I was born in Enid, Oklahoma, in 1948 and moved to Orange County in 1954 ahead of my parents who moved up a year later. I stayed with my uncle until they arrived and a year later, we moved to San Jose.

While growing up in San Jose, at the age of 12, when my brother Tim (my only sibling) was born, someone by the name of Waltrop came to our door demonstrating the steel guitar and how he could teach me to play it.

My dad bought me a steel guitar and away I went for 5 years until I saw this young black kid who was one of their students, playing the guitar boogie shuffle.

I told my dad "that's what I want to play." So, I switched to the standard guitar at that time. I had to promise my dad I would learn some country music.

I learned enough country to satisfy him but my interests were blues and rock. I studied one year under jazz guitarist Vic Grundy and 1 year under Bud Dimmick.

I found myself putting together bands throughout high school and after that. None of my schoolmates could read music, so I would pick out tunes and teach everybody their parts. Later I would record their parts on cassette and have them learn them by ear. Then we would play wherever we could.

Pat Simmons from the Doobie Brothers was a schoolmate of mine and we played together once in a while and were in rival bands, so to speak. My band in high school was The New Generation and his, I believe, was The Unrelated Brothers. While still in high school, we would go almost every week to see concerts at the Filmore and Winterland.

We saw and met many great artists who we became friends with and jammed with. Charlie Musselwhite was one we jammed with at the Mandrake in Berkeley. I also had the opportunity to jam with Mike Bloomfield, Mark Naftalin, Elvin Bishop, and others at the Family Dog in North Shore.

We had our own blues band at the time. I became bored with the guitar and went years without playing, then I would hear someone that would inspire me and pick it up again.

As a kid, I had an encounter at the Filmore once with Bill Graham. We arrived early to buy tickets and went inside to find someone to buy them from.

Butterfield and band were rehearsing and doing their sound check. Bill saw us and made it fairly clear he wanted us to leave. He used words I'd never heard before.

I've had the opportunity to play with some pretty good players over the years. I got married in 1974 to my wife Kathie and we moved to Grass Valley in 1978.

During this time I wasn't playing guitar much. In the 80s I met Dave Hall who installed car stereos for me and we became friends. I was in the cleaning business at that time and he called me one day and said: "Are you still doing the cleaning thing?" I told him I was and he asked me if I was interested in cleaning the AVM (American Victorian Museum).

Now known as the Miners Foundry. I got the gig. This is back when the KVMR studios made the AVM their home. Dave would service the equipment at the times I would be vacuuming etc. and he would ask me to keep the music going while he was servicing the equipment.

This was fun and he suggested that I go through the training and get my own show. So, I did and the rest is history. I guess you could say I qualify as one of the old timers now.

I was trying to remember some of the station managers who took their turns moving KVMR forward. Going backwards, I remember:

David Levin, Brian Terhorst, Joseph, Steve Ramsey, Francisco, Art Cohen, Laura Miller, and others. Don't remember if Jima was ever station manager.

It's been a great ride and I appreciate beyond words the privilege of being a part of the KVMR family. 30 years now and we're still moving forward despite some lean times.

Thanks to all the KVMR staff for their hard work and for the opportunity to be a part of this end of the musical spectrum.

By Keith West