Dave Dowling, St. Augustine Singer/Songwriter
I have sometimes described myself as “a writer who owns a guitar.” Actually I own several, plus a banjo, a mandolin, 2 button accordions, a stand-up bass, lots of harmonicas, penny whistles, and kazoos. I am not a “jazz musician” – except for the kazoo. Jazz kazoo is easy.
I have been a professional performer since my late teens and I love doing it. If someone asks “Are you going to play?” I say “Oh no, I’m going to work.” If someone asks “Are you going to work?” I say “Oh no, I’m going to play!”
There is no difference in my opinion. The only real division in my life is whether I am asleep or awake. In spite of withstanding some hard knocks in life, I am a very, very lucky man.
I have now made 5 CDs since 1994, three of them since April, 2007. I don’t really care for categorizing my songs – I did that when I owned Old Favorites Record Shop from 1981 – 1995. If a club owner asks “What kind of music do you play?” I say “I study your audience and play what I think will make you and your employees the most money.” If a patron asks that while I am setting up, I say “Why don’t you order a pitcher of beer and a sandwich and you tell me in half an hour.” If I am playing a “folk festival” I’ll call it folk music – a really broad and funny term, in my opinion. I really like Duke Ellington’s response to a journalist: “There are only two kinds of music – good and bad.” I would like to be remembered as a songwriter and performer who had a lot of soul and humor and basically told the truth about life. I play a lot of “blues” and “country” and know a lot about the music of the British Isles. I am currently obsessed with Bahamian music since a visit there last year. Since the early 70s I have done hundreds of school gigs, and once even ran a workshop in Jacksonville to “teach school teachers how to present both African and European “folk” music to their students. That was a lot of fun. I have also, since the early 70s, played for elderly people in hospitals, assisted living facilities, and nursing homes. In the mid-70s I played for terminally ill children at George Washington Hospital in Washington, D.C. I seem to have been a “musical therapist” before I knew what one is. It is instinctive to me and I credit my parents G.G. and Edith Bannister Dowling. They did similar work without a guitar and taught me the importance of “giving back” to society.
I seem to have been a nice enough guy to befriend many outstanding musicians everywhere I have lived. Depending on who plays or records with me, the music changes category. To me, a song is simply a vehicle that can be driven anywhere we want it to go. “The song is King” as my buddy Jim Quine (of The House Cats) says.
Saint Augustine has been my home since Spring of 1980 and I have had the pleasure of knowing and working with some of the finest musicians and human beings imaginable. Jim and I played in Salt Run Bluegrass Band from 1985 to 1995, our final gig being with the remarkable John Hartford. Band members were originally me, Jim, Tommy Mechling, and Chris Stuart (currently leader of the California bluegrass band Backcountry – do yourself a favor and check them out!). When Chris moved away, Salt Run enlisted Lis Williamson (currently of The Driftwoods and VTW), Eric Searcy (also the Driftwoods), and Eddie Wolford, who currently has a bluegrass band up North somewhere. I sure miss that band. I played the big doghouse bass We often had the honor of backing up former Bluegrass Boy, fiddler Chubby Wise when he played in North Florida. He was a member of Bill Monroe’s original band with Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs. Playing with the late Gamble Rogers in the last years of his life was certainly a highlight. I consider him my number one musical and story-telling mentor. I am a lucky man.
Tommy and I had met in Alexandria, Virginia in 1974 and played around the Eastern Seaboard as The Bunkhouse Boys. We are all still great friends and help each other on musical projects although we are in different bands.
My current band is The St. Augustine Ramblers. Jim Brady (formerly of Nashville) plays “a little bit” of guitar and sings. Shari Sax plays saxophone and flute and also sings. Sometimes I do solo gigs and sometimes duos with either Jim or Shari. This is a new band and we are excited about the future. Since Shari has a beautiful 3 year old daughter and a professor job, Jim and I do the long distance gigs.
When I am on the road by myself, my sidemen are The Noseeums. See ‘em? I do.
Some other of the St. Augustine musicians I have played and recorded with are: Bill Austin, Rob Piazza, Sam Milner, Bob Hensley, Bob Wilhelm, Doug Richard, Chip Herrington, Dick Kraft, Rocky Blaze, the late John Westbrook, my younger daughter Susannah Dowling (11 at the time), Steve Buell, Vince Jeffs, Mike Hart, Lon Williamson, Janine Newfield, Ed “Pops” Thomas, Drew Dixon, Jim Stafford (owner of Eclipse Recording Studio), Long John Higginbotham, and Bonnie Ferrari, and Julie Vaill Gatlin.
Some “out-of-towners” who have recorded with me are: Fiddlin’ Jack Schuster, Bob Kogut, Neil Thomas (of The Five Chinese Brothers), Markus Dietrich, Beek Webb (“The Flash of Coosaw Island”), Mike Metis, and Allan Block (“Dean of the New England Fiddlers”).
I am also currently recording with Long John and Stan Lynch (formerly of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers) on a project.
I often perform with Tommy Bledsoe and The Old City Farmers. I have performed with so many that it would take a week to list them all. I don’t even recall the names of all the people I was busking with in England, France, and Germany in the 1970s.
I have a slight distaste for name-dropping, but since I have been asked to, here we go: A few of the people I have “opened” for are: Norman and Nancy Blake, Chris Smither, Catfish Hodge, Guthrie Thomas, Jonathan Edwards, James Talley, and Steve Riley and The Mamou Playboys.
I have “shared the stage” with many. A favorite way to perform is sitting on stage with other songwriters “in the round” and taking turns – the Austin City Limits way.
I would say that hearing Bob Dylan in the early 60s changed my life. My high school yearbook picture has me sitting in a bathroom sink with guitar and harmonica rack. The caption is “Don’t sink twice, it’s all right.”
I don’t intend to sink. I know a lot about keeping boats afloat. May the wind be always in our sails. I hope you can find me playing my songs somewhere. Thanks for time spent reading this.