Fiddling Around

“Fiddlin’ Phil” Salazar, nearly as ubiquitous as bouncers or those girls who will dance with everyone but you, is definitely no stranger to local night life. Salazar, the guy with the beard, the baseball cap and the smile, seems to be in every local band, or else sits in with every local band. It seems like he’s played with everyone but the Daddyz, formerly the Ska Daddyz.

“Yeah. I’d like to play with them, too,” said Salazar during a recent interview. The Daddyz gig will have to wait, but Salazar won’t. On Tuesday night he’ll be at Cafe Voltaire with the Rincon Ramblers, that band of local acoustic all-stars.

“The Rincon Ramblers started as a Monday-night bowling league band and we’d just jam for fun,” he said. “We did that for a year or more--that was my favorite band because we never practiced and never performed. Then someone booked a gig, and now we have an album and regular gigs.”

Not that the Ramblers are in any danger of overwork--they usually practice once and play twice a month. Another of Salazar’s bands, Acadiana, is on a similar schedule but plays different stuff. While the Ramblers do acoustic folk, bluegrass and rock, Acadiana is a wild Cajun and zydeco dance band.

“The people in Acadiana had heard of me and called me up, but it took a year before I ever played with them,” he said. “I played with them once and then it took another year before I ever played with them again. Now I’m their permanent part-time fiddle player. I’m a permanent part-time member of all the bands I’m in.”

Here’s what a typical Salazar weekend entails: At the recent Acadiana CD release party in Oxnard, Salazar walked off the stage at the end of the gig, then drove to LAX and flew to Florida, then rented a car and drove a couple of hours to another gig with John McEuen, formerly of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.

“I play with the Rincon Ramblers and Acadiana, and sometimes the Cache Valley Drifters on Wednesday nights in Santa Barbara, but I tour with John McEuen & the String Wizards. I sit in with Southern Cross and Raging Arb & the Redheads, but since 1995, I’ve been freelancing and stopped producing bands myself,” he said. “. . . Now I never practice, I just show up.”

Perhaps Salazar never practices anymore, but he used to--a lot. Must be the genes. Salazar’s father is Frank Salazar of Ventura County Symphony fame.

“My father made me play violin as a young child. I started when I was 5 and I had to practice every day up until high school while my friends were outside playing. Later, I quit the violin and I started playing percussion and drums in my father’s symphony. I didn’t like practicing then, but I’m glad now. It’s the only thing I know how to do.”

Some of his proficiency comes from the days in the early ‘70s when Salazar used to hang around and play on street corners for tips.

“In 1972, I was playing violin with a guitar player, playing on Main Street for tips doing Beatles and Cat Stevens songs,” he said. They were playing in Colorado “when a guy with a banjo came up and said, ‘That’s pretty cool, but have you heard bluegrass?’ He took us back to his place and turned us on to a lot of bluegrass music such as the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.

Over the last two decades, Salazar has been in several bands, produced seven albums and gained a national reputation as a master of his craft.

“In 1974, I started a band called Hand Picked, which was sort of like the Rincon Ramblers with different players,” he said. “Then in 1982, I started the Phil Salazar Band--my mother named that band. Each of those bands lasted eight years. In fact, Hand Picked is still going--they play in Japan and Europe. That was the only band I’ve ever been in that ever made any money. . . . Later, I was in the Acousticats for five years.”

These days, Salazar spends six days a week at Heck Music Center in Ventura, where he gives music lessons to the next generation of violin players. Few will make it into the rock ‘n’ roll big time.

“I’ve been teaching since 1982, and so far, I have two students that play better gigs than I do,” he said. “One of them tours all over the country playing bluegrass, and another I saw the other night on Jay Leno backing up Willie Nelson. Some will play in symphonies, but the largest percentage of musicians don’t make money at it. In the ‘70s, there were a few violin players like Papa John Creach; now there’s Dave Matthews and that’s about it.”

Yet teaching can have its rewards, such as when the students actually learn something.

“Performing is mostly my hobby now,” he said. “My students are my day job. I have about 50 students now learning violin, mandolin, guitar and one banjo player. I love teaching. . . . The most important thing is I want them to have fun playing music like I do. It can’t get much better than this--sitting around here drinking Diet Pepsi all day.”

Haven’t you wondered about the difference between a violin and a fiddle? As it turns out, it’s like asking a person from Massachusetts and another from Southern California to pronounce “vase.”

“It’s mostly style,” Salazar said. “For Beethoven, you play a violin. For the Rincon Ramblers, you play a fiddle.”

BE THERE

Rincon Ramblers on Tuesday, 7:30 p.m., Cafe Voltaire, 34 N. Palm St., Ventura. $5. 641-1743.