I Hardly Know Your Name
FLASHBACK: San Francisco, California, 1962
“Hey, hey hey! Pull over, pull over. . . ”
Peter, Mary and I have no “cool” at all upon hearing KEWB, one of the San Francisco bay area’s hottest radio stations introduce our recording of “Lemon Tree.” It's 1962 and the first time we've ever heard one of our songs on the radio.
“Say, what???” Don Graham, a promotion rep for Warner Brothers, asks in mock innocence and with a grin brings the car to a stop on the side of the highway.
Peter, Mary, and I are headed to Oakland for the first “on-air” visit with Buck Herring, a disk jockey and radio personality, who started playing the Will Holt song as a track from our first album on his show with such regularity that it became the “pick of the week” for all his fellow DJs, and now Warners is promoting the recording at radio stations across the country
“Wow . . . listen, you can even hear the bass,” I volunteer.
“Shhhhhh, shhhhh . . . , ” say Peter and Mary, and we sit mesmerized by the sound of our own voices and guitars coming over the speakers until the song is done and the announcer says, “That was Peter, Paul and Mary and ‘Lemon Tree.’” And now a word from . . . .”
“Get used to it kids,” says Don, pulling back into traffic as the commercial jingle plays in the background. “You're gonna hear a lot more of this in the future.”
It's a pretty heady time for us. We're playing at the Hungry I, the San Francisco club where the Kingston Trio began their rise to popularity. We were hired for a week but the response has been so good, they've asked us to stay on for another.
This drive across the bay from San Francisco represents the first real radio promotional trip we've ever made. We've done interviews before but never on air. We haven't a clue what's expected of us.
“Just be yourselves,” Don winks, leading us into the lobby and punching the button by the elevator door.
“Don’t you think we should have brought something?” asks Mary as the door opens. “You know, like a thank you . . . ”
“Wouldn’t that kind of be like payola?” says Peter, who strikes me as unusually nervous about this intersection of our music and commercial airplay.
“Nah,” says Don, pressing the button for the studio floor. “You met Buck last week, and he’s looking forward to having you meet everybody at the station—no gifts required—and besides, I think the vice-president of the station will be there as well.”
“Really? How come?” I ask.
“It’s not that often that recording artists come to KEWB. I mean, promotion guys like me, for sure, but for the actual artist to come to the studio . . . well, that puts a real face to the music. And thing is, when the local top 40 begins to show a trend, other small stations pay attention and then Cash Box and Billboard start listing the number of plays a tune gets . . . and well, it starts feeding itself.”
Now we’re beginning to understand just how important this meeting with Buck and the station might be. I’m thinking if we make a good impression, wouldn’t it naturally follow that they’d be interested in listening to our new recording and possibly pick another song that could be a single?
I suspect Peter is thinking similarly because, as the elevator door opens on the 10th floor of this downtown office building, we both seem so preoccupied with the potential outcome of the meeting that we bump into each other while trying to exit into the hall.
“Craaaaash!”
In trying to regain his balance, Peter has knocked over the tall round chrome ashtray between the two elevator doors. It lies on its side with sand and cigarette butts littering the floor as the door to the radio station opens and the receptionist asks, “Is everything all right?”
Mary gasps. And without missing a beat, Don Graham—the leading record promoter for Warner Brother Record—rolls the tipped canister toward the open door with his foot and replies “Yeah thanks, we’re here to see Buck Herring . . . and we were wondering if there’s anything else we might destroy along the way!”
Seconds later, everyone is laughing, apologizing, setting the ashtray back in place (along with the sand) all the while introducing each other to the receptionist, the assembled staff and, of course, the vice-president of the station.
‘Turns out that “this is the beginning,” as they say in the movies, “of a beautiful friendship.”
What you’ve just read above is an introduction to one of the chapters in the forthcoming autobiography For The Love of it All. Jeanne and I refer to these introductions as "flashbacks” since they are written in a first-person you-are-there style (a.k.a. historical or dramatic present tense). Those of you who may have logged onto NOELPAULSTOOKEY.COM previous to these Substack postings might actually remember one or two of them that had been previously available on the website.
STATUS REPORT: The book is about 90% complete. We are currently writing about events that took place in the late nineties and early zips. Each chapter title is a line or phrase from one of my songs and introduces a thematically connected flashback—similar in style to the one above—followed by stories of events that occurred in that time period. Finally, at the end of each chapter, there is a more complete lyric of the opening song.
Certainly, it’s not your ‘“everyday bio,” but our sense is that the reader will be engaged in imaginative ways—making the journey through these past eighty-six (thus far) years of my life—more of a mutual adventure.
NPS (May 5, 2024)
Connections
Buck Herring (the disk jockey mentioned above) became a successful engineer and producer of 2nd Chapter of Acts, a Dove Award Christian vocal group inducted into Gospel Hall of Fame in 1999. Learn more about the prolific Will Holt (composer of “Lemon Tree”) who died in 2015.
Vibrations
PP&M perform Lemon Tree on a mid-’60s television show.
The title of this post—”I hardly know your name” is a line from "C'mon Betty Home,” a song which Noel wrote for Betty while she was studying in France. Here is the Kingston Trio recording of “C'mon Betty home,” and here is a version by Eddie Mottau & Joe Hutchinson, a.k.a. Two Guys from Boston.
Resonance
Does the notion that “love” is bittersweet seem quaint to you? How would you regard that concept in relation to the theological affirmation “God is love”?
As always, Noel opens up his long arms and corrals everyone in. Perhaps his name should be Noel Paul Inclusive Stookey.
As one who has been performing folk music since 1961 I would like you to know that your Lifelines album is still my favorite of all time by any artist. The recording “For the Love of it All” is beyond incredible. Thank you for all the years of joy and thought provoking music!