No One Wanted to Hear It: Adventures in auditioning for a summer gig in summer of ‘68

In 1968, Malcolm Lee, Terry Burke and I got together for a weekend spring break session to record an audition tape for summer work as folk singers in some exotic locale that was not Sikeston, Mo. We represented the male contingent of The Travelers and had been together in one form or another since 1961. As we’d be “traveling” without our younger female singers, it was just us three. A Mr. Alton McCann, accountant by day and a bit of a fanboy of ours by night, had a reel-to-reel tape recorder with two microphones in Sikeston and had kindly consented to work with us that weekend.

He probably didn’t know what he was getting into.

We started on a Friday night, obsessively singing and recording until the wee hours in his living room “studio,” got up Saturday morning, doing it again, and finally wrapping on Sunday, in time to head back to school, hoarse but happy. I’m sure it was one of the longer non-tax weekends of Mr. McCann’s life.

Malcolm and Terry were at school in Cape Girardeau, but I had to trek all the way back to Fulton, Mo. We recorded a bit more than 30 minutes of music, and I sent the copies off to several resorts on the East Coast. We were offered a gig at a resort in Connecticut, which included waiting tables, but had to pass, as we were expected to serve alcoholic drinks, and Terry had yet to see his 21st birthday. At least they returned the tape.

The following summer, Terry played his banjo at Shakey’s, Malcolm stayed on the radio, and I took physics in summer school at Lambuth College in Jackson, Tenn., rooming with my brother, who was going there on a baseball scholarship in the fall. None of us served alcohol that summer, although I, for one, consumed.

Time passed, Terry became an audiologist, Malcolm moved up the radio ladder, and I became a physician. But, I kept the old reel of magnetic tape through several moves until it ended up in Cape Girardeau with me and my family in 1980.

Visiting my brother-in-law at his Kansas City, Mo., home, I took the then-13-year-old reel with me. Malcolm was at a Top 40 radio station there, and I figured he’d have the equipment to play it.

And I was right! Not only did he have a reel-to-reel, he had a high-quality cassette recorder. They had become popular with the introduction of the Sony Walkman in 1979, but had been in radio well before that. Malcolm transcribed our magnum opus to cassette! Now, I could play it at home.

Pity no one really wanted to hear it but me.

I kept the cassette until the late ‘90s, when one of my computer whiz kids showed me how to convert it to an MP3. I copied the cassette to CD and sent them to Terry and Malcolm. In a CD jewel box, with cover art, no less!

Pity no one really wanted to hear it but the three of us.

And then, just recently, another one of my whiz kids showed me how to put it on Facebook.

So now, we’re out there in cyberspace, if anyone still calls it that. A group that no longer exists, made up of youngsters only existing in memory, brought to you by magnetism.

If no one really wants to hear it, well … pity.

If you turn it up loud enough, you can still hear the clicking of the cassette from 1981 along with the kids from 1968.

Here’s the link: http://chirb.it/Et99B5?fbclid=IwAR1WvizgAb5zLpdI-2iqUrDXKF6ZY9p0Ome7D8539xCgb_jSSflZmDTBKBU.