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Location: Back in the Valley of the Sun Mesa Az. | Didn't realize until recently that two of my favorite guitarists played ovation. Jim Croce and Cat Stevens. Cool.
Norse(awaiting my Balladeerwith baited breath)man1 |
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Location: Zion, Illinois | Cat & Jim are two reasons I became interested in Ovations in the first place (ok, Bread is a third). Just loved the way their guitars sounded.
Bradley |
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Location: Dallas | Norseman1, so? is the wife now cool with the purchase of that puppy you spent the rent money on? I only hope she don't beat you on the head with it :p
On a very serious note about Mr. Jim Croce - I borrowed 3 of my 14 nephews in 1974 , and took them to see Jim and another player (don't remember who he was) at Six Flags over Texas here in Arlington. The oldest to this day still talks about that show, and still thanks me for it. We too loved that man for the music he left us. Yes he was playing an Ovation, and they sat and did the entire show acoustic with no back up band, and we were sitting front row eye to eye no more than 20 feet. Sad to say that a couple weeks later we lost Mr. Croce. The oldest nephew in '86 decided he wanted to learn to play guitar, and became my first student. Now he plays "Leroy Brown" and I remember the show like it was yesterday.
Now I'm rantin' :(
Thought I'd share this story with you -
Failed to say that my nephew was 11 yrs.old when I took 'em to the see Mr. Croce -
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Gizz
[ July 29, 2002: Message edited by: Gizz ] |
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Location: SoCal | A good story. |
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Location: Shelton, Washington, USA | Gizz, the other player was probably Terry Muleisen (sp?) His was usually the fancy fret work you hear on Jim's records.
Norse, Jim was the main influence on my style and taking up the guitar. My favorite pic is one of Jim sitting in his front room with his Legend. I've corresponded several times with Ingrid (Jim's widow) over the years to get permission to use some of Jim's stuff and to thank her since I never got the chance to thank Jim.
Cat is another story, though... I love his stuff, but didn't realize until a few years ago that he played O's.
Jim |
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Location: NJ | Gizz;
More than likely the other gentleman was Maury Meulheisen (I may have the speelling wrong) who was Jim's long time accompanyist. Great guitarist!
Sadly, he too had his strings silenced on that plane flight.
Croce too was an inspiration for me in look into Ovation for my first guitar. He and (for a short while) Harry Chapin, Cat, and Loggins & Messina.
Speaking (or "not") of "current" O'users, does anyone know if Peter White (ex-Al Stewart and current solo career) and Ray Davies (Kinks) still play Ovations? One of the recent Peter White CD covers have him standing in the surf w/a shallow bowl Legend and (I believe it was) the last Kinks CD was a live collection with some "unplugged" stuff in which Davies played a green Balladeer (I THINK it was a Balladeer, but in any event it was a pretty guitar). |
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Location: Shelton, Washington, USA | Gizz, Cliff,
Cliff is right. It was Maury. I seem to get him and Terry Cashman confused for some reason. Jim's backup was Maury.
and.... do i remember dewey binell (bonnell... something like that... ) from America playing an O? |
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Location: NJ | That'd be Dewey Bunnell.
He and Gerry Beckley (and early on Dan Peek) comprised America. They did use Ovations (live) for quite a while, but I don't know about anymore.
(The last time I saw them they were "warm up" for Christopher Cross - god! - I'm getting old!!!).
I think they might be in the Taylor camp now.
F_ _ _ 'em! Somebody (who shall remain nameless) once told me they were a bunch of pricks, anyway.
I always did like their first couple albums, though. They had a pretty good live band, too. |
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Location: Back in the Valley of the Sun Mesa Az. | Harry (30,000 pounds of Bananas)Chapin played Ovation too?! Another fav. I guess my links to liking the Ovation sound run deeper than I realized. Bread is one of my wife's favorites.
What other folk rock guys played Ovation?
Norse(fun to reminisce)man1 |
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Location: NJ | Harry played an O for a short while around '77 or so and then switched to Alvarez. |
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Location: SoCal | From photos I remember seeing, Harry played an Ovation Classical guitar. |
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Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | America... hmmm Good musicians.. never seemed to be able to write a second verse tho.. "do dit-doo do doo, doo dit-doo doo doo" etc....
I didn't know Harry ever played Ovations, that's cool. He didn't anytime I ever saw him, but that doesn't mean a thing... I wonder if when he swtiched someone said "Harry, that sucks!!"
I tried several versions of the above paragraph to get that HTS line in... sorry that was the best I can do. |
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Location: Dallas | Norse(likes to create trouble)man1 - See what you've started again.......
You guys please don't put Yuk players who can't remember the words to a verse - on the same page with Jim Croce. Poor boy must be rolling in his grave. :p
Clif.d - Your friend was right - it had to have sound'd worse when they switched to Alvarez. -- Traitors - most likely paid to switch or they had better drugs in those days as an incentive. Go figure :confused: |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | These were the good old days! All these guys were playing Ovations. Now none of them are.
I remember meeting Croce at the factory with Maurry, funny guys and good players. Cat Litter (personal comment) had a slothead that was stolen and replaced with another. Played Legends too. Never met him but he was supposed to be a very real person. America, they spent too much time in the above mentioned box. No wonder they've gone to the T. |
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Location: NJ | cat litter must be the artist formerly known as jusef islam |
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Location: NJ | "...now I'm bein' followed by a cruise missle,....cruuuuz missle, cruise missle...." |
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Location: Dallas | Clif.d - You beat me to it :D |
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Location: Back in the Valley of the Sun Mesa Az. | How about Gordon Lightfoot's beautiful instrumentals, could they have been Ovation?
Norse(remember Arlo[Alices Restaraunt]Guthrie? Whatever happened to him? Not that he was a great guitarist, just got me thinkin about some of these Folk Rock musicians)man1 |
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Location: NJ | If memory serves me correctly, Gordo was a Gibson man.
Arlo (believe it or not) still records and tours. I saw him a few years ago. |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | Arlo is alive and well living in Great Barrington Mass. If memory serves me well he just bought the old church that was the restaurant where it all started. |
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Location: SoCal | Gordo plays Martin 6's and Gibson 12's. Arlo plays Martins (has a sig model). Both have played those guitars forever and will never switch (IMHO). |
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Location: Baton Rouge, LA | My first experience with Ovation was watching the Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour on CBS and noting that GC was playing these really cool roundbacks, which I'd never seen before. That intrigued me, so on one of his albums was an address for his fan club in Southern California, so I wrote to them and inquired about the roundback guitars. Wouldn't you know it -- about three weeks later -- not expecting any response -- a personal letter from Mr. Glen Campbell arrived, and in this letter he suggested I write to Ovation Instruments at the address he gave, and the letter was signed by GC himself. (Now, if I could find that damned letter, I'd put it on Ebay!) I was 12 or 13 at the time, but it was this act of kindness by Glen that prompted me to persuade my parents to buy me an Ovation A/E 1621-4 Artist as a birthday gift the following year. I was already taking guitar lessons, having bought and played a decent Yamaha steel-string, a nice learner's instrument. Glen was the first artist I'd ever seen playing Ovation, and gradually, over time, there were others -- Jim Croce, Bobby Goldsboro, Mac Davis, Tommy Overstreet, and many others. There's something about Ovation that makes me want to stay in that elite club!
And, fellas, I do love this club! It's great... |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Dammit Tommy
You earlier said you fix them, but don't play them. You probably play as good as anybody here, maybe better, a lot of us never took lessons and can't tell a fifth chord from a 1.75 liter. You are just waiting for one of us to make a musical faux paux so you can nail us with diminished 7th capacity, (a criminal defense when I was on Jury duty). You have almost as long a musical history as I do, those were all great musicians.
Bailey |
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Location: Dallas | AHhhhhh - the power of the little finger :cool:
Elvis (did I just say that?) only knew 3 chords.....
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Gizz |
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Location: NJ | if somebody would have sold me all I needed was 3 chords my parents could have saved a ton of money on lessons |
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Location: SoCal | You don't need a whole lot more than 3 chords to make music. My uncle played his 1914 0018 Martine (nylong string and now in my care -- family heirlom) and only knew 7 chords (I counted once). He got more music out of that guitar than I will ever get and I'm all over the neck.
The music is in you, not the guitar. The guitar (hopfully Ovations) just happen to be our way to get the music out.
In my case, I seem to be a bit consitpated. |
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Location: Maine | Cliff,
Saw Ray Davies last October doing a storyteller show with two Legends, both S/S, one Cherryburst, the other Greenburst. At the end of the show he tossed his well used copy of X-Ray into the audience. Unfortunately I wasn't close enough... |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Paul
I play mandolin mostly, 7 or 8 chords almost does it on a mandolin, you just move them up and down the neck and throw in some transition runs. I say use the KISS method where ever you can. You are right, play music, trying to impress with technique is a loser in most cases. Except for Chet Atkins of course, but he already done it and left the building.
Bailey |
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Location: Chicago | Dewey Bunnell (sp) played the Bicentennial Ovation (The Patriot)...among other Ovations. I have one and have always loved it's sound and action. The latter was high enough to give the guitar a robust-not thin-Ovation sound. |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | I wanted to get this in somewhere and this looks like a good place.
Saturday night's Grand Ole Opry live had appearances by Jamie O'Neill (a lady singer) and Lee Greenwood and each had an Ovation mandolin in their backup bands. I got a closeup look at the one in the Jamie O'Neill set, and it had a natural wood top and looked like some really nice abalone binding and trim or something similar. Do those mandolins come with different levels of trim or was that a custom order? I didn't get a good look at the one in Lee Greenwood's set, but it looked similar, they might have borrowed the same one.
Anyway, I'm seeing these mandolins more & more, Ovation may have something there. Now my wish list is an Ovation 12 string and an 8 string, maybe I could get my wife to approve a second on the house. Anybody out there know how to do that, convince the wife that is, I know how to get the mortgage?
Bailey |
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Location: Scotland | I think there was a few 30th anniversary mandos with abalone trim
Paul |
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Location: new orleans | I know i'm new(and young)jim and cat were both great influences on my playing, but what about nancy "hot legs" wilson she played o's for a while. How bout the doobie bros.?(sorry i'm from the south)they always had a ovation on stage somewhere... |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | Bailey, There were some "book" (30th anniversary, not to be confused with the collectors series) mandolins made. Make it one of those. There were also a couple if the A/E Vipers and a few others. While you're at putting on the addition put a mandocello on the list, guitar scale but with 4 pairs of strings, 80, 60, 40 and about a 20 I think. There are a dozen or two of these out there. Check Mando Bandits in Stalin Island, NY |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Thanks Paul and cwktwo, it was a pretty mandolin and probably the one you describe. with the mandocello, a second mortgage wont make it, I'll sell the house and hit the road with my collection.
Hobo Bailey (will work for string money) |
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Cat Croce