert they were privileged personnel. We were young, naive and idealistic.
I had the hottest DJ in Nashville, the "Super Shan" Scott Shannon to be the MC; he came with the advertizing package for the concert on his station, WMAK. Later in his broadcast career, he was a morning drive time institution in New York City, and a member of a broadcasters hall of fame. He was dressed as what he thought was "hip" at the time, a flowery shirt, tight pants with a scarf tied above one knee. He wanted to meet the artists of course, and be sure just how they wanted to be introduced. We first went to Rotary Connection's trailer; when I opened the door a thick cloud of weed smoke billowed out as we stepped up into the trailer.
I could tell the band members were wanting to have some fun with this local DJ in the South trying to look cool, and one of the band members came up to Shannon with this joint the size of a Cuban cigar in his mouth and then held it out right in Shannon's face. Now, in 1969 in Nashville, weed was a radical, dangerously illegal thing for most folks, and for a sense of the cultural times, Martin Luther King was dead less than eighteen months, there were still "White Only" signs on some public facilities, so a joint offered directly from the lips of a black man to a white man in the South was way outside the box in many ways for those days.
But old Shan did step up and took a short hit. He tried to hand it back, but the guy said "C'mon man, you can do better than that, this is some righteous shit, man, hit it a good one." Shannon did take another deeper hit and did not cough. The black musician was right about the righteousness. These were Chicago-based musicians, they had been around, they just exuded oceans of "cool."
I do remember they told him they did not want any pompous intro ... just ... "from Chicago ... Rotary Connection" and no need to mention their record label ... real musicians usually despise record label execs and the business bullshit which consists primarily of cheating the creative artists. I have no recollection of Minnie Riperton sharing in the "righteousness," perhaps to assure her vocal performance's integrity. Riperton that night was indeed Amazing in her range and control, the band super tight. Her flame of talent was extinguished by a fatal disease way too early (FYI, Riperton is SNL's alumna Maya Rudolph's mother). They wowed the almost entirely white audience, many of which I am sure had never heard of them before that evening. I remember feeling proud of my home town audience for the warm reception they gave her and her band.
Earlier in Janis's dressing trailer, she told me her famous chinchilla coat had been sent unsolicited to her by the Southern Comfort folks in appreciation for the huge increase in sales of their product which she had unintentionally made famous. She giggled that infectious high pitched laugh when she told the story, picked up the coat and held it out to me and said "Just Feeeeel that motherfucker .. rub your face in it .... if it had a dick, I'd marry it" and her infectious giggle filled the trailer again.
I did NOT see Janis drink any alcohol nor consume any drugs before her set. The only thing she would accept were UNopened cokes ... she said she could not take the chance someone might spike one with acid (do I need to say LSD?) or something before she had to perform.
The audience was still jazzed up from Riperton and Rotary Connection while the roadies set up for Janis's set, then the house lights went down, and after a few moments Shannon appeared in a tight spotlight center front stage, making the introduction. When he finished, the spot goes out, and he gets the hell out of the way as he had been instructed, and the band began laying down a funky beat. Janis was crouched behind the amps, bouncing in a kind of squat position, like a sprinter getting ready to run ... then she opened a full pint of Southern Comfort and killed nearly half of it in one swig then chased it with some orange juice from a glass container she had brought herself. She bounced up, out into the spotlight, and literally killed the audience of about 2,500 .... so much energy, so much brass, giving all of herself into her performance.
She would hit the Southern Comfort and OJ throughout the show. As I am writing this, I am getting little chills remembering her nailing "Ball and Chain" and "Piece o' my Heart." It was a very, very cool night musically in Nashville, and to my knowledge, the first time a San Francisco spawned rock act of Joplin's stature had been brought to the Music City.
Janis Joplin and Minnie Riperton on the same stage on the same night in Nashville in 1969, two icons who died too young .... it was special.
But, I was also a young and dumb kid then .... I did not think to have anyone take any pictures of me with Janis or the other performers. I had also neglected to notify or offer passes to either of Nashville's two daily newspapers, or any of the TV stations, so the press coverage of the concert was minimal. A lady reporter from the TENNESSEAN newspaper was at the airport when I met Janis, but her article stated she was surprised no promotion staff had met Janis. I called her after the article was published and informed her I was right beside Janis and her road manager as she asked questions while we all walked through the concourse. She refused to write a correction, saying she thought I was one of the musicians because of my youth and long curly hair!
All and all, I was just stereotypically a young person, infatuated with being in the presence of true female rock icons, consumed by the exciting moment, with no idea what would be really valuable decades down the road. Perhaps it was amazing enough I had gotten the date, the venue, the stage erected with a tarp stretched tight over it, and UNION electricians to lay the drop boxes required for the stage equipment, got the proper array of UNION stage lighting and crews specified by the performance contracts, the dressing trailers delivered and hooked up to electricity, a couple of thousand folding chairs set up on the floor to correlate to the printed tickets and the permanent seats. Thanks to all my hippie friends helping, the evening went off without a glitch. This still amazes me, that essentially a bunch of kids pulled off this concert.
Sadly, the old Coliseum burned to the ground not long after this concert, and with it, my rock concert promoter dreams .... the venue was riculously cheap .... 250 dollars while at the same time the newer downtown Municipal Auditorium would take a significant percentage of the total gate while being guaranteed a fee in the thousands of dollars to be paid in advance. And since this rock and roll stuff was considered so "dangerous," the Municipal Auditorium had a strict policy of everyone remaining in their seats which was vigorously enforced. And I was told they would NOT ever book the Municipal Auditorium for The Doors or Sly and the Family Stone. No such restrictions applied at the old Coliseum and the crowd quickly left their seats when Rotary Connection began to play and gathered close to the stage. One could tell the performers liked this intimacy with the audience and it gave a special atmosphere to the evening not then common in the South. Janis even invited one of my Busboys (who happened to be the one who had offered her an opened Coke and was blonde and handsome) up onto the stage to dance with her. The crowd went absolutely wild at this. Maybe it was because they felt this superstar validated the hipness of this audience in a country music town by having a local onstage with her, however briefly, and it was something not seen in other Nashville venues. Perhaps it is just as well the Coliseum burned .... had I gotten into that world big time, I might be dead now.
Since the flight for Janis and her band out of Nashville was a take-off the next day, most of the band members accepted our invitation to party at my hippie pad in an old house on Blair Avenue ... they were genuinely surprised the promoter asked them to party since apparently promoters tended to be more established and much older people than my young dumb ass. Nashville was, and is, the capitol of redneck super-patriotic country music located on the Buckle of the Bible Belt, and it was the peak of the Viet Nam era and Civil Rights tensions, so I guess this mixed race band was pleasantly surprised by their treatment from the locals.
I was not personally at the band party at the beginning, because Janis's road manager invited me and my lady to accompany them back to the hotel bar club. Imagine the ego-rush for this kid from Nashville, being invited out with Janis Joplin !!! Just how fucking unbelievable was that ?!?!?!?
At the booth in the bar, I soon realized I was not with Janis Joplin, the rock icon, but Janis, the girl who had been disrespected in Port Athur, Texas .... the brassy confidence was no longer evident. Janis slammed screwdriver after screwdriver, and she constantly asked if the "kids" really liked her. The talent which had just two hours before had dominated the stage and enthralled the audience was now replaced by an almost palpable personal insecurity. The woman on stage who had been the sexual fantasy of so many young males in the audience was gone, replaced by someone who did not think of herself as desirable, but rather someone who knew she had imperfect skin, someone who had been ridiculed in her youth. So, when less than a year later Janis was dead from an overdose, I was, sadly, not that surprised. But I will always have my memories of My Night with Janis Joplin and Minnie Riperton, two stars whose light disappeared too early, one from a path of self-destruction, the other by a fatal disease.
(more articles for your entertainment or irritation available in BLOG ARCHIVE near top right of this page.)
What a cool story! And a memory you can cherish.
ReplyDeleteThanks for this memory. I was there, front and center-stage!! I had come early as a guest of one of your "hippie friends" (his name escapes me) and you let me in for free and said "get a spot wherever you want." Of course, I went to stand in front of the stage--dead center. I was in the Air Force, stationed at Smyrna, so didn't look like most of the crowd because of my short hair. What a great night! A couple of years later in North Carolina, I was telling a friend about the concert and the young man Janis pulled on stage. The guy was from Nashville and had gone to school with the young blonde boy. The boy had told his friends what happened with Janis, but no one believed him! My buddy was amazed that it had actually been true! Great memories so many years ago.
ReplyDeleteYes! I was there, 10 rows back from stage and remember it all! This was my first rock concert and I had brought my cousin to it since he had just returned from Army duty in Viet Nam for a year. I was married to an AF man who flew Gunships in Thailand at that time and we lived in Smyrna.
ReplyDeleteSince seeing Janis, I have been to at least 50 rock concerts, enjoyed every moment, even some I can't remember...LOL
Am old enough to get SS now and I'm still rockin'!
Great story... Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI was there too! So nice to read your account Harry. I knew you as Harry back then. I still have a scarf that Janis left behind in her dressing room. Best regards, Stephanie (aka Stevie)
DeleteI wasn't there but I do have a unused ticket for the show that nite
ReplyDeleteSame here,yellow,$4,50
DeleteI was 17 and won a single ticket on the radio. Had to take a taxi. I still have the poster. Met Janis’ sister and brother - her brother said contact him if I ever wanted to get rid of it. Got Sam Andrews to autograph many years later when he came through Houston, Texas - he was solo and singing songs in French at a small Mexican restaurant.. In 2016, just by chance met someone at MD Anderson. He walked me to get a cup of coffee in the middle of the night - conversation about music & one of my favorite concerts came up. Just so happened that his dad was in Rotary Connection at that time. I took a picture of the poster and sent it to his dad on Facebook. Small world & thank you for one of the best concerts of my life!
ReplyDeleteI have an old rolltop desk that a friend who lived near Lee Swain sold to me in 1974-75 that he said had been there when Janis Joplin and company partied Lee's house on Blair Blvd. Wondering if anyone can confirm this.
ReplyDelete