Steve Fromholz Celebration

Day 5 - May 26

I won’t talk about the storm we kerrvived last night, followed by a mid-morning squall that kept us huddled under awnings until nearly noon today. Let’s just say the rain I wrote about yesterday was, by comparison, a mere spring shower.

Anyway, the skies cleared in time for Celebrating Steve Fromholz at Threadgill Theater this evening. And what a show that was!

As I mentioned in Friday’s post, Fromholz died in a hunting accident earlier this year. Today’s tribute was organized by a crew of his old running buddies: Craig Hillis, Craig Toungate, Fletcher Clark, Dan McCrimmon, and I didn’t catch who all else. It featured an all-star cast of Texas folk and outlaw musicians, with guest appearances by Fromholz daughters Darcy and Felicity, They kept it upbeat and full of laughs. Appropriate, I guess, because that’s how Steve mostly was.

As I’ve admitted on past occasions, I knew next to nothing about Texas folk music when I first came to Kerrville. The redneck rock revolution of the 1960s and '70s mostly escaped my notice. Fromholz was among the leading voices of that movement. So were McCrimmon and Mike Williams, along with Gary P. Nunn and Bob Livingston of the Lost Gonzo Band -- all of whom were here tonight.

Sitting in the audience, I felt once more like that babe in the woods: listening to the guys on stage tell stories about how it all began; how they met and watched each others' kids, how they started playing music together. Stories that happened when I was in high school or just getting into college. Everybody did one or two of Fromholz’ songs. I thought I was familiar with his work, but they did quite a few I’d never heard. Segle Fry was here playing banjo; he’s someone I’ve only seen a couple of times and know mostly from folk legends. And I didn’t know Tommy Elskes even knew these other guys.