![\"CD](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Sideman.jpg\")
Jonny is the first to admit as a young musician, having the opportunity to open for legendary bluesmen like Muddy Waters and B.B. King<\/a> \u201cI was definitely star-struck\u2026meeting ALL those guys!\u201d <\/strong>And to this day he continues to credit the influences of Jazz, Rock and R&B icons as diverse as Sun Ra, Frank Zappa, King Curtis and \u201ca lot of Stax stuff, Sam and Dave and Otis Redding.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\nOur conversation began like most, where\u2019s home? \u201cSan Diego<\/a>, baby!\u201d <\/strong>Jonny says proudly, \u201cI\u2019m a third generation Californian and a native San Diegan.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n Was your family musical? \u201cWell, as a matter-of-fact, yeah!\u201d <\/strong>Jonny smiles. \u201cMy grandfather played the violin, the clarinet\u2026 and the saw! The musical saw! And my mom would back him up on piano and he\u2019d do shows at the Lion\u2019s Club. He\u2019d have a guy with a giant apple on his head and he\u2019d take a gun and shoot it over his shoulder, with a mirror in one hand and a big spring-loaded worm would come out of the apple, cornball stuff, you know?\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cI have all of his instruments, though. I have his saw, his violin and his clarinet. He was a pharmacist and his name was John Nemes. He was a big wig up in Artesia, near Long Beach. He had a pharmacy. I remember they sold leeches for black eyes and bruises.\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cI have a jar they kept the leeches in. We got a couple of those.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Was saxophone your first instrument? \u201cNo, not by far! When the Beatles came out, that\u2019s what started this whole, damn thing. That Ed Sullivan appearance really started a whole wave of people wanting to be musicians. A friend of mine, Mike lived on the same street and we started taking guitar lessons in Escondido at the same time. I was probably seven years old then and that lasted almost a year. Then, I started getting into baseball so they didn\u2019t know what direction I was going to go in\u2026 sports or music? There was a piano at my Grandmother\u2019s house and a box of toys with a harmonica in there. And I\u2019d be running around with one of those. So in the 7th<\/sup> or 8th<\/sup> grade I had a paper route in Poway and I bought a set of drums from Apex Music down on Broadway in downtown San Diego with my paper route money. I played drums for maybe two years until freshman football.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n Battered and bruised, Viau had enough of football and naturally \u201cgot a flute.\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cI had listened to a Jethro Tull record and I really liked it. So I went from football to flute\u2026 and then from flute to sax. My flute teacher kept telling me, \u2018Man you need to play sax. Sax would mean a lot more work and enjoyment and it fits in with more types of music.\u2019\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n But music was always on your radar. \u201cPretty much. With my good friend, Mike, the first time I heard Sgt. Pepper\u2019s<\/em> was at his house. And he says, \u2018when he was listening to Herman\u2019s Hermit\u2019s, I was listening to Cream and Black Sabbath.\u2019\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cBut anyway, I started playing sax around the 9th<\/sup> grade, and by the 10th<\/sup> grade I sorta\u2019 joined a band. My friend, Reuben says \u2018I got band practice.\u2019 And I said, \u2018I want to be in your band.\u2019 He goes, \u2018well come to practice.\u2019 I go, \u2018okay.\u2019 I went to practice and I didn\u2019t know what I was doing. I just stood in a corner while they played\u2026 and tried to find notes that sounded good to play along with them. The bass player gave me a ride home and I thought that was fun to just go and rehearse once. And he said, \u2018You going to show up tomorrow?\u201d I said, \u2018Yeah!\u2019 So from that point on I just showed up for rehearsals.\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>)<\/p>\n Seems to have worked out well for you? \u201cYeah! I\u2019ve never actually been asked to join a band\u2026I just sort of show up.\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>)<\/p>\n So that was your first band experience? \u201cThat was a great band!\u201d <\/strong>Jonny says. \u201cAnd at first we were doing a lot of Allman Brothers stuff and had two drummers. We were called \u2018SkyDog\u2019 Duane Allman\u2019s nickname. And then we became more and more eclectic doing all kinds of other material and whittled it down to one drummer and we called ourselves, \u2018Orbis Max.\u2019 We were the shit in North County and Poway. We played all the big, big parties. We played some of the finest keggers that were ever thrown. It was a full-size band; we had three guitars, keyboards, singers \u2018cause we didn\u2019t care. We didn\u2019t care about making money. We never did make money. <\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a0We played school dances and we borrowed some money off my mom to buy a real PA system and she gave us three years to pay it back. We paid it back in a year. We played at Camp Pendleton. We\u2019d drive out there not knowing where they were going to send us, and it\u2019s a huge place\u2026 and you\u2019d be playing at a Quonset hut with about 80 men and one bar maid.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Nice you were supporting the troops and cool that your mom encouraged you\u2026 \u201cShe got involved whether she wanted to, or not.\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cBut she always supported my musical endeavors.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Can you talk about your ability to adapt your style of play? \u201cBeing in \u2018Orbis Max\u2019 helped me learn how to adapt, we were super eclectic and we played everything from jazz to rock and contemporary Top 40. Some blues, I mean we thought we could play blues. We weren\u2019t really real blues players. Another thing that really helped me out with those guys; from day one they would record. They would record live gigs; we\u2019d turn our band houses into a recording studio and recorded originals. I was thrown into that whole recording scene which is completely different from playing live.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Most call that honing your chops or higher education. \u201cLater, when recording I was very familiar with the process and for the most part wasn\u2019t nervous at all. There were a couple of times when I was a little nervous. Doing the Solomon Burke sessions was a high profile deal.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Who were some of your earliest influences in blues? \u201cI would have to say the Rolling Stones, only I didn\u2019t know it was the blues at the time. I didn\u2019t really know much about the blues until I joined the King Biscuit Blues band. In February 1980, I was 22 years old and they had a steady gig down at the Mandolin Wind on University and 3rd<\/sup>. They played every Thursday, Friday and Saturday which is unheard of in today\u2019s world.\u201d <\/strong>(Just as Jonny says the late blues harp player Ken Schoppmeyer\u2019s name, his phone begins to ring. Remember his ringtone is a wailing solo harmonica.)<\/p>\n Jonny\u2019s eyes are now wider as he says, \u201cI say the name Ken Schoppmeyer and the harmonica goes off on my phone. That\u2019s weird\u2026 talk about spooky shit. <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) But Ken had a huge, huge, huge blues record collection and he told me to come over to his house and I brought a bunch of blank cassette tapes and just recorded King Curtis, and all these sax players I\u2019d never heard of before and he turned me on to whole bunch of good music. Then I had to learn, I don\u2019t know, like 40 songs in two weeks to start playing with those guys. And that ran through almost all of 1987. Right when I get in the band, we\u2019re gonna\u2019 record a record and I\u2019m going, \u2018Oh my God! I\u2019m not really ready for this.\u2019 But the next thing you know, we\u2019re opening up for Albert King and B.B. King and Muddy Waters and Buddy Guy<\/a> and Junior Wells. So, I got to meet all these guys and take a picture. For a green, 22-year old meeting B.B. King was like meeting Babe Ruth or something. I was definitely star- struck\u2026 meeting ALL those guys! Especially the first time and they were all, nothing but nice. B.B. was just the nicest guy. I was so tongue-tied and the only thing I could say to him, he had this giant, glob of gold on his finger, and I said, \u2018Nice ring, B.B.!\u2019\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cBut the King Biscuit Blues band is where I definitely cut my teeth and learned a lot about life in general!\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n How about Jazz influences? \u201cRahsaan Roland Kirk, Stanley Turrentine, Charlie Parker, I mean there\u2019s so many.\u201d <\/strong>And what was your take away from them? \u201cWith Jump Blues and King Curtis what I noticed was and especially with the sax players, they blurred the line between jazz and blues. Is this jazz, is this blues, is it jazzy-blues or bluesy-jazz? I don\u2019t know, but it was good. I think with the saxophone, it\u2019s so associated with jazz so people come up and go \u2018you guys play some great Jazz.\u2019 Well, we\u2019re a blues band.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n You must have a pretty large R&B catalog, did you mine that genre? \u201cA lot of Stax stuff, Sam and Dave and Otis Redding. When I left King Biscuit, the band sort of imploded one night. You know with bands; that happens. And everybody quit the group on the 3rd<\/sup> break just before the last set. <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cI formed a little group with Eric Lieberman eventually, but before that I was in all-black Soul band from the Bay Area called C.P. Love and the Southbound Transit Band. Right after King Biscuit, in late 1987 and into 1988. They would fly me up to the Bay Area and I\u2019d do gigs up there. And we went to Telluride, Colorado. These guys were from New Orleans and they\u2019d never driven in the snow before. We\u2019re driving on that road from Silverton to Telluride in a van pulling a trailer. Which was fine going up, but on the way down it was snowing like no tomorrow and we were just sliding down that mountain. Nobody said a word, we were just scared shitless. But they treated me like family, they were nothing but nice to me.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cAfter that I was just bouncing around, freelancing and playing with anybody I could. I moved into an apartment in Oceanside, so I was taking any gigs I could to pay the rent. I would play with the Mudsharks and Scottie Blinn. And with Eric and the Rhumboogies and we played every Tuesday night at Winston\u2019s in Ocean Beach. I would get my horn player friends to come down and sit in. Sometimes we would have 3, 4, 5 or 6 horns and it was just organized chaos, with an emphasis on chaos. You\u2019ve got to be somewhat organized and play together unless you\u2019re Sun Ra, you know?\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Did you listen to Sun Ra? \u201cYeah! And I listen to a lot of Zappa, too. When I was locked in the blues closet, I didn\u2019t make that a selling point. And I would go see him when I could. I\u2019m still a huge Zappa fan.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n What was your first tour experience? \u201cIn 1990, I went out with Mitch Woods and his Rocket 88s from the Bay Area. That was my first real experience with touring, six weeks all across the country. I was touring with Mitch and backing up Earl King. I backed up Earl King several times and he was another guy who was just phenomenal. He wrote \u2018Let the Good Times Roll.\u2019 \u2018People see me, but they just don\u2019t know.\u2019 Not the one by the Cars.\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cJust watching him tune his guitar was a musical experience. He would have his guitar tuned to these really weird tunings and that\u2019s how he got some of those cools leads he would do.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n Gary Primich? \u201cOh My God! Oh My God! You know that session just happened to coincide with the Rodney King\/L.A. Riots! And these guys <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) had never been to California, they came out from Texas and it was a Wednesday, Thursday, Friday session. Wednesday is when they were beating up people, they took Reginald Denny out of the truck and just about killed him. Thursday was loot, scoot and shoot day and we saw so much shit, so many fires and people with shopping carts full of stuff. A refrigerator in the back seat of a Cadillac with the convertible top down, people pushing big screen TV\u2019s in those little red wagons\u2026 I\u2019m telling you, we got the most done in the shortest amount of time you can imagine. We almost did that record in about six hours. They\u2019d get on the talkback and go, \u2018Fellas that sounded good, we don\u2019t need to listen to it, trust me. Let\u2019s move on to the next song!\u2019 You really didn\u2019t know there was a riot going on until you went to the bathroom, this tiny little window, you could hear sirens and helicopters and stuff. They had a curfew that day and we had to get out before it got dark and we were all fine with that.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n The title of the album was \u2018My Pleasure.\u2019<\/p>\n Tell us about the Pleasure Barons? \u201cFrom \u201889 to \u201993, I did two spectacular tours with the \u2018Pleasure Barons.\u2019 Oh My God it was Country Dick, Mojo Nixon, Dave Alvin, Joey Harris, Juke Logan\u2026 and we all wore tuxedoes. Country Dick was doing Tom Jones songs two octaves below Tom Jones. It was so much fun. And so funny, during rehearsals we were laughing so hard learning this stuff and then we did it again in \u201993. The album was recorded in \u201989, I believe. It says \u2018Live in Las Vegas\u2019 but it was actually recorded in the Coach House in San Juan Capistrano.\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cIn \u201993 we had a tour bus that used to belong to John Denver and it was a really nice bus. And we had John Doe and Rosie Flores and Katie Moffett and it was a much more polished show. We had a bar on stage; it was when the swing revival and the martini revival was going, so if you weren\u2019t playing on a particular song, you\u2019d be making martini\u2019s for the guys. We only did two tours and then Dick died in \u201995.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Country Dick Montana was larger than life\u2026 \u201cI don\u2019t know if you knew about Dick and the Beat Farmers, but he was always getting doused with beer from the audience or from himself, you know? He went after someone one time who was throwing excessive amounts of beer on him and he jumped off the stage and grabbed a guy\u2026and started spanking him! Little did he know it was wrong guy?\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cHe started spanking him.\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cHe put him over his knee.\u201d <\/strong>What did the band do? \u201cWe were laughing, \u2018oh, there goes Dick! Just keep playing you guys.\u2019\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Kid Ramos \u2018Two Hands, One Heart.\u2019 \u201cOh that was a fun session. He <\/strong>(Ramos) decided to make an album with a cavalcade of guitar players. So, it was two days of a revolving door of all these great guitar players. Duke Robillard, Junior Watson and \u2018Gatemouth\u2019 Brown.\u00a0 We had three saxophones and a trumpet, Jeff Turmes being one of them, who\u2019s Mavis\u2019 bass player but he\u2019s also a great sax player. He wrote out some arrangements but when Gatemouth came in, he wanted to change up everything. We had everything worked out with the solo\u2019s but okay\u2026we\u2019re going to have to make some adjustments here. He\u2019d say let\u2019s do it this way and when the tape would run, he\u2019d do it a different way. It kept going on and on\u2026 till Kid goes, \u2018why don\u2019t we do it like the record?\u2019 Gatemouth goes, \u2018why do you want to do that for?\u2019 And Kid goes, \u2018I don\u2019t know, it\u2019s a T-Bone song.\u2019 <\/strong>Jonny laughs as he says, \u2018Gatemouth goes, \u2018I don\u2019t care if it\u2019s a Jesus Christ song; we\u2019re gonna\u2019 do it my way!\u2019\u201d <\/strong>(laughing<\/em>) \u201cLarry Taylor and I were looking at each other and laughing.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n Can we talk about how your solo projects came together, let\u2019s start with your first CD called Jonny Viau and Friends\u2026 Sideman<\/em>? \u201cI just got all my friends to come in and play a song or two and it was so much fun. I had it in the can in \u201996, but then I ran out of money so it sat and didn\u2019t get released until about 2000. Then, I put together my own band, Jonny Viau and the Blues All Stars at the insistence of Larry Matranga the owner of Patrick\u2019s. Because I was playing down at Patrick\u2019s with so many different bands I coulda\u2019 put a cot in the back room and slept there. The band I put together was called the All Stars so it could have anybody I wanted in it. It didn\u2019t have to be a set lineup. At any given time it would be Marcus Bashore, Mike Cherry, Dave Pruitt, Billy Seward, Adrian Demain, Troy Jennings, a piano player named Neil Walkup and then we did the Live at Dizzy\u2019s CD in 2002.<\/strong><\/p>\n![\"Jonny](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Jonny-Viau-Chris-Fast-Band.jpg\")
![\"Jonny](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Jonny-Viau-Blue-Largo-Zach-Zunis.jpg\")
![\"Jonny](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Jonny-Viau-Friends.jpg\")
![\"Jonny](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Jonny-Viau-On-Stage.jpg\")
![\"Sue](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Sue-Palmer\u2019s-Motel-Swing-Orchestra.jpg\")
![\"Nathan](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Nathan-James-Sharifah-Good-Thing.jpg\")