John Turner started playing drums in the fourth grade. That was a long time ago!
He knew He wanted to be a musician the first time he saw The Beatles on the TV.
It was not because of all the girls screaming and going nuts over them, it was because
of the their music, end of story. John was hooked on The British Invasion stuff,
The Who, The Kinks, however he was not a Rolling Stones fan. He got to see all the
major groups as they came thru Baltimore starting with the Beatles. He saw the Beatles
at the Baltimore Civic Center in 64 or 65 he can't remember the exact date, only that he
was in the fourth grade.That's when the seed was planted in John's head that you could
sound like your records live if you are good at what you do!
He started playing professionally when he was 16 years old in Havre de Grace MD
where he and his lovely wife Linda, also known as Lonestar, have been living for over
thirty years. John loves Havre de Grace. He is originally from Baltimore MD. John was
lucky because his music education came quick and while he was still young. Going on
the road with a band called Stoned Oak right after high school. The average age of the
guys in the band was 31-33 years old. John was barely 18 years old. The band was run
by the keyboard player Oakley "Silvercloud" Washburn.
John will be forever in his debt. The things
he learned from Silvercloud about playing music and how to make a band sound good has
stayed with John all these years. How many bands would play the entire side two of
Pi nk Floyd 's Meddle CD in the first set of the night! John was on the road for 8 years
with that band before he moved on. Bernard Purdie one of the famous drummers for
James Brown was also in a band with Oakley for a while.
John was bitten by the Jazz bug a few years ago and has put his own jazz trio together.
They do not play as much as he would like but just to be playing jazz is therapeutic for him.
Another one of the bands that John has very fond memories of is Tite Squeeze. He made
enough money in that group to start his hobby of collecting drum sets. The number is up
to seven now. He also likes to point out that he really enjoyed the music they were
playing. That is something that does not happen too much these days. But John under-
stands that if you want to make it in this business you better not let your personal taste of
music get in the way of your performance on the job. That's why he started writing his own
music. John has met some really nice people over the years playing music.
They know who they are!
John's music influences besides The Beatles are Spooky Tooth, Free, King Crimson,
Terry Reid, Wishbone Ash, Led Zeppelin, Bad co, (including all the music that singer
Brian Howe did with them), Foreigner, Steppenwolf and Johnny Winter to name a few.
As for drummers, Bill Bruford, Billy Cobham, Tony Williams, Simon Kirk of Free
and Bad Co, Mike Kellie of Spooky Tooth, Dave Weckl, Jerry Edmondton of
Steppenwolf and John Bonham of Led Zeppelin have played a big part in John's
development as a drummer. John has three CD’s out, one solo and two with the Reddog
Band. At this present writing, John is still trying to put together his dream band
The Difference but it's been a SLOW process
With John it's all about the music. Nothing more nothing less!
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