ASH GROVE ANNOUNCER

When we first put this reel-to-reel tape from Gary Morris on our old Teak 40-40 (4 track deck) it was with great anticipation and excitement. The mylar tape did not appear to be sticky, and thus did not seem to need special treatment, such as baking, but the tape was probably some forty-three years old, and was presumably very fragile.

Having set the machine up first using some other old 1960s tapes from our archives, we were ready to record directly into our computer using ProTools software. If the tape turned out to be very fragile, we may not have had more than once chance to play it, so we were recording as we auditioned it for the first time. The
levels were low, the volume needle indicators hardly budged on the tape deck, but we ran the signal through a little Mackie 1202 mixer to bump it up before it got to the computer. And it worked just fine, playing on its two outside tracks, one track each way. The middle two tracks had nothing but some after hours guys diddling randomly around on electric guitar and bass, without ever finding a groove, and no one was singing, so we didn’t pull those onto computer.

The announcer’s voice at this live Ash Grove performance first presented blues player/singer Bukka White with a lengthy and good-humored introduction. Bukka’s set, good as it was, seemed to last forever as we recorded and waited for what would come next, never knowing when Steve might suddenly show up. As the applause died down after Bukka’s last number and he told the audience he would be back later, a voice over the sound system casually spoke the words we were waiting to hear:

“After a very brief intermission we shall continue with Steve Mann.”

This was a very exciting moment for us, though the announcement itself is rather off-hand and casual, as if to say, ‘”Ho hum, it’s Steve again, as usual.” When he came on, we were mesmerized! Several tunes followed, with varying sound quality, but all exciting both in performance and atmosphere.
Gary Morris, who furnished us with this tape with the announcer’s voice, plus Mary Katherine Aldin, a former assistant to Ed Pearl who emailed Steve, and also Steve himself, all think the voice is that of Tom Dewey, a “greeter and seater” who apparently also introduced the artists on occasion at the Ash Grove Music Club in Los Angeles, some time in the late 1960’s.

—JS