Chuck Beattie

 and
Blues By Design

NEWS

 

 

CITIZEN-TIMES.com

Lennon's genius lives on

For a whole generation, the death of John Lennon is a moment that's etched into memory like Kennedy's assassination or Nixon's resignation.

"At first it hit like a rumor that could be true or maybe wasn't true," said Asheville blues musician Chuck Beattie, 54. "When I realized it was true, I remember being very confused, very sad — I couldn't understand any motive, any reason. This was the most peaceful man they could've picked out to kill."

It was 25 years ago tonight that Mark David Chapman, a mentally ill man with a twisted obsession with Lennon, gunned down the famous musician and former Beatle as he entered his apartment building in New York City. Lennon died that night, just 40 years old.

Local musicians like Beattie say Lennon's influence is inescapable, even if their musical style differs significantly. Lennon's raw vocal and guitar styles contrasted starkly with that of his writing partner and fellow Beatle, Paul McCartney.

"I definitely consider myself a Lennon fan more so than a Beatles fan," said Joe'tse Adams, a 27-year-old local singer-songwriter and dancer. "I just felt a kinship with Lennon, and I feel like in Asheville it exists among a lot of the artists. It is art for art's sake — you create art in the spirit of peace and love."

Beattie says he too was moved by Lennon's peace activism. Musically, he's more influenced by bluesmen but gives Lennon and the Beatles their due for energizing a young generation.

"Also, with the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and some of the other groups, this was the first time black music was given its proper due," said Beattie. "I was very moved by that."

Asheville resident Bill Kopp, 42, also was moved by Lennon's activism. Kopp is a Web designer, but he also has a band, The Poppies, that plays a lot of '60s tunes.

Lennon's musical genius is an influence that always will seep into his music.

"He was less afraid of failing and more willing to take some artistic risks," Kopp said. "Paul (McCartney) really evolved later. John was more like, 'I'll throw it out there and see what sticks.'"

Contact Boyle at 232-5847 or jboyle@CITIZEN-TIMES.com .

 

Pounding it home

Top drummers and other LEAF headliners show the kids how it's done

by Pete Zamplas

When Billy Jonas closes Lake Eden Arts Festival this Sunday, as is his tradition, the found-percussion specialist will help sound out a burgeoning new tradition – that of local schoolchildren playing alongside professional musicians.

It's part of LEAF getting the younger generation involved in the creative expression of music, through its non-profit LEAF in Schools & Streets program that debuted at the festival's spring edition.

Here's how it works: Kids at public and private elementary schools, housing communities and community centers learn the basics of playing music in hands-on workshops. Then they can perform at LEAF – often on the Main Stage.

"That's so cool for the children," says LEAF Producer Jennifer Pickering, who, with the Asheville Area Arts Council and other entities, brought to life her long-time educational vision.

"The kids get several different kinds of experience with an experienced, professional performer – including actually being part of the [LEAF] performance itself," Pickering goes on.

"It empowers these kids," stresses the program's director, Kerri Hampton-Pyle. "They get to experience what it feels like to be on a professional stage, as a performer."

A performer with sometimes-adult-sized responsibilities, at that.

Explains Hampton-Pyle: "They get performers' passes. They have a stage call. They're treated as regular musicians. ... Plus, it's [presented as] a career option. And they learn about team-building, diversity and acceptance."

And thus they grow attuned to the beat of a different drum, so to speak. And by such distinctive drummers as Jonas and Hampton-Pyle's own husband – Artimus Pyle of Lynyrd Skynyrd fame – no less.

"Like popcorn in the microwave"

Part of a blossoming cluster of similar programs, including Crescent City Mountain Summit – which brought together New Orleans students and Asheville mountain musicians at Swannanoa Gathering in July – LEAF in Schools & Streets debuted at the May festival with, among others, Baba and Mama Shabu (of The Magic of African Rhythm) and Pyle, who now heads the Artimus Pyle Band. (Pyle and the kids opened for seven minutes for percussion-heavy jam band Tribolotomee, headed by Pyle's two older sons, Chris and Marshall.)

Of course, Rome wasn't drummed up in a day.

"It sounded like popcorn in the microwave," Pyle admits of the kids' inaugural effort – in total improvisation, they pounded drums at different moments rather than attempt a synchronized group effort.

But it's all good. Pyle's not some exacting taskmaster out to mold perfect percussionists - at this point, he's simply spreading the fun.

"The look on the kids' faces when they played," he says, "was pure joy."

Pyle worked with 29 students at Asheville Montessori School for that first gig (his youngest son River, with Hampton-Pyle, attends the school). The children were especially young – ages 3-5, and thus could hardly be expected to appreciate their mentor's Southern-rock pedigree. He was simply River's dad – the one "with the cowboy hat."

Pyle says he demonstrated percussion instruments including shakes, chimes, bells, tambourines and steel pans. Then he got relatively serious, showing his students the proper way to hold a pair of drumsticks.

"Kids love to bang on drums and make noise," says Pyle. No groundbreaking news there. The novelty, he points out, was in having an adult actually telling them to make noise.

Drumming, claims Pyle, is also a great cardiovascular exercise and stress reliever. "Since 9/11, the whole nation's been stressed out," he offers. "I know what it's like to sit down and bang on my drums to get my tensions out."

Free to be

Young kids who play music experience a boost in self-confidence, according to Hampton-Pyle. (Montessori student Sarah Moore came out of her shell from the program, confirms her mother, Laura Moore, who recalls: "Sarah had the time of her life, performing on a real stage with a real drum set.")

And Asheville drummer Billy Jonas – advocate of unusual, recyclable and homemade instruments, including the percussive wonders available in any kitchen cabinet - is likewise concerned with creating happier kids.

"[He] is putting a lot into [this program] from his heart," says Hampton-Pyle. Jonas earned a Parents' Choice Gold Award in 2000 for his how-to DVD Bangin' and Sangin', and recently released Everybody's in the Band, an interactive video served up in a similar spirit.

"Children seem to respond best to songs that have nonstop participation," notes Jonas.

Still, the vital part of LEAF in Schools & Streets goes on off-stage. Recently, Jonas worked with students at Asheville's W.C. Reid Center, which offers after-school programs to at-risk kids. Singer Chuck Beattie spoke on the history of the blues to eighth-grade students at ArtSpace Charter School in Swannanoa, while The Georgia Sea Island Singers taught African-American call-and-response chants and gospel songs to fifth-graders there. And the Shabu family of The Magic of African Rhythm was at C.C. Bell Elementary in East Buncombe County last week, and are currently in residence at Pisgah Elementary. All performers are slated to play various stages at this weekend's LEAF, alongside their young protégés – typically a dozen kids per school who are chosen by random drawing.

Despite the input of their teachers, kids' musical experience will vary according to their age and background, points out Hampton-Pyle. The program director, a former historic preservationist, says she learned a thing or two herself when her son River arrived in the world.

"Once you have a child, it's not as important to save old buildings or dig up stuff from dirt. You live more for the moment."

For more information on LEAF in Schools & Streets, see www.theLEAF.com.

[Pete Zamplas is a freelance writer based in Hendersonville.]

 

 

 

Chuck Beattie is Asheville's Blues Brother Number One

photo: Special to the Citizen-Time

Who: Chuck Beattie and Blues by Design When: 10 p.m. Friday May 28. Where: Tressa's Downtown Jazz and Blues, 28 Broadway, Asheville Information: (828) 254-7072 On the Net: www.tressas.com and www.chuckbeattie.com

                              

 

 

Chuck Beattie has become one of Asheville's most popular musicians, not only for his shows with the band Blues By Design
but also for hosting a regular twice a month blues jam at Tressa's on Broadway.

Chuck Beattie charms an audience with no apologies, larger than life. He flirts with the ladies and teases the men. It's the grand old style of an era gone by but Beattie and his Blues By Design Band are part of a national revival of Chicago style blues. You can see them this weekend at Tressa's Downtown Blues and Jazz Club, the perfect place to shake around the dance floor or drape yourself around a partner to a sultry number.

His approach and sound have made Beattie one of the area's most popular performers - especially in the world of local blues. He has long hosted a regular blues jam - which now happens twice a month at Tressa's.

"It's a traditional Chicago style blues performance, in the style of Buddy Guy's Legends, with a couple guitars, bass, drum, sometimes a keyboard," said Beattie. "If I do a song, it's because a bluesman did it," said Beattie, discoursing about his favorite topic, the history of the blues.

"There might be a small body of music called the blues but for the most part any pop song became a rendition, a blues song because a blues man did it," he said. Each bluesman takes the same song and makes it his own.

"It's s not really a cover, it's my own arrangement, my own timing, my own feeling and interpretation," said Beattie, who also lectures about the blues, telling the stories of Robert Johnson and other bluesmen, some of whose melodies came from what he calls `Negro Spiritual Melodies', songs sung in the fields by workmen.

"The songs evolved because they were passed on by word of mouth," said Beattie. "My mom calls them ditties," he said. Blues By Design back Beattie up on songs like "Death Letter Blues", "Good Morning Little School Girl", Hootchie Kootchie Man", songs by B.B. King. "It's dancing, fun, lively music," said Beattie. "I like to keep the audience engaged, part of the show," he said.

Beattie was born in Wilmington but the family relocated to Rocky Mount. "I picked up music in the streets and at church," he said. He played trumpet all through junior high school and college, learning bass guitar at age 12 and playing with an assortment of bands. "I worked what they called the `chitlin circuit' and played with Otis Taylor, the Kelly Brothers," said Beattie. "I wasn't even old enough to be in the clubs I played in," he said.

While attending North Carolina Central University as a psychology major Beattie played in bands in Chapel Hill, Raleigh, and all around, on trumpet and bass. "In '71, my sophomore year, my brother was killed violently," said Beattie. "He always played with me, on drums, sousaphone, heavy horns," he said. "When he died I quit music and didn't play again until around '84," he said. "I picked up a guitar and started playing gospel music," said Beattie.

While attending graduate school in Tallahassee, Fla. Beattie met a bus driver who played in a gospel group and started playing bass with them, later switching to guitar. After moving back to North Carolina, he joined Stanley Baird's North Carolina Jazz Ensemble. "They already had 12 trumpets and a bass so the next thing I knew I was the guitar player," said Beattie.

In '96 Beattie moved to the mountains. "Everyone in Asheville was playing old time, bluegrass or singer songwriter stuff and I couldn't find anything I liked so I started a blues jam in Weaverville," he said. The jam ran for four years and brought together the blues scene, creating a forum for the style. These days Beattie hosts a twice a month blues jam on Thursday nights at Tressa's. "We play one set and then let other people get up and play," said Beattie. "We're geared to better players but we put our arms around less experienced players, put them up with others," he said.

The "Dr. of the Blues", as Beattie is often called, really is a doctor, with a PhD. in statistics. The music is taking him far and wide; he recently headlined a blues festival in the U.K. and lectured at the University of Pennsylvania. "I just got a call from Shanghai and may go to China for a month," said Beattie. Inquiries for his music have come in from as far away as Bolivia. "My records have made it to 12 foreign countries through dj's and the internet," he said.

Most important to him is that people learn about the music and its history, and that it be fun too. "Hip-hop, blues, all the modern sounds came out of that old field music that originally came from Africa," said Beattie. "There's no blues in Africa, it's been a natural evolution," he said. "Muddy Waters once said that if the blues had a baby, they'd call it rock and roll," said Beattie. "Even today, you play what you know and it keeps evolving," he said.

Carol Mallett Rifkin writes about music for the Asheville Citizen-Times. E-mail to cpmallett@msn.com

Guests invited to jam with Blues by Design

KAY ALTON

Staff Writer UNC-Asheville

Michael Maher, a senior computer science major, and the Blues By Design band are found performing at 8:30 p.m. every Thursday evening at the Raven Moon Café in Weaverville. Maher said that "my major is my life." However, Blues By Design provides relaxation and fun for Maher, who plays the guitar, vocalizes a bit and plays the harmonica with the band at least once a week. Maher so enjoys it "that I wake up every Friday morning looking forward to the next performance."

Maher said that his gig at Raven Moon helps him stay focused on the other jobs he holds. In addition to his full schedule at UNCA in computer science, he works as a full- time chef at Fine Friends restaurant in Asheville, he writes and he works as an intern with Databases By Design. In fact, his internship interview in October put him in the band.

Chuck Beattie holds a doctorate in statistics and owns Databases by Design. More than that, he leads the band, and Maher filled two jobs for Beattie on the same day. Both men declare their initial breakfast meeting was too coincidental for description. After Maher was hired by Beattie for Databases, he casually inquired into his hobbies to learn playing blues was at the top of the list. That very night was Blues By Designs debut on the Raven Moon stage and both men began singing and playing their guitars together for the full houses every Thursday night. "I started the band in an attempt to express my talent in a new way after the death of my brother," Beattie said. His brother was killed in a car accident, and their music was an important part of Beattie's life. He put down the instruments they played together and learned how to play the guitar. "Michael is the best intern I have had. Michael helped me achieve another goal in overcoming my shyness," said Beattie Beattie and Maher were playing guitars together when Beattie simply stepped up to the mic and began to sing the blues. He has been doing so on a regular basis since. In fact, anyone with talent and an instrument may join the band any Thursday night in open-mic sessions.

Another regular with Blues By Design, John Lomax, was described by another volunteer band member: "you've never seen bass fingers move like Lomax's." Lomax works in construction in Arden. He said he has played bass since he was 15 years old. It has been 18 years since he began and he has no other hobbies. He said that he has played with several other bands in Greensboro and other locales. "Asheville is a good place for bands, because so much happens musically here in the Asheville area," said Lomax. Lomax has preferred rhythm and blues music, and enjoys the outlet he has in playing at Raven Moon with Beattie and Blues By Design.

Mike Baker plays drums with the band, and started at the beginning as a regular. He moved here from his hometown, Los Angeles, Calif. He works at the Blue Ridge Mental Health facility. Baker has been playing the drums since he was a fourth grader, and we can all do the math to learn just how long he's been enjoying the rhythm and blues. Baker said he likes soul music and honky tonk country music also. His musical hero is Hank Williams. Baker joined the chorus of all the musicians interviewed by saying that this Thursday night jam session with Blues By Design and the Raven Moon patrons was a big part of his life. It gives him a fun and pleasant outlet to unwind.

One of the volunteer musicians drives all the way from Little Switzerland every Thursday to bring his daughter to dance classes in Weaverville. Charles Maginnis, who came originally from New Orleans, discovered the blues band at the Raven Moon and makes an evening of it with his wife and daughter. They enjoy dinner and stay for the music every week. Maginnis plays drums with the group. He has been playing for 25 years and also has played with other bands in places like Cocoa, Fla. Some of the musicians he has played with were in Billie Holliday's band. Maginnis plays an African drum called djembe, which he pronounces "gem bee," and the bongos. He has been with Blues By Design as an open-mic musician for six weeks and loves the music because it comes from "the heart."

"Big" John Anderson, another guitar player of 29 years, joins the Blues on a weekly basis also. Anderson hails from Candler and has always lived in Western North Carolina. He said that he has spent 29 years "trying to learn" how to play the guitar. Country music, blues, or "whatever" sums up his interests. He did say that mountain music prevails over rhythm and blues in this area. Anderson said that the Blues By Design music gives him a rare opportunity to join in playing this style of music around this area.

UNCA students are encouraged to attend the band's jam sessions and be a part of something fun in the Asheville area. Bring your instruments, voices, and dancing shoes and join the full house at the Raven Moon café every Thursday night at 8:30 for some great relaxing music and festive atmosphere. The Blues By Design band enthusiastically invites one and all the their open mic.

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