One of the Three Suns in Sunny Southern California

One of the touring members of the Three Suns, Joe Vento played the accordion and piano in the Three Suns for many years.   Another website dedicated to the Three Suns has credited Joe Vento for only a few years of service in the Three Suns, but I have found independent documentation to show Joe was possibly more involved as touring member than anyone else besides original member Artie Dunn (organ) after Morty Nevins (accordion) and Al Nevins (guitar) hung up their tour gear.

Joe was also on the tour with Del Casher (guitar) who was highlighted in the last two posts and Artie Dunn  who went on a wildly successful tour of Japan and the Philippines to promote the album "The Three Suns in Japan" that Joe, Del and Artie recorded.

Joe will be playing this Sunday August 28th from 5PM to 8PM at the Las Hadas restaurant at 4098 Balboa Blvd. in Northridge.   Joe will be conducting a band of about 18 fine musicians in the "Joe Vento Big Band."
Joe usually plays nightly from 6PM at the Zeffirino Restaurant at the Venetian Resort in Las Vegas.

Here's Joe's website:   http://www.joevento.com/

About 47 years ago today, the Three Suns played the Chase County Fair in Nebraska.   http://www.imperialrepublican.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3115:past-fair-entertainers&catid=36:news&Itemid=76

From last week's column about Del Casher, network radio personality Doug McIntyre added, "Del recorded my first and second demo reels for Talk Radio and is a great guy and a wonderful musician."   Here's Del Casher's website:   http://www.delcasher.com/

Wah Wah Pedal Pusher

Last week's post created a few questions.  One question is "It might be a good idea to include a link ....for those unaware of what" is the wah wah pedal.  The second question was mine, "Why is Del Casher asking for recognition now?"

I searched online and found a documentary on the wah wah pedal called "Cry Baby The Pedal That Rocked The World."    The video was released this year.  You can watch the whole documentary here at their website:   http://www.crybabydoc.com/    Don't worry about the babydoc part.  This website is about the Wah Wah pedal (Cry Baby is a brand name wah wah pedal) and not a dictator.

You can learn all about the history of the wah wah pedal in this documentary.   However, in the NY Times article of 8/6/2011 linked to in last week's blog:  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/07/business/del-casher-and-the-story-of-the-wah-wah-pedal.html?_r=1  the author Amy Wallace writes "But guitars take two hands to play — you can’t be fiddling with knobs during a solo. So Mr. Casher says he asked Mr. Plunkett whether the knob could be put into a pedal instead. In at least one interview, however, Mr. Plunkett has said that this was his own idea. (I could not reach Mr. Plunkett for comment.)"

One such interview with Mr. Plunkett is in this documentary  "Cry Baby The Pedal That Rocked The World."  In fact, even though Del Casher is interviewed in this documentary there is no mention from Del that it was his idea to use a pedal for guitar players.    I would imagine that Del would have mentioned it was his idea for the pedal on camera and director deleted Del's pedal comment to avoid contrroversy.   You would think that a controversy would be good for a documentary.   However, this documentary has an executive producer of Jimmy Dunlop.    Dunlop makes the Cry Baby Pedal.   See:  http://www.jimdunlop.com/products   

So Del's reason for an interview in the NY Times is apparently trying to give his side of the story that was most likely edited out of this documentary.  Even though this is an entertaining documentary and I recommend watching it,  this documentary made me want to buy a wah wah pedal which may be partially the purpose of this video.  I also found it rather odd that the NY Times author didn't mention the video in her column.

Del Casher in New York Times

Hi! This is my first blog so forgive me for any shortcomings. The purpose of this blog is to share information about the Three Suns.

The Three Suns were formed in 1939 by brothers Al Nevins (guitar) and Morty Nevins (accordion) and their cousin Artie Dunn (vocals and organ). By the mid to late 50's, Al and Morty stopped touring but kept recording and Artie Dunn toured with other guitar and accordion players.

Del Casher was one of the traveling members of The Three Suns around 1958-1959. Along with accordionist Joe Vento and original member Artie Dunn, Del was a member of The Three Suns on their very successful tour of Japan in 1959 and recorded with Dunn and Vento as The Three Suns on the album "The Three Suns In Japan" which was made exclusively for the Japanese market. Del went on to have a fine career as a guitarist on records, TV and movies and even was involved in the invention of the wah-wah pedal.

Here is an article about Del Casher which appeared in Sunday's New York Times about his involvement with the invention of the wah-wah pedal.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/07/business/del-casher-and-the-story-of-the-wah-wah-pedal.html