Siegel-Schwall legacy continues

WHAT: Siegel-Schwall Reunion with Otis and The Alligators
WHERE: Indian Crossing Casino, Waupaca
WHEN: 8 p.m. July 19
COST: $25
INFO: 715-281-0097 or chamberblues.com/ssb_home.html

By Jim Lundstrom

Corky Siegel and Jim Schwall were in the right place at the right time when they met each other in 1964. The Chicago natives met as music students at the hometown Roosevelt University – Siegel was studying reeds and Schwall guitar.

Chicago was home to many blues greats in the 1960s – Willie Dixon, Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, just to name the major triumvirate. These two young white dudes found they had a musical affinity with each other and with the blues. They cut their musical teeth playing Chicago blues clubs alongside some of the greats and were signed to Vanguard Records in 1965, which at the time was known primarily as a folk label. They were signed a year after another white Chicago blues player by the name of Paul Butterfield had been signed to Elektra.

The Siegel-Schwall Band and the Paul Butterfield Blues Band helped bring the Chicago blues sound to a much larger audience – primarily a young, white rock audience. Both bands broke barriers and helped shape the direction of American music history.

The Siegel-Schwall Band legacy continues with an increasingly rare performance July 21 at the Indian Crossing Casino in Waupaca, one of only two shows the band has scheduled this summer. The band is calling both gigs “reunion” shows.

“It’s always fun. For the most part it really is a reunion,” Schwall said from his home in Madison. “We don’t see each other. Our contact is mostly for e-mail these days, so when we get together, it’s really fun. Everybody really looks forward to it.”

“We’ve done other reunions, but it’s been more than a year,” said Jim Schwall from his home in Madison. “Our only other show is in Door County (Sunday, Aug. 17, Peg Egan Performing Arts Center, Egg Harbor). Twice a year is not a hard and fast rule, but it’s sort of whenever something comes up. The e-mails go around to see if everybody’s free. If we are, we do it. But we’re not kids any more.”

But don’t think these guys are retired. Siegel is kept busy with several other projects, including Chamber Blues, a performing arts center-friendly fusion of classical and blues music. Schwall also has a variety of Madison-based projects, including solo gigs and his own Jim Schwall Band.

“The Jim Schwall Band, that’s pretty much me and another guitar player/singer, Andy Ewen. We take turns singing. Definitely blues based.”

Schwall said he’s particularly looking forward to the ICC show and sharing the bill with Otis and The Alligators.

“I always like bumping into Otis, so this will be a fun gig all the way around,” he said. “I know all those guys. I’ve done various split gigs with Otis over the years. Actually, I’m playing in a couple bands right now with his longtime bass player, Ken Stevenson. He moved down to Madison a couple years ago.”

Stevenson plays bass in the Jim Schwall Band, and the two share the stage in a band called So Dang Yang.

“It’s pretty much built up around a Madison singer/songwriter, Marques Bovre, to showcase his tunes,” Schwall said. “Marques has been out of the business for a couple years. He’s decided it’s time for him to come back. It’s pretty radically different from my band, which just makes it fun.”

The Siegel-Schwall band includes Rollo Radford on bass, who got his start with the great Dinah Washington and went on to record with Martha and the Vandellas before hooking up with Siegel-Schwall, and legendary drummer Sam Lay.

Butterfield hired drummer Sam Lay for his band.
Lay had drummed for Little Walter, Muddy, Wolf and Dixon before hiring on as drummer for the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. Bob Dylan completists probably know Sam Lay was the drummer when Dylan went electric at Newport the summer of ’65. He joined Siegel-Schwall in 1969.

“Corky and Rollo and I are all about within a year of each other in age,” Schwall said. “The guy having the toughest time is Sam. He’s almost 10 years our senior (he turned 73 in March). So we have a second drummer with us these days, a guy from Chicago named Sambo. That gives Sam a bit of a break. He can slow down. We can feature him a bit better and he doesn’t have to sit there and keep time for an hour and half. Aside from that, that’s the only change. Everybody else is the same guys we were in 1970, which is a scary thought.”