When I last left my story I was about to start a new job in California.
I began working at church headquarters in Pleasant Hill, CA on October 1, 1978. i'd taken some graphics classes in college and was about to learn printing "On the Job." My official title was "Graphic Arts Clerk," but I got to operate the press, the huge Xerox machine, learned cutting and padding skills, did layout, design, illustration, typesetting, and a bit of graphics camera work that I learned from John McFee in Walnut Creek. John was the father of famed Doobie Brothers multi-instrumentalist John McFee, so I became a fan of their music during those hours in the darkroom. It was one of those great opportunities that push you to learn so much in a very short time. I learned that I had a knack for layout and design and that I liked taking on impossible challenges and deadlines and trying to exceed expectations.
Although I had a supervisor, she was a bit of a recluse and rarely came out of her office. I got to do the customer service aspects as well as the actual production work. Then, when she was off work for 6 months with an injury, I got to run the department by myself. I found I really enjoyed being my own boss, and making the impossible look easy. I still do...
While I worked there I also got involved with the youth ministry council at the local SDA church. I made some great friends on one hand, but I also became more sure than ever that being politicaly savvy was more important than either talent, commitment or passion. I saw both pastors I began with, guys with hearts for people and service, "flushed out" by the system and replaced by "Corporate Climbers."
Charlie stayed with us until about Thanksgiving and then moved up to Angwin, CA to live with a former academy dean who was now employed at PUC, the church college in Northern California. He struggled with depression and discouragement over the next few years and was in and out of the band, by his own choice, often during those years. But we always stayed friends, and he always came back. I think God had a hold on His heart, and wouldn't let him go.
In the spring of 79, I was finally able to put together a group and do a concert at Rio Lindo Academy where my sister was a student. The kids that joined worked hard and gave up Sundays to drive from PUC (St. Helena) through the Napa/Sonoma hills to Healdsburg, practice all day and then head home to study. We were about half high-school age and half college aged kids.
The academy kids were: Sheri Caviness-soprano, my sister Julie-alto, Dan Blower-tenor, ARP Synthesizer and trombone, Paul Dickson on sound, Jimmy Ressiger-transportation, and Pete Stimple-logistics and laughs.
The college kids were: Alline Roderick-soprano, Mike Hinrickson-Bass, Gary Peters-tenor, Bob Grady-bass guitar, and myself on piano and singing lead.
We had a good concert, but with so many new kids, and no real road-testing or close community, we couldn't hold the group together over the summer. The next year I left my graphics position at church headquarters and went back to school, this time at PUC, in the beautiful Napa Valley.
Over the summer I'd made friends with a guy named Bart Vogel who was heading to PUC as well. When we got there we immediately started jamming together with some of his friends. Charlie, Gary and Julie were still interested in carrying on where we'd left off, and Bart introduced me to Gary Brady, Skip Johnson, and Dee Silber. Bart, Gary B and Skip were all songwriters so we started doing features at on-campus services with players and singers sitting in as the songs required.
We bounced around with various line-ups until in early November when we added Bernie Osborn on drums and trumpet. I met Bernie when we both had the early-morning custodial shift in the college library. He was an Oakland native who'd come back to school to study for the ministry after some years of military service. He got us a couple gigs at churches in the Bay Area and by Christmas we'd formed a group that was an amalgamation of kid's we'd brought from Michigan: Julie, Gary P, and myself, plus some "west-coasters" - Bernie, Gary B, Val Leno singing soprano, and Brian Wilcox replacing Charlie as the bass singer.
Bart had decided, with our blessing and encouragement, to style himself as a solo act. So, although we still hung out... writing and and playing together often, he didn't join the group as such. He did go out on gigs with us most of the time as a guest artist, and added a lot of joy, comaraderie and laughs both onstage and off. I still remember a little ritual I'd brought west with me... "Spazzin' Out" that Bart adopted, made his own, and made into an artform of "global proportions."
Bart's sister Julie Vogel came onboard as our sound engineer. Julie still stands out as having some of the best "ears" of any sound-person I've ever worked with. She took all the changes in style, equipment and personnel in stride and made us sound better than we deserved or expected to sound.
In December we added Rob Elliot on electric guitar, and imported Jeff Jones, (a high-school kid who Gary B knew from Tennessee,) to play bass guitar. Gary flew from Fresno to Memphis over Christmas break and drove back to Angwin with him.
Through all that time and all those changes, we were still called Living Water.
With a lot of hope and excitement, we returned to school early from Christmas break to rehearse... Before we'd finished our first day together we found that we had major musical and philosophical differences.
Val had come to PUC to travel with the Heritage Singers on the weekends. That hadn't fully worked out, but she was afraid to commit to our band because we had a "heavier" approach to music than she thought the market would bear. She was afraid it would ruin her chances with Heritage. She did go on to tour with them in the late 70s-early 80s.
Brian, a quartet man at heart, had never sung with drums and electric guitars before and was, frankly, freaking out.
We'd added another soprano named Mary who'd done well in the audition but just wasn't finding her way or fitting in. She had mystical and (she felt) prophetic tendancies and just couldn't focus on the goal.
Before the day was out we'd replaced Mary and Val with Debbie Sjoren, who was dating Gary B. She had been our "designated photographer" but, as it turned out, was a really solid singer and a great team-player. We'd also talked Brian into hanging with us and giving it another try.
That lineup, pictured in these promo shots, (shot on Bart and Julie's parents deck in Walnut Creek) took us through February 1980, when we fired Jeff for not showing up at rehearsals.
We replaced Jeff with Jon Yoshida, an awesome all-around musician who had lots of focus, drive and experience. Jon could play anything we threw at him with style and passion. Through his playing, prodding, friendship, support and coaching we grew by leaps and bounds musically.
In March, Bernie left school and Rob dropped out of sight as well. Jon's brother, a student at Fresno Academy, came onboard to play drums and a couple of their friends, also brothers, joined on keyboards and electric guitar. Charlie came back and replaced Brian and we began to cover a lot of the Imperial's material from their "One More Song For You" album. We did "Water Grave", "I'm Forgiven", "Higher Power," "I Just Want to Know What I Can Do For You," and a host of others...
The distance between Napa and Fresno made rehearsal sporadic and by June, our electric player had joined the military in hopes of paying for dental school. Weighing all the factors: distance, time, other comittments (Jon had gone back to Heritage as thier part time bass player) we decided to go our separate ways. The irony of it all is that our tightest music ever, music that would have been powerful and inspiring to audiences, was never performed live because we were too focused on perfection.
I accepted the apparent end and went home to enroll in cosmetology school. We thought Living Water was done...
Next time: How the west was... 2: the Bart Vogel and Living Water era, complete with downloadable MP3s.
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