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but I always loved playing the guitar, and at that camp, I was always up there with the hootenanny
leader, playing [chuckles]. Yes, that’s what we did. That’s what we did. As a matter of fact, there’s a
wonderful book called “Rise up Singing”, that originated at my summer camp and it has the lyrics to
everything from Scotch ballads to labour songs, to rock and roll. It’s got everything in it and that

was like our bible.

BiTS: You obviously continued playing guitar and singing while you were in school, perhaps even
in high school as well.

EW: That’s right. I had a jug band in high school with my high school buddies [chuckling]. Yes, I
played the washtub bass.

BiTS: Well, that’s something

that connects us as well
because when I mentioned in
my email that I played in a
skiffle group, that’s what I
played [laughs].

EW: Yes, that’s right, and I

didn’t realise what skiffle
was until fairly recently. I
said hey, wait a minute,
that’s our music [laughing].
Yes they’re playing ‘Rock

Island Line’, for goodness
sake. Something I’ve been
singing since I was six years
old.

BiTS: Yes, absolutely wonderful stuff. Tell me how your career developed then. You clearly were
enthusiastic about playing the music. Did you start doing gigs and that sort of thing?

EW: [Laughing] I don’t know, the word career always makes me laugh. I’m sorry. Let’s see, my first

gigs were playing at children’s parties, so I could make a few bucks which I preferred to babysitting
[laughing]. It was like glorified babysitting. When I was in high school, I think my mom realised I
was never going to get serious about the violin and she had the vision to get me guitar lessons with
her friend’s nephew who happened to be David Bromberg. I started taking lessons from him when I
was in high school and he encouraged me to go down to the village and play in the basket houses, so

that’s what I did and that was in the sixties and those were my first, if you could call those gigs. It
got me out in front of people playing things that were so complex I can’t play them anymore.

BiTS: On your website, in your bio, you mention the very first set of the opening night in CBGB.
I’ve no idea what that means.

EW: CBGB. [Chuckling] Have you ever heard of CBGB?

BiTS: I have not. No.

EW: Oh my goodness, it was the epicentre of the punk movement. Bands like Talking Heads and

Television and Debbie Harry. A lot of people played there, but it originally started out as CBGB,
which stood for Country, Blue Grass and Blues. It became something else, but that was the owner's