First of all, I want to
say thank you for all of your thoughts and prayers you have directed my way the
past few weeks. I think I’m getting on the right track – between all the “alogists”
I am going to be seeing. But, thank God I’ve got the insurance to do that now.
With everything that has slowed me down over the past few weeks, I still have
tried to stay on the go as much as I usually would. At the same time, there are
some events that I have missed – such as last Tuesday’s presentation of the Bob
Kingsley Living Legend Award to longtime RCA Records head Joe Galante at the
Grand Ole Opry House in a benefit for the Opry Trust Fund. I would have loved
to have been there – but it wouldn’t have mattered much……I still would have
chickened out! Of what, you ask? Let me explain.,,,,,
During my sophomore
year in High School (1989-1990), one of my classes assigned us with the task of
writing to someone whose job we wanted to have when we grew up, and asking
about their thoughts concerning the job and what advice they would give. As I
have told you before, the music business has been my passion and dream since I
can remember. Aside from being President for a few months in the second grade,
it’s all I have ever wanted to do. So, my letter didn’t go to Joe Montana or
whoever had the coolest occupation back in the day – it went to another Joe –
Galante. He was responsible for developing so much of the talent that you heard
coming out of RCA for almost four decades. That’s the job I wanted to have. So,
I wrote my letter and mailed it to RCA Records, Nashville TN – sometime during
the winter months of 1990.
One thing I have since
learned about this business that if journalists get behind on returning phone
calls or emails from time to time, multiply that times a million and you will
understand the schedule of a Nashville label head. So, that combined with the
fact that I was merely a tenth grader at DCHS, I wasn’t holding hope that I
would get anything back……..But, I was wrong.
One day, as usual, my
mother picked me up from school. As I walked up to the mailbox – hoping that my
Music City News issue would be in there – there it was – my first manila
envelope! (Typically, record companies and publicists mail out hundreds of CD’s
a week in those manila envelopes – and I have gotten many, but in 1990 – I was
a rookie!) In it, was my letter, a typed response to each question – and surprise
of surprises, a cassette of each project that the label was working at the
time. Alabama…..Ronnie Milsap….Keith Whitley…..Prairie Oyster (Surely you
remember them!)…….I was on cloud nine. Though the tapes have long gone, I still
have the letters in a scrapbook. It’s one of my most treasured possessions.
Now, here comes the “Chicken”
part of that story. Working in radio from the next year (1991) on, I slowly
built my name up in the business, started attending CRS in 1995, and attended
more and more musical events as time progressed. And, I would see Joe Galante
on different panels or forums. I wanted so much to thank him for that letter,
and to be honest, I did in later correspondence and a few phone interviews I
did with him. But, I might get to within five feet of speaking to him at an
event – and then I would chicken out. He has that intimidating of a presence –
though I did hear that during their time together at BNA, Kenny Chesney did
teach him the art of the hug. “Why would he want to hear anything from me,” I
would ask myself. And, I still struggle with that answer. But, I figure one day
it will happen. I hope so.
Anyway, hearing of the
award ceremony last week just made me smile a little bit at thinking about my
life and the direction it has taken over the years. I’m not going to say that
without that letter, I would have never pursued music or radio – but it did
serve as a lot of inspiration. And, though sometimes there are too much month
at the end of the money, and you wonder how you are going to get from Point A
to Point B, I couldn’t – or wouldn’t imagine doing anything other than this……
