| On Call |
| Tony Piacenta |
Tony's bio:
| Well , I guess it’s safe to say my musical background is a bit sketchy and sporadic. At the age of about 7 years old is when I think I first became aware of my love of music and it’s power to touch people…..thanks mostly by me becoming aware of these four "Lads from Liverpool" , you might have heard of them,…..they were called The Beatles. To this day, I still carry with me a true passion for that whole Fab Four phenomenon , their wide variety of great tunes they provided to the world , the awesome memories those timeless songs still stir up in me and what they did to revolutionize the world of rock and roll. I still can clearly remember several great summers as a kid , me and my friends constructing homemade guitars out of cardboard cutouts fastened to baseball bats , complete with drawn in strings, pickups, volume knobs, etc. We’d play those Beatle records over and over again, using that little record player on my backyard patio at my home , acting out that music , fantasizing we were playing it ourselves. Believe it or not , we even convinced some of our "girlfriends" back then to be our "go go" dancers while we acted out the songs and once we even charged admission and put on show for a group of parents in the neighborhood. !!! Around that same time in my life I began tinkering with the drums on my uncle’s drumset whenever I would visit my grandparents in Wethersfield on the weekends. All the while listening to and playing along to Beatles and other classic 60’s rock tunes. When I was about 10 or 11, I received my own set of drums ( the most memorable Christmas I can recall ! ). A few years later I got involved with a rock band and we used to practice songs at my house ( god bless my parents ! ) I was the drummer and we even used to play a gig every now and then , school dances, etc. This "garage band" phase lasted about 2 or 3 years years. When I was about 16 yrs old I decided I wanted to sell my drums to get some cash . I became more interested in my girlfriend and a car. Yeah, sounds stupid to me too. ! The whole music part of me was sort of put on hold…for quite a while, why ?? …I don’t know. !! Fast forward about decade or so ……I hadn’t really done anything with music since I was 16 years old !! Then one day some old friends invited me to a little jam session. They asked me to come over and sing while they played some songs. As time went on me and the guys eventually mastered several cover tunes and were asked to start performing at a local bar once a month. So there it was …. I was the lead singer in this rock band and I can remember being up there at these gigs ,singing away, often thinking to myself " what happened …. how the heck did I end up here, doin’ this " ?? It was a bit surreal and strange , but a blast !!! Well this "lead singer / rock band" phase lasted about a year. After leaving the band I received a used guitar as a gift and just started fooling with it at home in my spare time. This solo tinkering became quite an enjoyable way to pass the time and this phase lasted about 5 years. During this time I became more aware that I really did miss performing live music in front of people. Then while at an employee karaoke party in 1996, I realized that a fellow employee at the time ( Greg "Ziggy" Zigmont ) and I sounded pretty darn good singing several karaoke tunes together. We and several others enjoyed the sounds of our harmonizing voices…it was a nice blend. I then learned that Ziggy was also a big Beatle fan like myself and that he also was currently spending time at home fooling with the guitar. "COOL" !!! Well it didn’t take long before we were plotting and scheming on bringing our guitars into work once or twice a week , planning out little private music sessions. After our second shift schedule would end we would seek out a secluded quiet spot to play / learn some tunes. Sometimes we would play for hours lasting until about 3 am !!! Eventually, after quite a few months, we had several songs under our belt and people who heard some of our sounds suggested we should start performing at clubs. At this point in time , I simply laughed at the thought… it was the furthest thing from my mind…. however as time continued to roll on and we became tighter musically and personally , I realized it was something feasible and might actually be fun to venture into. It wasn’t too long after that, 1998 I believe , that we walked into a bar with our guitars and performed a somewhat tacky ,but good , live audition for the new owner , hoping to get booked for a gig. Thankfully he really liked us and liked what he heard. It was official ….we received our first official booking as an acoustic / rock duo. And ya know what they say…. " THE REST IS HISTORY " !! |
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