Bridgeport’s resident Poet Laureate Timothy “Ace” Holleran experienced some pretty cool company during his days as a professional musician, mostly behind a drum kit.
Jennifer Warnes, oh my. What a silky voice. Her vocal on Right Time Of The Night, written by Bridgeport’s own Peter McCann soared to Number 1 in 1977.
Ace shares that story and more in this gem of a holiday card.
Yep, those magical, not-quite-frosty times. The front page of the Post announcing the number of shopping days until Christmas. Maybe I’d get one Thursday evening with my folks Downtown.
Main Street was suitably spangled. Slow-moving, Detroit metal on the byways in finned glory. People actually talking. “Hey Dad, that’s Doctor Tackacs!” Visits to Read’s and Howland’s. Floors of delight with pneumatic cash cylinders hissing about in serpentine tubes. Mysterious, gloved ladies running the elevators, collapsing pantograph doors. A club sammy at Woolworth’s, maybe some hot cashews from Morrows for the CRL ride home.
No need to watch A Christmas Story. We had it for real, our own “Silver Bells,” come to life.
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Cut to 1969. A folk singer from Bronx Ave. in the North End, Rick McDonald, gave me a call. His band needed a drummer. It seemed a record producer had “discovered” them and wanted to bring them into the studio. My Slingerlands sat in our Black Rock basement, dormant in blue-agate splendor. The producer, Paul Leka (a former Bassick hoopster), knew what he wanted. He had written a tune, “Going to Bethel,” an ode to the recent White Lake Music and Arts Fair. In one day at RCA Studio A in Manhattan (where both Sinatra and Elvis had recorded), we cut some tracks, including “I’m in Love,” which became the record’s B side. And we were renamed Route 17.
Two events also occurred that day. I totally botched a take (from the booth came, “Way to go, Ace.”) and I met a piano player, a guy from Gregory Street, between Park and “Arnistan,” named Pete McCann. He told me, “I’ve got a band. A serious band. You should join us.” So, in one afternoon, I gained a nickname and a career. Both stuck with me for years.
The Route 17 record didn’t hit. In a meeting with Leka and some cohorts, I heard them fooling around with a little chant, something like, “Na na hey boy.” And the rest is history. A malfunctioning radiator gave the guys a band name, Steam.
I did more sessions for Paul Leka at Connecticut Recording Studios, on that same Main Street in Bridgeport. In a closet there, I found an odd-shaped, green tambourine. Yep Paul wrote and produced that solid-gold chestnut for The Lemon Pipers.
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Meanwhile, I stayed with Pete McCann, recording three albums with the Repairs Band, under the aegis of Andrew Loog Oldham, founding producer of some Jaggery band from England. Repairs eventually moved to LA. One afternoon, Pete played a song he’d been fooling around with. “Sun goes down/On a silky day/Quarter moon walkin’ through the Milky Way.”
I said, “That’s a hit.” And so it was the right time of the night for Jennifer Warnes.
I was back in Beepo, playing in the pit at the Downtown Cabaret, when Pete called again. He flew me out to Hollywood to drum a bit on his first album. No, I didn’t get to play on “Do You Wanna Make Love,” but gold it went. Twice gold, internationally.
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Leka and McCann didn’t stop there. Connecticut Recording blossomed above the HL Green store on Main. Harry Chapin, with Paul producing, cut “Cat’s in the Cradle” there. Paul brought in some REO band from Illinois, who recorded their first two albums while living in Westport.
Pete McCann moved to Nashville where he penned a good number of hits, both country and mainstream, for artists like Anne Murray, Whitney Houston and Julio Iglesias.
Mortal coils have shuffled for both songwriters. I now write more than drum. This story ain’t about me, anyway.
But it is about those wonderful songs, songs of our city. As Christ—sorry, Holidaytime—this year, maybe light a tree, pour some glőgg, get cozy—and remember those tunes from sons of Park City. Songs to be proud of.
Oh yeah, Route 17 is still on YouTube.
