This was one of the most flat-out enjoyable reads I’ve had in a long time. I have seen Katie perform many times, heard her talk on the radio several times, and even chatted with her personally a few times. I knew her as a talented musician and entertaining storyteller but I did not know her as a writer. Others, it seems, have been aware of Laur’s writing skills for some time. It’s my impression that nothing other than the foreword, an introduction, and Katie’s acknowledgments was written specifically for this book. In one of the book’s essays, Katie talks of selling her writing and says she sold everything she wrote. From that, I assume that each of the essays and stories that make up Red Dirt Girl has previously appeared in print somewhere. Where I don’t know and regret that where ever it was, it was outside my field of vision. That I am only now seeing the literary side of Katie is very much my loss. This gal can write.

She writes about growing up in Tennessee, Michigan, and Alabama and the family and music that was so important to her. She writes about the Cincinnati music scene, and many other scenes in the city too. She writes about life as a touring musician traveling by van to regional bluegrass festivals and national radio shows. She writes about staking out her own spot on radio with nearly three decades of Music From The Hills Of Home. And she writes about all of those things with insights that show she was never just singing or talking; she was also listening and watching.

Laur and I arrived in Cincinnati within a year or so of each other so I’m familiar with many of the people and places she writes about. I remember Caledonia, Mister Spoons, and Johnny Rosebud. I remember Aunt Maudie’s (where I almost certainly first saw Katie perform) and the still-thriving Arnold’s. But I remember these things as a customer or audience member while Katie remembers them as an insider. Her memories not only wake up some of my own but also augment them and maybe make me appreciate them even more.

She also writes about people and places I’ve had no personal contact with at all. In fact, that applies to most of the book’s subjects. While those writings don’t awaken any of my own memories, they are every bit as entertaining as those that do and more educational too.

Being a resident of southwest Ohio during the last third of the twentieth century certainly makes some of the subjects of the stories more familiar but I don’t know that it makes any of the stories better. Laur made her living as a musician so a goodly portion of the book’s content is music related but far from all of it. Bluegrass was her forte so many of the writings that are music related concern bluegrass musicians, venues, and festivals — but far from all of them. I’m fairly confident that reading this book will be flat-out enjoyable no matter where you live and even if you’re not a fan of bluegrass or any other sort of music. Of course, if you did spend some of the last four or five decades in or near Cincinnati and are a bluegrass musician or maybe even a bluegrass fan, you just might be in the book.

Red Dirt Girl: Essays and Stories, Katie Laur, Orange Frazer Press (2022), 6 x 9 inches, 309 pages, ISBN 978-1949248-593

Available direct from the publisher, Orange Fraser Press, and at local bookstores, Iris Book Cafe and Urban Eden.

This book brought back some memories, corrected others, and filled in gaps I didn’t even know I had. And I was only here for the last quarter of the covered period. For the years before I moved to Cincinnati, it confirmed some rumors and filled in some blanks. Its author, Steven Rosen, has done an awful lot of writing both as an employee (Cincinnati Enquirer, Denver Post) and as a freelancer (NY Times, LA Times, Cincinnati Magazine, etc.). He is currently serving as Contributing Visual Arts Editor for Cincinnati CityBeat as well as continuing to freelance. With a resume like that, it’s surprising to learn that this is Rosen’s first book.

True to its title, the book is organized by the venues where concerts took place, but venues only matter because of the events they host, and those events are what is really at the heart of Lost Cincinnati Concert Venues of the ’50s and ’60s. The two venues in the subtitle are great examples. The Surf Club operated at the beginning of the 1960s and became known for hosting comedians like Lenny Bruce, Dick Gregory, Henny Youngman, and Phyllis Diller; musicians such as Sarah Vaughan, Peter, Paul, & Mary, and Julius La Rosa; and acts like The Smothers Brothers and Homer & Jethro who were a bit of both. Ludlow Garage rose at the end of the decade with performances by Alice Cooper, the Allman Brothers, Santana, the Kinks, and a whole bunch more. People may or may not remember that the Surf Club had taxidermied swordfish on the walls or that the Ludlow Garage had some really big chairs, but remembering where you saw Phyllis Diller or the Allman Brothers is a certainty.

Cincinnati is a border town with some Kentucky venues as accessible to residents as many in Cincinnati itself. Rosen’s first chapter is, in fact, titled “Northern Kentucky”. He acknowledges the Beverly Hills and Lookout House showrooms but seems to feel that their notoriety has brought them enough attention. He focuses on some lesser-known places like the Sportsman’s Club (where the Drifters once performed), the Copa Club (Miles Davis, Sam Cooke, and more), and Stagman’s Flamingo Dance Club (Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, et. al.).

Rosen describes and locates the venues then fleshes them out with tales of the acts that played there and the people who owned and managed them. In the case of the northern Kentucky clubs, ownership might have a little organized crime involved and Rosen discusses that too.

There is also a chapter on “Downtown Cincinnati” (Living Room, Albee Theater) and one called “Neighborhoods and Beyond”. There are lots of neighborhoods in Cincinnati and Rosen doesn’t get to all of them but here’s a sampling of the neighborhood-venue-performer combinations he does get to: Walnut Hills, New Cotton Club, Aretha Franklin; Eastern Avenue, Vet’s Inn, Albert Washington; Western Hills, Hawaiian Gardens, Lonnie Mack.

Some venues get their own chapters. In addition to the subtitle’s Surf Club and Ludlow Garage, there’s Cincinnati Gardens, Seven Cities, Babe Bakers, Hyde Park-Mount Lookout Teen Center, and Black Dome. Gene Autry played the Gardens long before that Everly Brothers headlined show with Rodgers, Holly, Anka, Cochran, et.al., and in the years that followed, the Stones, Beatles, James Brown, Bob Dylan, and just about everybody else played there.

One act and one event also get their own chapters. The act, not surprisingly, is the Beatles who played Cincinnati twice; once at Cincinnati Gardens and once at Crosley Field. The event is the Cincinnati Summer Pop Festival of June 13, 1970. It was also held at Crosley Field and Rosen uses the chapter to mention that the Ohio Valley Jazz Festival took place there from 1964 to 1970. With acts like Traffic, Mountain, Grand Funk Railroad, and Bob Seger, the Pop Festival was a major event and Rosen can certainly be forgiven for stretching the ’50s and ’60s by a few months. Back in those days, people apparently sometimes brought pineapple upside-down cake and peanut butter to concerts giving fans something to remember Alice Cooper (cake) and Iggy Pop (peanut butter) by.

Rosen used some of his own memories in this book and combed through a lot of local papers and other publications. He also contacted many of the others who were actually there. Jim Tarbell, of Hyde Park Center and Ludlow Garage fame, provided the forward. He also provides a telling comment about loss at the end of the ’60s. Reflecting on rock becoming big business, he says, “It was baptism by fire to realize how quickly the whole scene changed from peace and love to money.”

Even though it’s not exactly about peace and love and money, the book’s final sentence does make a thoughtful observation on the loss of a major Cincinnati concert venue. “Crosley Field is now lost but is still dearly missed by fans of both Cincinnati baseball and Iggy Pop.”

Lost Cincinnati Concert Venues of the ’50s and ’60s: From the Surf Club to Ludlow Garage, Steven Rosen, The History Press (Jan 10, 2022), 6 x 9 inches, 176 pages, ISBN 978-1467147217

Available multiple places including Arcadia Publishing (History Press) but I suggest going straight to the guy who wrote it: StevenRosen.net.