WQSV Profile:
King Gypsy
How did you come to be involved with WQSV? And how long have you been involved?
I first met the crew of WQSV at the old Depot in Downtown Staunton when Mojo Parker was playing a show for the station in 2016. Later I met Chuck and Ben and others around Staunton at different shows. And Chuck (Troutman) has always been a supporter of the Blues in Shenandoah Valley for many years. But I heard WQSV as soon as I moved here in 2015, and I’ve been listening ever since. So when Chuck ask me if I’d like to do a blues Show, I just had to say yes…..
When did you start DJing? Are there any DJs who influenced you? Or something/someone else who influenced you?
I started out in a small-town radio station (KOKX-Keokuk, Iowa) in 1976, as a student in high school working with and learning from the radio personalities who worked there at the time. They taught me how talk and read copy, play Carts (8-track tapes with commercials and songs), reading farm reports, news, and weather. I also to mix records, my first exposure to that black art. I then started DJing at clubs during the disco era, and I had a regular gig at Uncle Sam’s in Minneapolis, which would later become Prince’s Club Sixth Avenue. Later after I moved to the Bay Area, I DJed House Parties and was a pioneer of the early “Jungle Music” and “Techno” movement in West Coast House Scene. My Radio influences would include Bob Corritore and Blaise Lantana out of Phoenix (KJZZ); Wolfman Jack back in the Day, Alex Bennett, radio personality from the Bay Area and Newy York, Pat Mitchell Worley (Beale Street Carvan), Bobby Mitchell WOZZ New Orleans, and Dr. John…
Talk about your connection to music/the role music plays in your life?
I started singer at 36, and took up harmonica after meeting John Sebastian on a flight between Phoenix and New Jersey. I had met Boz Scaggs previous to this, and he had introduced me to the blues. But John gave me my first harmonica and one of his Cd’s to learn to play; at the time my sister was doing sound and management for blues singer and guitarist, Bluesman Willie Phillips from Georgia. I would travel with them to their shows and I really learned the blues firsthand from Willie. And with John’s help I was playing harmonica well enough to play with a band in less than a Year. That was the year I joined my first blues Society, The Central Jersey Blues Society. Later I would move to St. Louis, where I quickly developed my singing and playing style, and toured with a band called Millbury, playing in Memphis, Nashville, Little Rock, Kansas City, and New Orleans. Then I moved back to Phoenix, where I started my own R&B Band, The King Gypsy Caravan. After 8 years, I had to disband that group when I oved back to the California (Sacramento).
Describe your show.
Well, originally, the Blues Shows was myself and Mojo Parker alternating weeks. But recently Mojo, has been touring, so I’ve been doing all the shows. Now for me, the Blues Show on WQSV is a chance to really explores the roots and influence of the blues across the music spectrum, not just old and new blues, but the history, the stories and the many, many tentacles that run ‘blue” from popular music to ragtime, to blues to bluegrass and jazz, R&B, as Rock’nRoll and Country, Metal…wherever it takes us.
Who are some of your favorite musicians and why?
Dr. John – he’s funny, funky, knows old and new music, and kept New Orleans music alive; Al Green, I want to be him when I grow up; Bonnie Raitt, she’s just great, as well as Rickie Lee Jones. Elvis Costello, great musician and songwriter, John Sebastian for obvious reasons, Neil Young for his songwriting, Ian Anderson for his songwriting and style. And of course, Ray Charles and Mozart….
What is your first memory involving music?
My aunt’s Motown records in the 60’s when I was very little. And going to black church’s in the south to listen to Gospel Choirs…
What was the first concert you attended?
Steppenwolf as a child, but then as a teenager, my first concert was seeing the band “War” in San Diego, CA. The Batles and James Brown, and of course “Soul Train”!!
How do you go about building your show?
I like to pick a fun theme and build a show around it, building a framework of blues history, and showing how it evolved and changed over time. Last week was “The Mississippi Blues Trail”…. Plus interesting interview and sound bytes to mix things up…. I try not to talk too much. I’d like to have guests in the future to feature their music and their favorite tunes in the future…
Do you have any particular criteria when selecting music for your show?
It just needs to have blues roots….. Or express the evolution or revolution of blues to and from it’s roots.