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5 "It Beats Digging Clams": The Working Life of Country and Western Musicians in the Barnstorming Era
- University of Illinois Press
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5 “IT BeaTs dIggIng ClaMs” THE WORKING LIFE OF COUNTRY AND WESTERN MUSICIANS IN THE BARNSTORMING ERA Gift exchange and the spirit of community are important elements of the country and western event. And yet, for the New England country and western musician, it (the event, the music) is also about the money. Country and western music has provided a way of making a living—or part of a living—for several thousand people in New England over the course of the music’s history in the region and as such should be examined here as work. Most contemporary country musicians entering into the professional marketplace today approach country music work in much the same way an aspiring professional athlete approaches his or her sport: an agent will develop and promote unknown and inexperienced talent for the purpose of securing a record contract for them, or musicians will spend years of preparation toiling in obscurity while incurring a financial loss, simply covering expenses, or earning spending money (as opposed to making a living) with the hope that one day an agent or scout will take notice of them and elevate them to the status of international“star.”Modern-day New England country and western musicians who make a working-class or middle-class “living” do so by augmenting their earnings from a day job with money earned from music, or they work as musical chameleons ready to adapt to a wide variety of musical shades, working five to seven nights a week, like self-proclaimed “gig pig” Denny Breau (interview 2005). This has not always been the case in New England, where country and western music once provided a means for a living for performers, owners and employees of country and western–only music venues, record companies , jukebox operators, and media outlets such as radio and television. For about four decades—roughly covering the duration of the barnstorming era—there were many full-time professional country and western bands working throughout New England who earned a higher income than the 146 chapter 5 working-class wage earners, woodsmen, farmers, and fishermen who listened to their music and attended their shows. Country and western music provided a better income and a more cosmopolitan lifestyle than most working-class people could expect from factory, agricultural, woods, or maritime work. In fact, for many of the professional country and western musicians of the 1930s, it was this very real likelihood of making a better living that attracted them to making a life in country and western music—or, as Gene Hooper of Machias, Maine, says,“It beats digging clams”(Hooper and Hooper interview 2005). According to Gene, one night’s earnings from winning an amateur talent competition was far greater than what he could earn from an entire week spent digging for clams along the Maine coast during the Depression: And I was just lucky enough that I won that [amateur talent] contest and got five dollars. In 1937 or ’6, whenever it was, I forget what year, that was a lot of money. ’Cause I’d been digging clams, you know, and clams then was twenty-five cents a bushel. And that was more than a bushel, because it was a basket. And I finally, that’s the year I finally got this guitar and learned all of these songs. And that five dollars that I got from singing, why I’da had to work two or three months clamming to make that same kind of money, you know? So that kind of convinced me that maybe I—if I’m lucky—I can get into show business. (Hooper and Hooper interview 2005) “Show business” is a term used frequently by the pioneer generations of New England country and western musicians. Jim Smalls, a country and western music promoter active throughout New England from the 1930s through the 1960s, groomed several aspiring musicians by teaching them the “business”side of show business before introducing them to what he called “the other side of show business,” meaning the stage (LeBlanc interview 2004). Starting Out in Country and Western Show Business: Amateur Competitions Gene Hooper’s introduction to the country and western profession by way of winning an amateur competition is a nearly universal experience among country and western musicians of his generation. Competitions were often staged by traveling entertainers who recognized that the promise of a cash reward would bring in many paying customers who would not otherwise attend; in particular, children and...