July 27, 1974: A band called Summer

 

First sighting of three guys who have long played prominently on local stages. See the Footnote. 

July 27, 1974

‘Summer’ Rocks With Warm Breezes 

MIKE PANEPINTO’S GREETING at the door of his parents’ house in Snyder gets straight to the point:

          “Hi! We don’t have much time. We just got a call from Saia and we’re playin’ the Outside Inn tonight.”

          The other seven members of this six-week-old band called Summer are milling about the living room in a similar state of urgency.

          It’s something you have to expect when you occupy the pinch-hitter’s slot in booking agent Fred Saia’s lineup of local bands. It’s a tough position.

          You need patience, stubbornness and the ability to step into virtually any situation at the last minute and come out looking good.

* * *

“AS SOON AS we got the band going,” Mike says, “I went to Fred because I knew he didn’t have many bands with brass. He’s been putting us in when other groups don’t work out. Now we’re building a name for ourselves and people are starting to call for us.”

          Catching them a week earlier at the Poorhouse East had already shown why. For one thing, unlike many groups with horns, Summer doesn’t base its repertoire on the same old tired Chicago and Blood, Sweat & Tears foundation.

          Fronted by George Garcia, who sings with that kind of Three Dog Night polished energy, and a wall of horns that’s punchy but not blarey, they draw material all the way from Loggins & Messina to Tower of Power and ZZ Top.

          The Chicago and BS&T numbers have been compressed into easily digestible medleys.

* * *

ALL IN ALL, Summer is a band that rocks enough to continually move you while being smart enough and tasteful enough and talented enough to be good for just plain listening. It’s hard to believe they’ve been together for less than two months.

          It was Mike, the drummer, who started planning for a band this summer back around Christmas, sending out letters to every musician he could think of.

          The nucleus, however, is a group of guys he’s played with for years. Most of the rest are Music Department classmates at UB.

          “Paul, Steve, Phil Sims and me all used to be in Dumble’s Dixieland Band,” Mike says, “otherwise known as …”

          “The Sweet Blue Tutti-Fruitti Alligator Shoes,” the other three say in a sing-song chorus. The room dissolves in laughter.

          One reason the band fell together so quickly, trumpet player Paul Juette proposes, is because of experience.

          “We’ve played in so many different organizations,” he says, “and so many different styles – Dixieland jazz, rock, classical, you name it.”

* * *

GEORGE GARCIA, for example, the oldest man in the group, is a UB music major and co-founder of the Puerto Rican Theater & Arts Workshop on Virginia Street.

          He spent several years in New York City as a studio backup singer and was once lead understudy in the Broadway production of “Hair.”

          “I was understudy for about 18 months. I played the lead on and off for about a year,” he says.

          George came to Buffalo, his wife’s hometown, about two years ago. He knows most of the band from UB.

          And sax player Steve Rosenthal, a UB student who also plays woodwinds and flute, played (as did Mike) in George’s workshop production of “Jesus Christ Superstar” last year.

          Trumpeter Phil Christner is a UB music major too, as is trombone player Phil (Ace) Sims, who writes the group’s arrangements. He once played with the rock band Breckenridge.

          A winter replacement already has been lined up for trumpeter Paul Juette, who will be returning to the Manhattan School of Music.

          Waiting for him there are friends in a classical music quartet and an offer to record for the Musical Heritage Society. Paul and Steve were in the band Hernandez together last summer.

* * *

BASS PLAYER Tom Drew is a UB student too, but he’s into arts management.

          Mike is a percussion major at Fredonia State and plans to commute all winter to the group’s gigs and rehearsals.

          In his first year in college in Tennessee, he was part of a group called Crawford that was on the verge of a record contract with Decca.

          Guitarist Bruce Nelson, at 27, is the only other member of the group besides George who isn’t 19 or 20. He’s a Buffalo State graduate, a substitute industrial arts teacher in Buffalo schools and a veteran of rock bands from here to California and back to Georgia.

          “The band was originally 10 pieces,” Mike says. “We had two keyboard players besides the eight of us. The thing is, nobody’s got the money for a 10-piece band.”

          Now that they’re eight – plus equipment manager David (Woodstock) Andresyn, a rocker in his own right with the band Axton-Cross – things are easier, but not much.

          The plan is to get seasoning in clubs through the winter, then polish up the original songs Phil Sims and others in the group are writing and try for a recording deal next summer.

          “Right now though,” Mike says, “we’ve found that people won’t take an eight-piece group unless they’ve got a following. And you can’t get a following unless you play. So we’ve been working one-shot affairs.”

          That situation is changing, however. The Outside Inn gig went so well they were invited back for Aug. 7 and 8.

          They’re doing a five-night stand next Wednesday through Sunday at the Surf Club in Bemus Point.

          On Aug. 10, they do a 1 to 4 p.m. shot for Amherst Cablevision at the Amherst Recreation Center and Aug. 23 and 24 they’re at the Poorhouse East.

* * * * *

IN THE PHOTO: Foreground, from left, Phil Sims, George Garcia, Steve Rosenthal, Tom Drew, Bruce Nelson and Phil Christner. In the tree are Mike Panepinto, left, and Paul Juette.

* * * * *

FOOTNOTE: So many notables in this band. Let’s start with the one I know the best, Steve Rosenthal, whose name is synonymous with the group he helped start in 1978, the Amherst Saxophone Quartet. Mainly a classical ensemble, they’ve performed and recorded extensively. They even appeared on “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” in 1985. In 1998, Jim Santella summed them up in review of their 20th anniversary concert in The Buffalo News:

“The group has recorded six albums for MCA Records, the Musical Heritage Society and Mark Records. These include two recordings of American music, an all-Bach album, an all-Eubie Blake disc, a collaboration with Lukas Foss and a recent jazz recording. Why is the Amherst Saxophone Quartet so successful? The members have a strong sense of humor to go along with an exacting technique and dedication to excellence. … Tenor saxophonist Rosenthal’s glib commentary and light-hearted humor make the music accessible to almost anyone, regardless of their musical background.”

Phil Christner went on to be principal trumpet with the Charleston Symphony Orchestra from 1979 to 1982, then joined the Buffalo Philharmonic during the regime of musical director Julius Rudel. He’s been with the BPO ever since.

Paul Juette did indeed go back to New York City, but he didn’t stay. When he came back to Buffalo in the 1980s, it was to change careers. He graduated from UB Medical School in 1986, did his residency at Buffalo General Hospital and went into emergency medicine with an office in Amherst in the Dent Tower.

Tom Drew lights up towers. His LinkedIn page reports that as president and CEO of Drama Lighting Inc. in Amherst and Manhattan since 1984, he’s done the Hancock Tower in Boston, Mass.; the pediment of Liberty Center Tower in Philadelphia; and the Con Edison Headquarters Tower and the Met Life Tower in New York City.

He also did lighting for the Football Hall of Fame Museum, the U.S. Capitol Visitors Center Museum, shows by Michael Jackson and Siegfried & Roy in Las Vegas, and the Tribute in Light for 9/11 for the Guggenheim Museum in 2002. At UB in the 1970s, he did lighting and sound for the avant-garde Creative Associates.

Three other members of the group – George Garcia, Bruce Nelson and Mike Panepinto – are defying my efforts to track them down on Google.

And then there’s Phil Sims, a mainstay of the music scene here for 40+ years. He became lead trombonist and arranger for the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and toured extensively. More recently, he founded the Buffalo Brass Big Band, from which he's spun off a 17-piece ensemble of top local players called the Musicians of Buffalo Big Band, which appeared regularly at the Sportsmen’s Tavern, and a smaller group called the Phil Sims MOB Horns.

He has written and arranged for the Buffalo Philharmonic, has conducted it in jazz and pops programs and was a guest soloist in a BPO concert with Doc Severinsen. He’s also written for a school and college jazz ensembles and a lot of regional jazz artists, not to mention his commercial work for radio, TV and commercials.

Less admirable was his teaching stint in the Niagara Falls middle schools from 1987 to the early 2000s. A couple of his former students recently filed lawsuits accusing him of sexual abuse. He lost his teaching license in 2004 after he pleaded guilty in a case involving one of the girls and, despite her appeals to the judge for leniency, wound up doing six months in the Niagara County Jail.

* * * * *

FURTHER NOTE: All of these transcripts of old feature articles about the Buffalo music scene can be found in a somewhat more legible and searchable form on my Blogspot site: https://www.blogger.com/blog/posts/4731437129543258237.