[Dixielandjazz] Chuck Conklin RIP

[Richard Broadie]

For those of you not familiar with Chuck Conklin, he's the guy who mortgaged 
his house to keep the LA Classic Jazz Festival going in its early years.  He 
was the founder of that festival to which the current Sweet 'N Hot Festival 
owes much as its precursor.   He was the leader of the Angel City Jazz Band 
that featured many of LA's top players including Betty O'Hara and Dick 
Cathcart.  As a recording engineer he recorded many of Bob Tabor's Poor 
Angel sessions.  He worked as an audio engineer on numerous tv shows 
including Cheers, Wings and Fraser.

I met Chuck and Mert around 1970 when we were neighbors in the San Fernando 
Valley.  He used to sit in on my band along with Ken Albers of the 4 
Freshmen who came from Chuck's home town and was his close friend.  Chuck 
wasn't a particularly talented player but was smart enough to surround 
himself with absoluely the best out there and then stand back and enjoy the 
music.  In this manner, he was a most effective leader.

We had a couple of nice chats 3 weeks ago at the Sweet & Hot festival.  I 
have two photos of  him that were taken then that I'd be happy to share with 
anyone who would like to have them.   Just drop me an email at 
rbroadie at dc.rr.com.    I hope Floyd Levid or someone writes a nice obituary 
on him.   I'm sure I'm leaving so much out about how significant Chuck's 
contributions were to the LA Jazz scene.

I'll miss my friend Chuck very much..  R.I.P.

Dick Broadie

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Robert S. Ringwald" <robert at ringwald.com>
To: "DJML" <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Wednesday, September 29, 2004 11:54 AM
Subject: [Dixielandjazz] Chuck Conklin RIP


> Just received the following sad news from Mel and Deanna Mints
>
> (snip)
>
> It is with sadness that we send this email.
> Chuck Conklin passed away, Sunday, September 26th.
> We will all miss him.
>
>
>
>
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