I am a singer/songwriter/guitarist/sax player/keyboardist/bassman from rural south Pope County, Illinois, Brookport, Illinois. For as long as I can remember, music has been one of the most important, cherished activities in my life. I have had many lessons as I studied music through middle and high school ages. Clarinet and piano were instruments that I was schooled in playing. I was sent to the music camp at the DuQuoin state fairgrounds twice while in High school. I played difficult solos at school band contests and won plenty of blue ribbons, some red ones too.
I participated in High School theater and had major parts in musicals such as West Side Story. Anything musical I liked.
My recollection is that when I was about 10, my grandmother gave my older brother Cary a guitar. It was probably a Stella or something like that. As younger brothers will do, when he wasn’t playing with it, I picked it up. I started to teach myself. It has always been exciting to play guitar!
It didn’t happen immediately, but over time, I got better at the guitar, and I, like everyone else around my age, became immersed in popular music. Record albums were becoming easier to get and there was radio and even some TV. Bands like the Allman Bros., Beatles, Rolling Stones, Grateful Dead, Jimi Hendrix, and singer/songwriters like Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Arlo Gutherie, Pete Seeger, John Prine, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, and others were all getting their music out there. Guitarists like Duane Allman, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Carlos Santana, Roy Buchanan, Chet Atkins, Jerry Reed and others were ripping out incredible licks.
Being into them lead me to discover their influences, many of them Black or other colors. I learned about the blues, Muddy Waters and Willie Dixon, then John Lee Hooker, Buddy Guy, just to name a few. R and B and soul, Aretha, Ray Charles, Wilson Pickett, Nina Simone. Even jazz, John Coltrane, Miles David, Ella Fitzgerald, Oscar Peterson and many many more. And while great players have always humbled me, I loved it all and still do!
I wrote my first song when I was 14, and in 9th grade. Simple, and I can still remember a few words of it and the beginning chords. I have always been fascinated with songs. A good song can take you places where nothing else in this life can lead you. You know what I’m talking about! I love to write songs - it’s such a magical event for a new song to appear, especially if you think it is a good song!
I have never gone too many years in my life since about 20 where I haven’t been in a band. I don’t know if I can remember every single one, but I do remember Flatland Rainbow; Dan Eilers and the Rainbow Ranch boys; Chaffees, Donham, and McGrath; Donham and Chaffee; Post Impressionist Grape Nuts Review; Bear Creek Band; Two Shoes; Just Us; Rhythm Women and Groove Daddies; Azotus, and the current bands, Rooted in So.IL; and The Melungeons.
I also perform on occasion as a singer/songwriter. I have performed 1 - 2 times a year since 2006 for the Sunday Songwriters Showcase at the Bluebird Cafe in Nashville, TN. On Valentine’s Day, 2009, my song, “As Long As the Stars Shine”, was performed by the Guys All-Star Shoe Band on the Prairie Home Companion radio show.
When I play with Rooted in So.IL, www.reverbnation.com/rootedinsoil I play primarily electric guitar. A three piece power trio is a challenge for everyone involved. That’s why I like it and why I think it has helped me be a better player. As the guitarist, you are responsible for the fill and the melody. Sometimes you have to go between the two and how you do that makes a big difference in the music. But I also play some sax solos. I keep the sax on a stand where I can play it easily from playing my guitar.
Both of my current bands have been working on original material, and have made a number of recordings and video, but nothing studio quality yet. But that soon is going to be changing. I have made several studio recordings since 2003. There are plenty of decent worktapes of both bands online. The Melungeons webpage is found at https://www.melungeonstheband.com.
Those are: “Just Us Band,” “Rhythm Women and Groove Daddies”; “8 Songs”; “Taking It Day by Day” and “Dreams Are Never Gone.” I also made some mostly acoustic tracks at Pinewood studios in Metropolis, Illinois for a year or so. Those recordings are typically two acoustic guitar tracks, some have a bass track, and vocals and maybe one harmony - with me doing all the tracks.
While all the other albums were made into CDs (although the “Just Us” album only had a few CDs made, and “8 Songs” only had 25 copies made), my latest, “Dreams Are Never Gone”, has not been released. I decided to make this webpage and release it here, as well as all my other studio recordings, and just let anyone that wants to listen and even keep any of songs do so.
I also paint and write. For 7 years, between 2007 and 2012, I wrote regularly in a blog at my domain, www. ruralthoughts.net. That domain isn’t published at the moment. But the blog is here on this webpage. I also intend to establish a page to show at least some of the my paintings. I think this is going to be a fun project!
Mark Donham