1966-1967 - "The Outcasts" - Pleasantville, New York merged with Biancanello Family/ I live (ch. 9) TV "Wonderama", school, orphanages, church, father friend of Leonetti Family with Bell Records.
1969 Mom and I moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, snuck into clubs to drink colas and sit in - the club Zircon Jacks, The Cambridge Commons concerts joined Orange Wedge. A local bunch of kids who played with fire and gusto for poor kids club: Surf Nantastic", I toured with Jake and The Family Jewels, and headliner Bo Didley. The series called "Summer That" met David Bloom whom I studied under a bit.
1970 - Joined "Ham Bone" Stanley Steele, Stephan Sattler, Matt Allen, Sean Benjamin, Steve Jacobs, and my late friend Paul Freedlander, "a master at ideas".
1972 - My main guitar teacher was Paul Lenart who took me under his wing, where, other friend and teacher Bob Margolan taught lessons. Paul took me to a festival at Windom College, Vermont and I ended up playing with him - an 8000 crowd stage. He later would do many great things for me.
1973 - Through Paul Lenart (he was leaving his band and joining "T-Bone Walker's band. I took the job and I was with Bill Briggs and his band, "Funky Potatoes". I realized how much he cared about me and he and Bill Briggs and Company. It's what I try to do now for younger players.
Bill had just finished with the Boston band "Barry And The Remains. I met Barry Tasheon at a concert in Lincoln, Nebraska. The Remains were on Epic Records and had toured with the Beatles on their first American tour.
1973 - Summertime my father got a job writing for Nebraska Educational Television. I tried to go to school, but was thrown out because I was playing again with Jim "Cid" Cidlik (an original Heartmurmur) and David Trupp from Zagar and Evans band, who at that time, was the best drummer I knew.
1974 - Returned to East Coast to form a group with Tommy Flanders (Polygram - Christal). We played at Phill Ramone's A&R Studios and a couple New York gigs like cafe "Wha", who was owned by Richie Havens. Tommy was having me study guitarists like Merle Travis, Johnny Burnette, Pop Staples and Duane Eddy, Wayne Cochrin, and Scotty Moore. We were going in at night (A&R Studios) and negotiating record deals with A.B.C. Dunhill and Don Kirshner Records.
Tommy Flanders was an original song writer and founder of "The Blues Project" with Al Cooper, Danny Kalb and the others but left them to do material similar and with Eric Anderson on Verve Records. Tommy's concept was to get a rockabilly sound and combine it with rhythm and blues. We worked under the agency (Boston) of Jon & Lea Seduca whom I was recommended by Billy Briggs from my guitar work with him.
The recession hit and so I joined up with an old friend from Warner Brothers, Phil Greene and Kenny Lyons (Columbia label). This is the time things got going. Phil and I wrote a song "Love Me The Way I Am", which was bought outright and the money was used to form Normandy Studios in Warren Rhode Island. The band lasted, again with me the last.
1975 - I met, through my guitar teacher from Cambridge, Massachusetts Aaron "T Bone" Walker a few years back and was introduced to his manager Robin Hemmingway - I was hired as this new guitarist. I stayed with Robin awaiting his return - which took three weeks. A sad day when we received news of his death. I had sat in with him a lot at "Jacks", because in the end he played piano and sang incredibly!
1976 - I joined the Back Slap Blues Band which based itself out of Petersborough, New Hampshire. They were later to become members of "Roomfull of Blues", with Phill Greene behind the board.
1977 - Received a letter from Larry Boehmer to play in Nebraska again in "Little Jimmy Valentine and the Heart Murmurs", then to become "The Table Rockers", "Not All There", and back to "Little Jimmy Valentine" and "The Heart Murmurs" in the course of twenty three years.
NOW: Still going, but are Rock-A-Boogie Boys with Bobby Lowell,
SEAN BENJAMIN
Delta Blue Coffee
A new CD from Palace Records
After 20 years as workhorse and lynch pin for the house band at the legendary Zoo Bar in Lincoln, Nebraska - the oldest continuously operating blues club in the country - Sean Benjamin is one of the best-kept secrets in the blues world. A child prodigy, he opened for Bo Diddley in 1969 at the age of 14 and sat in with James Cotton, Amos Garette and Muddy Waters when he was 17.
In 1997, Sean Benjamin and Larry Boehmer, owner of the Zoo Bar and winner of the W.C. Handy Award for Lifetime Achievement, celebrate 20 years playing together at the Zoo and other venues where they've served band for Magic Slim, Claude Williams, Snooky Prior, Joe Houstin, William Clarke, Lavelle White, Carey Bell, Earlene Owens, Charlie Musselwhite, Larry Davis and others, and opened for George Thorogood, John Mayall, Muddy Waters, Asleep At The Wheel, Bo Diddley, Jerry Lee Lewis, The Everly Brothers, Jason D. Williams, The Paladins and many more internationally known artists.
Sean is a downhome kind of guy, easy and comfortable. Palace Records is proud to present his solo debut album in which he goes back to his roots - in Sean's words, "The kind of stuff I play on my porch." The CD that resulted is rich, simple and fundamental. It will warm your insides like a great cup of coffee.
Born a blue baby and nearly pronounced dead at birth, Sean Benjamin was one of the first children in America to survive a complete blood transfusion. Today this blue baby - who delights capacity crowds at the Zoo Bar 2-3 nights a week as he has for more than two decades and co-hosts a weekly open stage at Duggan's Pub - comes to you on Delta Blue Coffee.
"Sean Benjamin has been an integral member of the Zoo Bar house band since 1977. He is an amazingly soulful player with a very thorough knowledge of the blues. When it comes to blues guitarists - and I've seen them all - Sean can hang with the very best." - Larry Boehmer, owner of the Zoo Bar.
Palace Records, Lincoln, Nebraska (402) 560-6350
