Rick Thew, Buddy Rich, and me

In the summer of my 14th year, I bought myself a drum set with money I had earned from picking strawberries and doing a paper route for several years. I'd made a deal with my parents that, in exchange for their allowing me to spend $250 of my own hard-earned money, I would sign up for summer school stageband—and maybe learn how to play my new toy.

There was another drummer in this stageband, a recent transplant from Northern California named Rick Thew. At first glance, he was just a normal 14-year-old kid with a very outgoing personality. But at first listen, he was an enormously gifted drummer, one with all the natural talent of a prodigy plus some professional training. He told me he had taken lessons from both Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart and Moby Grape drummer Don Stevenson.

Crap. Before signing up for this class, I had only played the snare drum in school band and dinked around a little on a friend's starter drum set. I was doomed. Not only would I never get to play on any songs, but this guy Rick would mock me mercilessly when I tried.

Surprisingly, this guy Rick, despite his prodigious talent, wasn't an arrogant jerk. He didn't make fun of me, he didn't criticize me, he didn't condescend in any way whatsoever. In fact, he took me under his wing, rather quickly becoming the mentor I didn't know I needed. And in a very short time, I had learned enough from him to almost sound like I knew what I was doing on the drums.

After stageband ended and school began, Rick and I remained friends and I continued under his tutelage, paying him $2.50 per lesson, once a week, at his house. Eventually I was OK enough on the drums to start playing with some friends in a (pretty awful) rock band.

During one of my drum lessons at Rick's house, he asked me if I'd ever heard of jazz drummer Buddy Rich. I hadn't, so Rick treated me to a few tunes on one of his Buddy Rich albums. Rich was incredible. I couldn't believe a drummer could do what he did.

Then Rick showed me the design he'd recently added to his bass drum head, which had his initials, RT, inside a kind of logo. He told me he'd copied it from the logo on Buddy Rich's bass drum, which looked like this:

Rick asked me if I'd like him to do an RC logo (for Rick Cooper) on my bass drum head, and I said yes. So the next time he was at my house, he did—using an El Marko pen. The beautiful new logo made me feel like I was part of a very exclusive club: Rick Thew, Buddy Rich, and me.

Rick didn't play in the junior high concert band with me and the other percussionists, because he was mainly interested in playing a drum set, not a snare, bass, or cymbals. But we still hung out together, mostly at his house during my weekly lessons. As the year progressed, however, we hung out less and less, probably because Rick was also interested in drama—and girls. By winter he had landed the role of Gandalf the Wizard in the school play, Lord of the Rings, as well as a girlfriend.

So, Rick was not only an immensely talented drummer, but a graphic designer and an actor, as well, and he had a girlfriend.

I hated him.

And I loved him. Especially when he announced that, for my 15th birthday, he had somehow talked his dad into taking us to see Buddy Rich's big band perform at a hotel in downtown Portland. 

I couldn't believe my ears. I was going to see the legendary Buddy Rich play, live in concert. Had I died and gone to drummer's heaven?

I remember exactly two things about the concert: that Buddy Rich and his band were absolutely phenomenal, as expected, and that, during the band's intermission, Rich walked by me, nodded, and said "Hello." 

I was blown away. I felt that he had personally anointed me as his...successor. Or something. 

As if.

Not even the venerable Rick Thew could succeed Buddy Rich (he admitted as much to me himself).

Here's a video of Rich doing a drum solo in 1970, the year Rick Thew and I saw his band in concert:

Flash forward two years, and Rick and I are back together in the high school stageband. At that time, you had to play in the concert band in order to qualify for stageband, so Rick also played with me and the other percussionists in the concert band. I noticed something funny, though, about the way he played in concert band: he would often—maybe even always—follow my lead on the snare drum parts, as if he was unsure about how it should be played. I didn't think much about it at the time, though, because I was so in awe of Rick's playing in stageband (where it was me following his lead most of the time).

At the beginning of our senior year, band director Dale Cleland decided to start treating his concert band percussionists the same as the rest of his musicians: he would audition us for chair assignments, e.g., first chair, second chair, etc. The player who scored the highest on the audition would win first chair—with all the rights, privileges, and responsibilities thereto appertaining (I'm still not sure what they were). 

Cleland gave us each a page of sheet music with about 30 seconds' worth of snare drum music notations on it. We were to take it home, practice, and come in the next day individually—and privately—for the test with Cleland. I had taken piano and guitar lessons when I was younger, so I could read music, no problem. And I practiced the hell out of that sheet music, just to make sure I didn't embarrass myself during the audition. Other than that, it didn't really matter to me, because I knew Rick Thew would beat me—and all the other percussionists.

We did our auditions, I played well enough to avoid total humiliation, and we waited. The next day, Cleland called us each into his office individually and gave us the results.

I had won first chair.

I was stunned. I simply couldn't believe that Rick Thew, the drummer everyone (including me) revered like a god, hadn't won. And I felt badly for him that he hadn't. I couldn't possibly deserve this.

Cleland, however, apparently begged to differ. He told me at the time that even though Rick Thew was the "most naturally gifted drummer I've ever seen," he couldn't give him first chair because Rick couldn't read music well enough.

Aha. That explained why Rick often appeared to be following my lead. Damn. I'd discovered Achilles' heel. And I wasn't happy about it.

Rick wasn't happy, either. He stuck it out with concert band till the end of the quarter, then quit, telling me that he just didn't have time for it in his schedule. He refocused his attention on drama—and girls.

So I finished out my senior year as the only drummer for stageband, except for an occasional "solo duet" with my friend Jaren Balzer*, who was a switch hitter between trombone and drums. (I had played guitar in a band with Jaren back in 7th grade, and he was the drummer.) Being the sole drummer in stageband was fun, but I missed Rick, his cheerful attitude, and his inspiring licks.

Here's an audio recording of me playing drums with the Lakeridge High School stage band, under the direction of Dale Cleland, in 1972. There are two pieces here: "The Gig Is a Gas" and "Swamp Rock Stomp." The latter contains my drum solo, which segued into a drum duet with Jaren Balzer about halfway through. I used a photo of a gold sparkle Gretsch drum set here because that's the set I played in stageband. I wish I had a recording of Rick Thew playing...

Fast forward another four years, and Rick Thew is married and has three kids. He and his wife Marie invite me over for dinner at their cozy little home in Oregon City. Rick tells me he's working at a lumber mill in town and playing drums only occasionally, and mostly on his own. It makes me sad to think he isn't pursuing a career with his musical gift, especially since I would give anything to make a living playing drums, but I also understand how hard it would be to raise a family on a musician's itinerant wages. Sometime during the evening, Rick mentions that he's writing a rock opera and wonders if I'd be interested in playing drums for it when it's finished. "Sure," I reply, knowing what a long shot such an ambitious project is—and also that in reality, Rick and I probably wouldn't see each other again. He had a family now, and chances were good that I'd be following suit in a few years. Our rock 'n roll fantasies were about to become just that—fantasies.

I was right that I wouldn't see Rick again, but I was only partly right about our rock 'n roll fantasies. I ended up playing with several bands through my 20s and 30s, from progressive rock to jazz, and so did Rick. I found out about Rick's drumming exploits in 2017, when we reconnected via Facebook followed by a long, happy phone conversation.

I learned that Rick and his family had lived in several different states while he worked in a variety of jobs, ultimately settling in Battleground, Washington. He told me about his closest brush with fame (playing in a rock band that opened for Blue Öyster Cult) and I told him about mine (playing with Neal Gladstone and Friends on a Portland TV show called 2 at 4, with a purported audience of around 250,000). The funniest thing we talked about was the Buddy Rich concert, which Rick remembered much more clearly than I did. It was funny because he remembered that we had each brought dates to the show (he even remembered their names)—and I didn't. I was there to see Buddy Rich, not pay attention to some girl who probably wasn't even interested in jazz, let alone the world's greatest jazz drummer! (My belated and heartfelt apologies to that poor girl.)

Near the end of our conversation, Rick mentioned that he had had some health issues and wasn't doing well, but that I was welcome to come up for a visit anytime. I told him I was still working full time and had a small homestead to help my wife run, but I would see what I could do. 

I never made it to Battleground.

Just over a year later, I started sensing that something was wrong with Rick. I called to see what was up. Marie answered the phone. She told me Rick had passed away almost a year earlier—not long after we talked. I was devastated that I hadn't made it up to see him.

Love, respect, and gratitude to you, my dear old friend. Your friendship, your expert drum lessons, and your steadfast belief in me helped turn a hopelessly mediocre drummer into one who, by dreaming of becoming Buddy Rich's successor, maybe could've played for a rock opera. I will never forget you, Rick Thew.

*It was Jaren Blazer whose drums I had dinked around on when we played together in that 7th grade band, and it was he who recommended that I buy my drum set from Don Wunn Music in Portland. The guy who sold me my set was a percussionist in the Oregon Symphony named Wayne Mercer (he moonlighted to support a big family). Five years later, Jaren would marry Mr. Mercer's daughter, Diane. I lost touch with Jaren after that, but Jaren, if you're out there: love, respect, and gratitude to you, too, my dear old friend.