This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
Posted by Larry Jordan on February 4, 2015, 7:53 pm
This was a bad week for music in 1959 and 1983.
Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and "The Big Bopper" were killed in a plane crash after playing a show at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa. The travel editor of the magazine I publish (Midwest Today) -- Bob Hale -- was a young man then and was the emcee the night of their last show. Bob appeared on our weekly radio show this week, recounting behind the scenes stories. Buddy and his road band had sampled bratwurst in Wisconsin and had liked it, and got to talking with Bob about it and he said he had some in his freezer. They made plans to come back to Clear Lake a day early next time and have a barbecue, and go out on a power boat and water ski. Bob was also backstage for the coin toss when it was decided who would take the airplane that night. (They'd had trouble with their tour bus and chartered a plane. The pilot was only qualified for VFR flight and took off late at night in bad weather. The plane crashed in a farmer's field a short time after take-off.)
Bob commented that before the show he saw a pensive Buddy gazing upward and a friend had commented that Buddy would be a bigger star than Elvis, because he not only sang he also wrote his songs. Yet mere hours later, his life was snuffed out.
The second sad anniversary is the passing of Karen Carpenter, one of the smoothest singing voices to ever be recorded. Her loss was no less tragic, as she died of anorexia. It is still a disease which is not fully understood.
Her brief life was explored in fascinating detail by author Randy Schmidt, and then he did a follow up to his best-seller, called "Yesterday Once More." It features essays/interviews by top music journalists, and I am proud to say that our daughter, Sara Jordan, wrote the last chapter in the book!
(As you may know, 24 year old Sara also helped edit my 672 page "Jim Reeves: His Untold Story" and gave an assist on the 48 page book that accompanies the 8 CD set, "The Great Jim Reeves." Her writing also appears in several other books and she makes her debut in a prestigious anthology of top authors to appear in the spring. More about that later.)
Randy Schmidt thought enough of Sara's writing to make hers the last chapter in the Karen Carpenter book. It's a fascinating read and I urge you to check it out.
The music business has indeed lost some great talents over the years. It seems like the better they are, the sooner they depart this world.
To read reviews of the Carpenters book, click the link below.
As an interesting addendum to the Buddy Holly story, here's Dion talking about The Winter Dance Party, which is the tour Buddy was doing at the time of the crash. It's a long, but interesting first-hand account of the events that unfolded.
The famous "coin toss" is addressed around the 40 minute mark on the video.
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
This is one of the most engrossing, well-told videos I have ever seen regarding a historical music event. Dion does an incredible job of telling the behind-the-scenes stories of the Winter Dance Party tour, and humanizes all the guys. It's incredibly emotional and poignant, and gives you real insights into the personalities of these men.
Dion is also a talented singer/guitarist/songwriter, and gives us a feel for the music that each of the guys performed.
I can't say enough good things about this video. Thanks for posting it. Anybody who wonders what life was like on the road in those days should watch this, whether they are fans of rock 'n' roll or not. It's extremely well done and will make you appreciate, perhaps for the first time, the significance of the tragedy that took the lives of these wonderful young performers!
That video was fascinating. And informative. I learned a lot. Did not know J.P. Richardson wrote "White Lightning", for instance.
It is amazing to me that otherwise smart people seem to suddenly get stupid when an airplane is involved. Maybe Holly, Richardson, and Valens did not know to ask about the pilot's qualifications. They were young men, and maybe they just trusted that the charter service would provide a pilot who knew what he was doing. But not inquiring turned out to be a fatal mistake. There have been far, far too many plane crashes over the years due to pilot error and poor judgment that could have been so easily avoided. Jim Reeves crash is another example.
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
A couple years ago, after going to the Surf Ballroom, my wife and I braved a very cold wind and mud to walk to the site of the crash. The airplane, after the crash, was unidentifiable as an airplane. The Big Bopper was thrown from the airplane but the others were still in the plane. Almost every bone in The Big Bopper's body was broken. Very tragic.
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
What I cannot wrap my head around is the fear factor. I can't even imagine the kind of fear these guys would have experienced if and when they knew the plane was going to crash. The same goes for Patsy Cline's crash.
Of course, I'm sure things may have been a lot worse for Jim given that he was the one flying the plane.
The mind has infinite speed. Can we even imagine the number and nature of thoughts running through someone's head at the moment of impact?
Very tragic, indeed.
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
I saw an interesting documentary a few years ago. In fact, it was on YouTube. Some years ago, some group (don't recall) raised money to put a monument (I think it might have been a life-size statue) on the Bopper's grave; however, the area of the cemetery he was buried in wouldn't allow it. The family then decided to rebury him in another part of the cemetery where they could have the monument. The family decided to have a second autopsy done. Since the Bopper's body was the only one out of the plane, they had wondered if he may have initially survived the crash and was crawling for help. Some people get the strangest ideas. Ever since the crash, there had been rumors there was a gun on the plane, so the family also wanted to know if the Bopper had been shot on the plane. Why that would have happened, who knows?
The family hired someone to do the autopsy. The guy stated, when they opened the coffin, the Bopper's body was so well preserved, he could look from the Bopper's remains to his son that was standing next to him and tell they were related. They determined there was no gunshot wound and the Bopper's injury's were so severe, there is no way he could have survived the crash.
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
The pilot was the only one in the plane,still belted in his pilot's seat.Buddy Holly and Richie Valens bodies were outside the wreckage of the Bonanza.J.P.Richardson was thrown farther away near a fence.They took xrays of his well embalmed body in its casket after exhuming him for reburial in a new grave.Every bone in his body was fractured.No one could survive that crash.The Bonanza had turned end over end,rolling on that frozen Iowa cornfield.Buddy Holly chartered that plane and probably trusted the charter company to have good pilots,a misplaced trust he couldn't have realized.He wouldn't have thought that the pilot might be less than fully qualified. As for Jim Reeves,a combination of a sudden summer thunderstorm he was unaware of until he got to the Nashville area low on fuel,and his following his instincts rather than the air traffic controller's instructions,and a possible tampering with his plane all may have contributed to his crash.It was not his poor judgement.Even a professional pilot can crash in bad weather.Anita L. Cooper
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
One correction to this Anita; Jim was not "low on fuel." I'm not sure where that notion arises. Fellow pilots who flew with him and even friends who accompanied him to airports out of which he flew always remember him making sure he had ample fuel.
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
The fascinating account of your friend's connection with Buddy Holly was of particular interest to me, Larry. My three where-was-I-moments during my early years in Dublin, Ireland occurred in 1959, 1963 and 1964 and all, funnily enough, had a Texan connection. They were the abrupt deaths of Buddy Holly, JFK and Jim Reeves. I was 11, 14 and 14 and in the house, the street and the front garden respectively. In 2010 I achieved a life-long ambition and Greyhounded across Texas from Lubbock to Carthage via Dallas. The contrast between how the West Texan town and the one in East Texas commemorate their greatest sons is stark. The Buddy Holly Centre in Lubbock is superb and speaks for itself. In Jim Reeves's home town I got the impression that he is just about tolerated. Carthage reminded me of a cabbie who drives a four passenger automobile and who is hailed on the sidewalk by a party of five. JR is the fifth passenger who is reluctantly allowed to sit on the fourth passenger's knee. While in Lubbock I had the good fortune to have lunch with Sherry Holley, Buddy's niece. A delightful lady, she was particularly curious to hear I was headed for Carthage. I have always been keen to come across any connection between the two great Texan artists whose lives were to terminate in such tragically similar circumstances. One of the links is the great Phil Everly. A pall bearer at Buddy's funeral, the awe in which he and his brother Don held Jim Reeves is patently clear in the radio interview the Texan conducted with the two Kentuckians. Phil, of course, sadly passed over last year. And in one of those strange coincidences another pallbearer Joe B. Mauldin who played the upright bass in the Crickets died last week, Feb 7 - the anniversary of Buddy Holly's funeral. (The day the bass guitar replaced the upright bass was another one of those days the music died. Just as the Texan Roger Miller once acutely pointed out, you cannot roller skate through a herd of buffaloes, no amount of trying would ever get a twirl out of a bass guitar. Even Paul McCartney couldn't do it - the Liverpudlian who idolises Buddy Holly. Another enthralling coincidence is the one you have written at length about, Larry: how Jim Reeves recognised both when Jack Ruby assassinated Lee Harvey Oswald on live TV. After Carthage I headed up to Nashville, the musical city where Buddy Holly and Jim Reeves met with contrasting fortunes. One cold day there I went to a bar on Broadway to see Charlie Louvin who was billed to sing there. And as I made my way with difficulty on icy sidewalks I thought of Charlie's cousin, John D Loudermilk who penned the most famous song ever about a plane crash, 'Ebony Eyes'. And thought also of the occasion I happened to encounter Don Everly in Dublin (the Louvin brothers of course hugely influenced the Everlies) and asked him after a concert there how come he and Phil hadn't got to sing their exquisite rendition of that musical monument to pathos. 'Heck', he replied, 'We haven't sung that song since Buddy died'. Alas, by the time I got to the bar on Broadway it was to discover that the gig had been cancelled due to the band's inability to negotiate the wintry highways. I was destined never to listen live to Charlie Louvin in person as he crossed over the bridge some months later. Sometimes you get the idea we are all pawns on this big checker board of a globe and that there is one big Bobby Fischer-type God up there, moving us all around at His whim. Keep up the great work, Larry !
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
Why didn't the ATC direct Jim to an alternate airfield instead of having him fly around the storm cell? If Jim had plenty of fuel in his plane,he could have taken an extra half hour or less to fly to another airport in the opposite direction that the storm cell was moving.Was this a possible error on the part of the ATC? Of course,nothing can change the past and bring back the dead victims. I was wondering if this angle had been considered as a possible factor in the crash of Jim's plane.Anita L. Cooper
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
Unlike the way it is now, in 1964, the Approach Controller, John Hettish, could only advise Jim; Reeves was the pilot in command. John told him a right turn would keep him clear of the rain area. As he explained in one of the interviews I did with him for my book, "Jim Reeves: His Untold Story," he had planned just a short deviation for Jim whereby Reeves would make a right turn (to the east) and only go a little way, thus going around the rain cell, and then turn northward to land. This would have sufficed since the rain cell was so small. It would not have added any significant time to Jim's flight.
There was absolutely no need for Jim to land at any other airport; he just needed to avoid the rain area, and he thought he could do that by staying on his present heading, as the rain was off to his left as he looked in the direction of the airport. So he declined to turn right and in so doing, made his first of three fateful decisions that day.
Unfortunately, the intense rain cell intersected his flight path and opened up on him and he lost his visual references.
Jim's close friend and fellow pilot, T. Tommy Cutrer of WSM, said "I blame the controller," but I do not share that view.
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
Well, if the controller advised Jim to turn, and Jim declined, then the controller, naturally, cannot be blamed. What a waste that Jim would not heed the controller's warning. :-(
Re: This week marks sad anniversaries for the music industry
Jim's arrogance killed him. He thought he knew best. But then, this is the same man who was gone for much of the first half of 1963, making a movie in South Africa and touring Ireland and England, plus U.S. tours. And he comes home and immediately gets his pilot's license, without having spent time practicing his flying skills. And he did so by paying Elmo Merriwether, a flight instructor, to give him his flying test...the same as Patsy's pilot, Randy Hughes. Elmo was NOT Jim's normal instructor btw. The wrong man has often gotten the blame for what happened. Elmo was known to be unduly impressed by celebrities. That's a fact.
Ordinarily, a pilot would be tested by one of the FAA guys who was headquartered in Nashville, but Jim Reeves avoided that. Months later, when Bill Larson and Glen Kemp both flew with Reeves (individually), they noted his lack of flying skills. Glen even had to take over controls of the airplane because Jim stalled it and the buzzer went off!
Jim should not have been flying the Beechcraft, a more advanced aircraft, which required a minimum of 200 hours (WHICH HE DID NOT HAVE and Fred Bunyan and others from Southeast Beech, who rented him the plane, KNEW that). But they were friends with FAA guys so when the accident report was written up they "estimated" he had 200 hours, which was b.s. There was no reason to estimate anything; every time a pilot rents a plane there are records kept. They could and should have pinned down EXACTLY how many hours Reeves had flown. But to do so would have implicated Southeast and their insurance company very likely would have refused to pay their claim for the lost aircraft.
So there obviously was some collusion between those writing up the accident report and Southeast. Another word that comes to mind is corruption. There was a whitewash in the Reeves plane crash investigation.
Read my book, "Jim Reeves: His Untold Story" for more details, so significant, that an entire chapter of a book called "Hit List" by Richard Belzer and David Wayne, was devoted to Jim's accident -- all based on my book and investigative reporting.
on February 4, 2015, 11:35 pm, in reply to "