Episode 1: Ty Hanson

Episode 1 features Gene’s conversation with Ty Hanson, a musician who played with Frank Sinatra, The Jackson 5, James Brown, and many more. Hanson, 76, was a drummer and trombonist, and got his start on the so-called Chitlin Circuit, “a collection of performance venues throughout the eastern, southern, and upper midwest areas of the United States that provided commercial and cultural acceptance for African-American musicians, comedians, and other entertainers during the era of racial segregation in the United States” (source: Wikipedia). He says he played 355 straight days with B.B. King, touring the Jim Crow South on a bus and remembering the blues legend as “quite the gentleman.” Hanson credits his mother, a jazz singer, with inspiring him to take up the drums at age 12, and his wife and best friend, Cheryl, for helping him reach “certain pinnacles of music and life itself,” calling her “a great voice in his success.” (Cheryl was on hand for the interview but remained off mic.)

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