Danny Kalb passed

[rpjazzguitar]

Nov 19, 2022.

He was a NYC based blues guitarist. In the early 60s, folk-blues, then lead guitar for the Blues Project. A great player.

He was 80.

I thought his passing should be noted.

[bako]

Thanks for the DK mention.
Danny was a Brooklyn neighbor. I can't say I really knew him but at least 5 times, he would be sitting on his stoop and see me with either a guitar or cello on my back and call me over to talk. He'd ask about what music I was involved with etc., talk shop about the players and music he liked and suggest we get together and play sometime. That never did happen. Each next time we spoke was as if we were meeting for the first time again. His health had not been that good for awhile. I walk by his former house quite frequently and his absence will be noticed.

[FourOnSix]

Sorry to hear. Kalb was one of my early heroes and influences.

He was a seat of the pants kind of guy. I saw him once in a NYC club with Sea Train. He asked the audience if anyone had a nail clipper, a capo and a cigarette. For some strange reason, I happened to have a capo on me and handed it over. Also gave him a smoke. At the end of the show, I had to go up and ask for my capo back. He had totally forgotten about it.

[rpjazzguitar]

I just read Steve Katz's book.

He wrote that Danny was given a massive dose of Owsley acid in SF and never recovered.

The book, btw, gives a detailed picture of life as a NYC based rock musician in that era. I enjoyed it, but I was around there at the time, saw some of the bands and met some of the people. I don't know if the book would be interesting to everyone.

[rpjazzguitar]

Thanks for the DK mention.
Danny was a Brooklyn neighbor. I can't say I really knew him but at least 5 times, he would be sitting on his stoop and see me with either a guitar or cello on my back and call me over to talk. He'd ask about what music I was involved with etc., talk shop about the players and music he liked and suggest we get together and play sometime. That never did happen. Each next time we spoke was as if we were meeting for the first time again. His health had not been that good for awhile. I walk by his former house quite frequently and his absence will be noticed.

If it's not being too nosey, can you say what part of Brooklyn that was?

[bako]

Park Slope Brooklyn

[sgcim]

I just read Steve Katz's book.

He wrote that Danny was given a massive dose of Owsley acid in SF and never recovered.

The book, btw, gives a detailed picture of life as a NYC based rock musician in that era. I enjoyed it, but I was around there at the time, saw some of the bands and met some of the people. I don't know if the book would be interesting to everyone.

I read it a few years ago. It was pretty interesting.. I remember some crazy incident with Danny Kalb involving smashing a window or some glass, but I don't remember what happened.
Especially interesting was the Al Kooper removal from BS&T by Bobby Colomby and Katz. They claimed that AK sang out of tune, and based on the one recording there is of AK singing live with BS&T, I have to agree with them.
John Simon produced the first BS&T record, and he must have worked a lot with AK, because he doesn't sound bad in the studio.
Colomby and Katz were getting literally sick from hearing AK sing live, and they offered him a spot as keyboard player and songwriter, but AK wouldn't accept it.
A trumpet player friend of mine was in a band with Jerry Weiss, one of BS&T's trumpet players, who was schizophrenic.
They got into an argument on a gig, and my friend punched the sh-t out of Weiss right on the stand.
Weiss started Ambergris, but they flopped. Weiss spent most of his life in a mental institution.

Colomby decided he was ready to produce records and did a poor job on the second album, especially on the Latin section of God Bless the Child..
They should have kept John Simon; he would've caught the horrible trumpet solos on GBTC.
Who were some of the people you met from that scene?

[rpjazzguitar]

I met the early BST horn section one night in the lobby of the Fillmore East. I recognized Fred Lipsius and maybe Lew Soloff. Chatted briefly.

Chatted briefly with Hendrix at the Wha? and somewhat longer with the original Blue Flame drummer who I met outside the Animals show in Central Park. Their bassist went down to the Wha? and discovered Hendrix. Of course, Hendrix wasn't exactly nobody even then. He'd already played with the Isleys and King Curtis, I think.

Saw the Blues Project (multiple shows, Central Park, Tompkins Sq Park and others - they were my favorite band).

And, saw perform and/or just on the street: Bitter End: Joni Mitchell, Tom Paxton. Cafe Wha?: Jimmy James and the Blue Flame, David Frye, The Raves (great early folk rock band that never made it big). The Night Owl: Lothar and the Hand People (great band), Cat Mother and the All Night Newsboys, Circus Maximus. Electric Circus: Clear Light, the Stone Poneys and Taj Mahal (playing solo). Cafe Au Gogo: The Fugs and the Grateful Dead. On the street: Frank Zappa, Alan Ginsburg, Simon and Garfunkle (coming out of an Everly Bros show at the Bitter End).

The Bitter End also had comedy. Dick Cavett and a hysterical group, The Uncalled For Three.

I was already playing guitar but I was there as fan, a kid from Brooklyn hanging in the Village because it was fun.

[John A.]

I took some lessons with Danny when I was in high school (ca. 1978-9). I found him to be a fairly unsettling person, and only stuck with him for maybe a couple of months. His hands shook and his affect was strange, but he could play really well. I found out about his freak-out around a year later, which explained a lot. He was a seminal figure in blues-rock and psychedelia. His obit made the front page of the Times, which was well deserved.

[Stringswinger]

I sure listened to the Blues Project back in the day. Hailing from the East Coast, they were an important band. 80 years of age is above average for an American man to live so DK had an OK run. Where he went, we shall all follow as nobody gets out alive. Play them guitars folks, it is later than you think.

RIP Danny Kalb.

[sgcim]

I met the early BST horn section one night in the lobby of the Fillmore East. I recognized Fred Lipsius and maybe Lew Soloff. Chatted briefly.

Chatted briefly with Hendrix and somewhat longer with the original Blue Flame drummer who I met outside the Animals show in Central Park. Their bassist went down to the Wha? and discovered Hendrix. Of course, Hendrix wasn't exactly nobody even then. He'd already played with the Isleys and King Curtis, I think.

Saw the Blues Project (multiple shows, Central Park, Tompkins Sq Park and others - they were my favorite band).

And, saw perform and/or just on the street: Bitter End: Joni Mitchell, Tom Paxton. Cafe Wha?: Jimmy James and the Blue Flame, David Frye, The Raves (great early folk rock band that never made it big). The Night Owl: Lothar and the Hand People (great band), Cat Mother and the All Night Newsboys Circus Maximus. Electric Circus: Clear Light, the Stone Poneys and Taj Mahal (playing solo). Cafe Au Gogo: The Fugs and the Grateful Dead. On the street: Frank Zappa, Alan Ginsburg, Simon and Garfunkle (coming out of an Everly Bros show at the Bitter End).

The Bitter End also had comedy. Dick Cavett and a hysterical group The Uncalled For Three.

I was already playing guitar but I was there as fan, a kid from Brooklyn hanging in the Village because it was fun.

Fred Lipsius tried to play a gig for the club date office I worked for. He fell on his face because he didn't know any tunes.
Wow! You saw Circus Maximus live! I've gotten to know the leader of that band, Bob Bruno, very well through the Web. We email each other once in a while. He was really a multi-instrumentalist jazz musician, but his main instruments were piano and upright bass.His father was a composer who left the family to make it in LA. He wound up writing for Disney. Bob Bruno jammed with Hendrix and Larry Young. He had a long career as a musician.

You must have run into Harvey Brooks, the bass player, in the Village. He played with everyone back then. He's the cousin of a friend of mine, and he just wrote an autobio that you'd probably enjoy. He played the concert in Forest Hills with Dylan when he first went electric, and people were so bugged, they rushed the stage, while Dylan escaped in a limo, and Brooks, Al Kooper and Levon Helm were left alone to face the charging crowd.

I recently read Paul Simon's biography, and he pretty much ran things in NYC after Sounds of Silence came out.
Al Kooper had an autobio, "Backstage Passes and Backstabbing Bastards (referring to BS&T)".
I was too young to play The Bitter End, but I played Paul Colby's Other End, Carnegie Recital Hall, and Storytowne Jazz Club with Clark Terry.

[John A.]

I sure listened to the Blues Project back in the day. Hailing from the East Coast, they were an important band. 80 years of age is above average for an American man to live so DK had an OK run. Where he went, we shall all follow as nobody gets out alive. Play them guitars folks, it is later than you think.

RIP Danny Kalb.

It doesn't seem like he had an OK run. It seems more like he had a difficult and painful run for most of those 80 years. Yet he soldiered on. I'm not sure what lesson one should draw from that. Otherwise, I certainly agree with the sentiment that one should carpe the guitar diem, especially if that gives respite.