LLOYD READING DISCUSSES THE BLACK BOOARD DAYS AND SINGS TO COLLEGE CLASS. GRAD STUDENTS LEARNED ABOUT THE BAKERSFIELD SOUND AND BEFORE


Photos by:Dr. BLT, Hank Ray, and some random dude. (copyright 2008 Nu Bako Sound Recordings/Krocker Records)





Here are "da boys" at the gas station on the "Grape Vine" , on the way up to the gig.
It was a really fun trip, Dr. BLT drove and Lloyd and I road along. Bruce and Lloyd and some great debates and conversations and topped it off with Lloyd's great dust bowl stories. I picked my black,resonator guitar


Here Lloyd Reading and Hank Rayplay for the fans. Note the special guest above!




Above:Lloyd Reading sings and played guitar at The College of the canyons (Photo courtesy of : Dr. BLT; copyright 2008 Nu Bako Sound Recordings/Krocker Records)
Hank Ray sings "Black Board Love Song" in upper middle photo above.(Photo courtesy of : Dr. BLT; copyright 2008 Nu Bako Sound Recordings/Krocker Records) Llod Reading plays lead guitar for Hank.






Abobe
Above Lloyd posseswith some of his adoring fans.






Country music legend, Lloyd read sign autographs for fans in a magazine he was featured in. Lloyd really captured the imagination and heart of the audience with his captivating ballads.




Here is the 3of us joking around and congratulating each other on a job well done. Exposing some more younger folks to our traditional music and performance style.


Rockwell Canyon road,the street the college is on, Bruce and I are writing a song by that name. This is the name of our buddy at Trouts as well.





Dr. Bruce and Lloyd dine on the memorries of tonights performance.Lloyd interwieved his personal recolections of the dust bowl and the early music that sprang from it between songs.



Here is Lloyd Reading and myself holding Dr. BLT's card at the burger joint, this was right after the performance at the College of the Canyons in Valencia. Dr BLT had set up the performance to correspond with the curriculum for a large class of graduate students. It was the best audience I had ever played for.


Here is a photo taken by the waitress at the Island Resteraunt there in Canyon Country, just a little east of the College. To quote Samual L.Jackson in the film "Puilp Fiction", -"now that's a taste burger!".



Here is Lloyd after dinner, we ravaged a set of burgers. After this Dr, Blt and I dropped Lloyd at went on home with some great new memories.



Here Dr. BLT drops Lloyd off at his Bakersfield home where he lives with his daughter Anna. We got him home about 10:30. Thanks Lloyd, job well done.



Reading in College (the song)
words and music by Dr BLT copyright 2008 Nu Bako Sound Recordings/Krocker Records
Media (Permission obtained)


In Vygotsky's sociopsychological theory of human development, mentoring, or something I've frequently referred to as "cross-generational mentoring," is deemed essential to the healthy development of children and adolescents. Having folks from an older generation share their talents, their songs, and their stories with folks from younger generations is crucial to the formation of identity in developing children. Furthermore, this sort of bonding experience is essential in terms of a child attaining a sense of being connected to something larger than him/herself. Cross-generational mentoring is the key to attaining a sense of one's roots, one's culture, one's community, and one's history.

In the Developmental Psychology course I teach at Chapman University on Rockwell Canyon Rd. on the College of the Canyons campus in Valencia, California, I try to bring theory to life by offering living examples.

89-year-young Bakersfield sound legend, Lloyd Reading, who jammed with all of the greats associated with the birth of the Bakersfield sound, and who was right smack dab in the middle of this exciting movement as it was spawning some of our greatest country stars, is the living embodiment of Vygotsky's theory of human development, involving mentoring.

Lloyd was offering songs and stories to my students that depicted a very personal history involving the old days when he migrated with his family from Oklahoma to California in the midst of the California gold rush, and began his career and enduring legacy as a Kern County country star. He laid the groundwork for Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, though he would always be humbly standing just one short step behind the spotlight of giants like these.

I call Lloyd Reading the Kern County country music conduit. He is taking the lead among all others in bringing the Bakersfield sound of yore to new generations that hunger to be connected to something bigger than themselves--something bigger than the here and now.

After downing a some burgers and fries at Islands on Valencia Avenue, we began taking the ride back to Bakersfield, on the same grapevine Lloyd once traveled by foot. As we drove back, Hank Ray, one of the most promising among the new crop of Bakersfield-sound-grounded artists, entertained Lloyd and myself with spontaneously spawned choruses to what may soon develop into fully-arranged tunes that chronicle our visit.

We took Lloyd with us. We wish we could take him with us wherever we go. We took a living legend to the classroom. We took the country to the city, and the city will never be the same.