Meet the All-Stars

We've seen the front men of the "Pittsburgh All-Stars," the crack band assembled to perform at the Tony Janflone Jr. benefit on March 13. Now, let's meet the rest of the guys:

Rick Witkoski, guitar. The veteran performer, known for his work with Crack the Sky, also is a veteran producer at his Studio L in Weirton, W.Va., which he runs with his wife, Deborah. Why Studio L? The Witkowskis are co-composers of "Vitamin L," B.E. Taylor's 1983 hit.

And speaking of Crack the Sky, the band will perform at the Rites of Spring Festival (RoSfest) at the Keswick Theater in Glenside, Pa., on May 4. As a side note, the theater is right around the corner from where my grandparents on the Funk side lived, so I spent plenty of time in the vicinity as a kid. Small world ...

Derek Bayer, guitar, helped organize the benefit with Curtis Swift, saxophone player in Tony Jr.'s regular band.

Tommy Bellin, bass guitar. "He is like the premiere bass player in Pittsburgh," says Rick Witkoski. To see what he means, check out the bass solo in the middle of "Vitamin L," as Tom does a take on a Vince Guaraldi favorite. You also can catch him with No Bad Ju Ju, and he has played in B.E. Taylor's band.

Rick Dickerson, drums, has played for numerous area bands, including Tony Janflone Jr.'s. He appears on the album "Live at the Blues Cafe."

Jamie Peck, keyboards. Along with composing music for a variety of radio and TV projects, Jamie Peck is an accomplished producer. Among those he has worked with are B.E. Taylor, Peters Township musician Tom Breiding and Christian singer Sandy Lusco.

I have some more footage from the benefit, so bear with me as I get it ready to post!

Another All-Star

I shot about three hours of footage at the recent benefit for Tony Janflone Jr. (actually, that was going on two weeks ago), and I'm slowly but surely getting around to editing a representative sampling of the video.


The latest features Rob James of the Clarks, jamming with the "Pittsburgh All-Stars" unit that highlighted the benefit show. Rob, a fellow IUP alumnus, performs "Better Off Without You," a song he wrote for his regular band. The studio version appears on the Clarks album "Let It Go" (Razor and Tie, 2000).

BTW, I still have footage from that night of Tony Janflone Sr. jamming with D.C. Tanner, and also of the Skip Peck Trio. If you've been enjoying the videos as they've come online, keep an eye out for additional material!

A shot of Vitamin L

Someday I'd like to apologize to B.E. Taylor.

When he released his album "Love Won the Fight" in 1983, I was asked to write a review about it for the college newspaper. Since I was a know-it-all who considered anything recorded after 1970 not to be worth my while, I didn't have the greatest things to write about the record.

Hey, that was a quarter-century ago. What did I know?


What I do know is that hearing B.E. perform "Vitamin L" at the recent benefit concert for Tony Janflone Jr. was an experience that certainly transcended writing for the school paper. With a stellar cast, including "Vitamin L" composer Rick Witkowski on guitar, B.E. had the audience members where he wanted them, including yours truly.

A highlight of the performance was a bass solo by Tommy Bellin, who does a jaw-dropping rendition of Vince Guaraldi's "Linus and Lucy" in mid-song. Aspiring bass players might want to study Johnny's technique closely. Tommy, by the way, plays regularly with No Bad Ju Ju, a band that's definitely worth catching.

Here's the full video version of "Vitamin L."

And if you run across a 1983 copy of the IUP Penn with a writeup on B.E. Taylor, please ignore it.

Pittsburgh's Mr. R&B

The one time I met Billy Price, I thought I'd impress him by bringing along a CD of an album on which he sang in the early '70s: Roy Buchanan's "That's What I Am Here For."

Billy took a withering glance at it. "That's a lousy album," was his comment.


Well, I like it, but I wasn't going to argue with him. After all, he's been one of the most popular Pittsburgh performers for three decades.

And seeing Billy perform these days is a heck of a lot different than what he was doing with the late Mr. Buchanan in the day. That was in kind of a blues-rock motif, punctuated by Roy's feedback-laden, virtuoso guitar, good listening for college kids sitting around their apartment (the first time I heard it), but ...

Today's Billy Price Band is a rhythm-and-blues shot of energy, with Bill delivering the suitably gritty vocals of a seasoned veteran. And he has a crack supporting cast that epitomizes the polished, professional R&B revue.

Billy joined the top-flight crew of musicians who gathered recently to help fellow performer Tony Janflone Jr., the Washington guitarist who is recovering from injuries so he can return to the stage (and play more benefits on behalf of others, and he's done countless times in the past).

With my video camera perched atop a video game machine at the Rhythm House in South Fayette Township, I captured the Billy Price Band in performance. Here are some tunes from that show, all from the band's 2006 album, "East End Avenue":

• "Keep It to Yourself" (Price, Tiven, Tiven)
• "Soul Sailin'" (Mike Sweeney)
• "If You Cook Like You Walk" (Jimmy Britton)

Here's another one: Bobby Lexing's "Bump and Grind." For whatever reason, my recorder cut off the end. Plus, from my vantage point, guitarist Steve Delach was standing behind a speaker, so I couldn't catch the visuals of him playing his hot licks.

And yes, catching the band live beats sitting around listening to "That's What I Am Here For." (Sorry, Roy, wherever you are.)

Bill Toms: 'Spirits, Chaos, and a Troubadour Soul'

If you meet Bill Toms, you'll find him to be a very polite guy who speaks in a relatively unassuming, somewhat modest tone of voice.

That's the off-stage Bill. Put him and his guitar in front of an audience, and he's a changed man, infused with the spirit handed down to him by the great rock 'n' rollers.


Bill spent two decades playing with Joe Grushecky's Houserockers, and eventually he formed his own band. Attending a Bill Toms & Hard Rain show is like chugging a Red Bull, without the aftertaste: It's all about energy. Check out the video of "Another Round for the West End Kid" recorded at a benefit Bill and his wife, Joyce organized for victims of the political fallout in Darfur.

Though he can rock with the best of them, Bill has another musical side, exploring the folk tradition of Americana with an introspective pen. He is ready to release "Spirits, Chaos, and a Troubadour Soul," an album that showcases his penchant for capturing real-life situations and distilling them through often bittersweet but always accessible songs.

While "Spirits" features plenty of acoustic guitar, Bill mixes it up with some heavier vibes. The album opens, in fact, with power chords and energized slide guitar leading into the upbeat "Together."

In contrast is the somber, elegaic "There Was a Time," Bill's duet with musical partner Tom Breiding (Peters Twp. resident), who produced the album, most of which was recorded at Tom's AmeriSon Studio. The production, by the way, is impeccable; Tom is a perfectionist in the studio.

"Spirits" features a revolving cast of characters playing with Bill. The full Hard Rain lineup (up through 2007) appears only on the album's sole cover, the Waterboys' "Fisherman's Blues," and the closing track, "Revelation Shuffle." Both those were recorded at Rick Witkowski's Studio L in Weirton. (You may remember Rick's guitar playing from the '70s band Crack the Sky.)

Other performers of note include Megan Palmer, whose violin adds a sense of urgency to the paranoid visions of "No Way Out"; vocalists Jill Simmons and Andrea Pearl; and even Tom's son Jack Breiding, an aspiring percussionist who helps lend to the ambiance of a couple of tunes.

A featured track on the album is shaping up in "It's Saturday Night Somewhere." Check it out on YouTube:



The scheduled release for "Spirits, Chaos, and a Troubadour Soul" is April 15. A local CD release show with Bill Toms & Hard Rain starts at 9 p.m. Saturday, April 5, at Cefalo's in Carnegie. Opening acts are Erin Sax Seymour and Lorenzo Bertocchini.

Have a new release you'd like to see featured? E-mail Harry Funk at hfunk@observer-reporter.com

King Cool

Donnie Iris has been one of Western Pennsylvania's favorite musical sons for nearly four decades. (I'm sure he doesn't want to be reminded of that, but his first national hit, the Jaggerz' "The Rapper," hit the charts in 1970.)

King Cool (hey, that's the title of his second solo album) sang a couple of his favorites last week as part of the benefit for Washington musician Tony Janflone Jr. His performances were definitely highlights for the capacity crowd at the Rhythm House in South Fayette.

So without further ado, here are "Love Is Like a Rock" and "Ah! Leah!""

I recorded the show with my video camera perched on top of a video game machine, with me staring straight up at the viewer to see what I was capturing. It wasn't the most comfortable of arrangements, but it was effective.

---

At the Observer-Reporter, we've been experimenting with a video/print series called "What's Up With That?" and we're already up to five episodes. (The work on those helps explain why I haven't been posting on this blog as much as I should.)

This week's installment is titled "Size does matter," which should pique your curiosity right there. Seriously, I'm just starting to learn the art of making videos, but I think this episode turned out well, thanks to the ladies who participated.

So do yourself a favor ... watch "Size does matter."

A night for Tony

Washington, Pa., musician Tony Janflone Jr. has been playing professionally since he was a teenager, and he's played countless benefit shows over the past three decades.

Last fall, Tony and his wife were involved in an accident, and the medical costs continue to rise as they recover.


Knowing all that Tony has done on behalf of others, fellow musician Curtis Swift, the sax player in Tony's band, organized a benefit to help defray the costs. Signing on were such well-known Pittsburgh-area musicians as Donnie Iris, Billy Price, B.E. Taylor, Robert James of the Clarks and Rick Witkowski, whom you might remember from his work with the '70s band Crack the Sky. And of course, Tony Janflone Sr., the dean of Western Pennsylvania guitarists.

I had the pleasure of filming the proceedings at the Rhythm House in South Fayette Township on Thursday, March 13. Owner Darryl Price and others working at the venue were very friendly and helpful, suggesting that my best vantage point would be from atop a poker machine near the soundboard! I patched one audio channel from the soundboard, used an ambient mike for the other, and came up with a pretty good mix for the parts of the show I've played back so far.

Tony Jr. told me beforehand he wouldn't be playing at the benefit, but the guys called him up to the stage, where he played a smoking "Green Onions."

Since it was Tony's night, I started editing three-plus hours worth of video there. Unfortunately, he was behind a speaker from my vantage point for the first three or so minutes, so I made do with a series of stills until he finally stepped to center stage.

Click here to watch the result.

Mr. Clinton comes to Washington...& Jefferson

President Bill Clinton made W&J his first stop on the campaign trail. He is of course campaigning for his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton, who will be hoping for a win in the upcoming Pennsylvania Democrat election which is just around the corner.

President Clinton was greeted warmly by a packed audience consisting of mostly Hillary supporters (although a young man with a shirt espousing his disagreement with Hillary on the Iraq war and a lone Ron Paul supporter were in attendance). During his speech, he touched on the topics of health care, the economy, the previously mentioned war, international diplomacy, education, and the environment.

You can take a brief look at the speech or watch the whole thing if you like. The full version comes in a little under 40 minutes.

Catching up

On the video front recently, we at the Observer-Reporter have continued to work on our multimedia series, "What's Up With That?"


The latest video episode, which debuts today, features Davidson United Methodist Church in Glyde, Pa. Congregation members built what appears to be a small, shed-size church near the real one (built 1867). Motorists on the well-traveled Route 40 probably have passed by and wondered:

What's up with that?

If you've had that question, or if you've never seen the church before and you're simply curious, tune in:

• Episode 3: Big church, little church

Take a look at Monday's newspaper for more.

---

Our first "What's Up With That?" project for March addresses the time-honored statement, "No to snowflakes are alike." Of course, the day the snowflake story ran in the newspaper, it hit 70 degrees locally. But we did film the video in the dead of winter, at Fort Cherry Elementary Center, and the third-graders seemed to have a ball telling us all about their theories on the purported uniqueness of snowflakes.

If you'd like to catch their points of view, tune in:

• Episode 2: Kids ponder frozen water