Backstage with Jeff Maynor

Regular viewers of Channel 3's Weekend Morning know one of my passions is early rock and roll music. I am emcee for a series of "oldies" concerts at the Mentor Performing Arts Center, the beautiful 1500-seat hall in Mentor, Ohio.

The most recent show featured The Toys, The Vogues, The Crystals and Frankie Ford.

The Toys were a "one hit wonder" group, "A Lover's Concerto", but they did a very well-received half hour opening set featuring many other girl group hits of the era. Original group member Barbara harris led The Toys.

The Vogues featured three original members of the group including their original lead singer on all their hits, "Five O'Clock World", "You're the One", "Turn Around", "You Are My Special Angel" and others.

Backstage one of the Vogues told me British pop star Petula Clark wrote "You're the One" with her husband Tony Hatch. One of their big thrills when their record was high on the charts was getting a phone call from Petula Clark. She wanted them to know she liked their version of her song better than her own.

The Vogues are from Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania, outside Pittsburgh. They let me know repeatedly it's pronounced Turtle "Crick", not "Creek". They all still live in Turtle Crick.

I love hearing of people who could live anywhere they choose but stay in, or stay connected to, their hometowns.

A related sidebar, I was talking this week to Tony Butala, founder and lead singer of one of my favorite groups, The Lettermen. Tony was born in Sharon, Pennsylvania, near Youngstown but moved to Los Angeles as a youngster and made his way in the music business there. He's been fronting The Lettermen for now approaching 50 years.

Tony has a home in LA and in the Napa Valley in California, but recently bought the home in Sharon that he was born in, and that is now his home again. He told me he came back, in part, to be in the place and with the people that mean the most to him, and also to lead the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in Sharon which he established there.

To Clevelanders that would be "the other music hall of fame", but it's a very worthwhile endeavor. The Vocal Group Hall has its 10th Anniversary Induction coming up at the Chevy Center in Youngstown the first weekend in November. Watch for more on that event coming up on the Weekend Morning News.

Back to the Mentor show--The Crystals featured original singer DeDe Kenibrew. They have an awesome songbook, "He's A Rebel", "Uptown", "Da Doo Ron Ron", "Then He Kissed Me" and others.

I had heard for years that "Da Doo Ron Ron" was not intended as the final title of that song that became a girl group classic. Songwriters sometimes write the lyrics to verses first and, while they may have the tune for the chorus, leave the lyrics, including the song title, to be filled-in later. I've been told they'll put nonsense syllables in temporarily to be replaced by the final lyrics later. I'd heard that's what "Da Doo Ron Ron" was, filler to be replaced by a "real" title, but then the writers couldn't come up with anything they though was an improvement.

I asked DeDe if she knew if this was so and she said "Not true". She said she'd asked the writer, Jeff Barry, and he told her "Da Doo Ron Ron" was always intended to be the title. He heard it as a catchy pairing of "words" and sounds that fit the feel of the record.

Closing the show that night, in every sense of the term, was The Great Frankie Ford.

Now here's a guy who had one hit record--an iconic, anthemic rock and roll classic, "Sea Cruise", but just one hit. Fifty years later Frankie Ford is still closing shows off that one hit. How can that be? Well, Frankie is a total entertainer, the whole package, in the tradition of Al Jolsen and Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard. They command a stage as if "the audience goes wild" is part of their job description.

Though Frankie Ford closes with his big hit, the other highlight of his set is his version of the Ferlin Husky country crossover "Gone". The audience expects good time New Orleans r&b from Frankie, but they are absolutely destroyed by his vocal talent and incredible range on this song. Backstory--Frankie Ford went to college on a music scholarship.

Backstage he told me one of his best friends in the early days of rock and roll was Jackie Wilson. Jackie, you may know, collapsed on stage during a show in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, fell into a coma and lived for several years in-and-out of consciousness. During those years Frankie was a regular caller and would talk with Jackie on days that he could speak.

The next rock concert at the Mentor Performing Arts Center in November will feature Youngstown's Edsels, Randy and the Rainbows, and two of the best acts from early rock and roll performing today, The Contours ("Do You Love Me") and Lou Christie ("Lightning Strikes", "Rhapsody in the Rain", "The Gypsy Cried").

Information's available at the box office, 440-232-8962.

We hope to have Lou Chrisie on our Weekend show in November.