The Bend Theatre in Strathclair was a magic place that showed two
movies a week, hosted many local concerts and, occasionally, brought in
a touring music group. In the '50s, Winnipeg radio station CKY had a Saturday
morning show that featured a regular live country band. The bands would
use the show to plug their live performances around the province and most
of them found their way to our theatre quite regularly. Station DJs, such
as Porky Sharpeno, would moonlight as emcees on these shows and would usually
plug the show all week on their radio shifts. The stage shows featured
a nice mix of country songs and instrumentals, pretty girl singer, cornball
humour, audience participation, costumes, lighting (black light was a favourite
gimmick), and sale of photos, programmes and songbooks. Many years later
I would refer to a Ray Little Show songbook for the lyrics to the Kentuckian
Song that Sue-On recorded for our fourth
album. (The song had originally been featured on the soundtrack of
a '50s Burt Lancaster movie, The Kentuckian.) After digging through
stacks of memorabilia I finally found these obscure lyrics . . . on one
of the inside pages beside the picture of the smiling steel player, Tex
Emery.

See the
full page of photos HERE
The Bend Theatre stage show that stands out most in my memory, however,
was the Hal Lonepine / Betty Cody Show in the mid-'50s. Accompanying this
husband and wife singing team was their 15-year-old son, Hal Lonepine,
Jr. on Gretsch guitar. The kid was incredible . . . and he later
became even more incredible when he set the guitar and jazz world on its
ear. In those later years he dropped the Jr. stagename and performed under
his real name: Lenny Breau.
The show also featured the Ward Sisters and a steel and bass player who
came out later in a Grampa Jones type costume and persona to add a bit
of comedy relief. The guest singer was a very young and dynamic Elvis impersonator
named Ray St. Germain. Ray also went on to become a major performer with
hit records, international tours and his own television show. One of our
greatest thrills was meeting Ray, one of our early influences, many years
later at the Manitoba Association of Country Artists Award Show. We and
Ray were both up for the Manitoba
Entertainers of the Year Award. . . and Sue-On and I were more surprised
than anyone in the room when we were announced the winners of this major
award.

ON THE ROAD WITH BILL and SUE-ON HILLMAN
A 50-YEAR JOURNEY : ROOTS & INFLUENCES
CKY Hal Lone Pine Show with Ray St. Germain and Lenny
Breau
Click
for full-size image
The big old 78s in my collection just didn't have the pizzazz
of the new unbreakable 45s and LPs with their stacking turntables, colourful
photos and peer acceptance. So, for many months leading up to Christmas
'56, I started a campaign to make my parents very aware that our old turntable
was terribly obsolete. Success! Under the tree that year was a portable
RCA record player that could play all three speeds and all sizes of records.
Along with this technological marvel was a selection of records from various
members of the family: Elvis' second album, Bill Haley, Pat Boone and Crazy
Otto (my Aunt Merna was a real fan), Tennessee Ernie Ford (my Nannie was
a fan), and a few more. My record collecting and guitar playing now went
into full gear as I could hide away in my room and play along for hours
every day, picking guitar riffs off my growing collection: Elvis, Johnny
Cash, Carl Perkins, Lonnie Donegan, Dale Hawkins. This collection grew
in leaps and bounds when I joined the RCA record club: Chet Atkins, Hank
Snow, bluegrass, etc.
 
The arrival of my transistor radio meant that I now had
a constant musical companion while doing chores. It was a sad day when
this 7 transistor Standard, pocket-book sized radio ended up at the bottom
of the lake during a boat accident. But was soon replaced by a big multi-band
Sharp which brought in stations from all over North America. This much
larger boom box served me well a few years later when I spent my summers
spray painting houses, barns, bins and elevators.
Great changes were also wrought by the arrival of television in our
home. There wasn't much of the new music on the tube but the Ed Sullivan
Show had the occasional rock act: Elvis, Buddy Holly, The Everlys, Buddy
Knox -- and CBC's Hit Parade show and Country Hoedown had some interesting
moments. But the early days of TV were magical. I 've tried to share some
of the excitement in the CKX-TV
Overview chapter of this Odyssey.
My Harmony Monterey archtop had served me well but it had many limitations.
One day while thumbing through the new Simpsons-Sears mail order catalogue
I came upon a picture of a guitar that seemed to offer everything I wanted
in an instrument: a shiny black, gold-flecked Silvertone electric guitar.
The price was way out of my range but my grandmother had been saving her
pension cheques for an emergency such as this. The story and photos of
this guitar, and of each guitar that came after is featured in our Favourite
Guitars I Have Known... and Own chapters.

Around this time, weekend country dances became a fairly
regular social event. Most towns had old time dances that featured local
musicians but the best teen dances were at the Oak River Arena Dance Gardens.
The town was small but they brought in some fairly big names. One night
that stands out featured Marty Robbins and his band. Marty was riding high
with cross-over pop/country hits that included the classic El Paso. This
was an event to look forward to because of the great guitar work on his
hits (the guitarist on the record was Nashville legend, Grady Martin).
On this particular night, however, Marty's long-time lead player (name
forgotten) fell sick and had to leave the stage. Marty ended up playing
lead himself for the rest of the night . . . occasionally sitting informally
on the front of the stage. This was the first time I had ever heard fuzz
guitar as the lead player had used the effect on Marty's hit, Don't
Worry 'bout Me. Story has it that the effect was discovered in the
studio by accident when a guitar amp malfunctioned because of a loose tube.
A few years later, whenever I went with the gang to functions in
nearby Newdale, I always looked forward to having a coke or hot chocolate
in Soo Choy's Paris Cafe because he always had a good stock of magazines
to browse through. We were sometimes served by his pretty young daughter,
Sue-On, a
pretty and bubbly little girl who had recently come from Hong Kong with
her mother. Her older brother Kenny and I were friends and classmates through
grades 11 and 12.
 
I was a member of the Royal Canadian Air Cadets for eight
years -- having joined as a Junior Cadet at age 11. My two weeks at Air
Cadet 1960 Summer Camp in St. Jean, Quebec, gave me the opportunity to
jam with another guitarist - a real treat because there were very few players
around home. He wasn't much better than I was but he did a nice version
of Honky Tonk and soon I had another riff to my slowly growing guitar repertoire.
Another memorable music experience associated with Air Cadets was the singing
of a seemingly limitless number of bawdy ballads on the many military bus
trips we took over the years -- songs I haven't had much occasion to sing
since as there hasn't been much demand for them in mixed company.
  
The summer of '61 closed the first chapter of this musical
odyssey. With a suitcase of clothes, box of books . . . and guitar, I moved
into Brandon College Men's Residence. I remember that my first record album
purchases I made down at Brandon Musical didn't impress many of the guys
in the dorm: Don Reno & Red Smiley bluegrass, Bob Dylan, Hank Snow
with Anita Carter, The Staple Singers, Elvis Presley Gospel Album, Frank
Sinatra and Dinah Washington. For me though, it was a sort of musical rebirth.
Within a year I was playing guitar on a daily
live TV show and was the proud owner of a new Gretsch
guitar.
   
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