The death of a legend

Les Paul died last week, and chances are you never gave it much of a thought.

But if you are of a certain age, the musician and innovator changed your life.

Without Les Paul, rock music as we know it would have been a very different thing. Without Les Paul, the guitar as a driving instrument central to rock might never have achieved that role.

As a kid, I didn't much care for Les Paul's music. His TV show with his wife was never a favorite at our house.

But Paul, who lived to be 94 and was performing as recently as last spring, invented the solid body electric guitar. And in doing so he changed the face of 20th century popular music.

The best guitarists I grew up listening to played Les Paul guitars or they dreamed of the day one could have one of their own.

And, trust me, it was an era of great guitarists.

Here, chronologically in the order I encountered them, are four who will always be noteworthy.

I first heard a kid named Rick Zehringer about my sophomore or junior year in high school. There were a lot of talented garage band guitarists in those days. Phil Fleming, an old friend from nursery school days at church, was quick and innovative. My old buddy Barry Fitzpatrick had more natural talent and a better understanding of music, but Barry had trouble disciplining himself to be as good as he could have been.

Both of them were in awe of Fort Recovery's favorite son Rick Zeheringer.

Or Rick Z. as he was known in those days.

I first heard him with the Rick Z. Combo out of Union City. That morphed into Rick and the Raiders.

And less than a year later, they were The McCoys and had a number one hit.

Rick, who was the fastest guitarist I ever saw, later changed his name to Rick Derringer. Zehringer plays fine in Mercer and Darke counties; Derringer plays better in LA.

That was all about 1966.

In 1968, I had my second encounter with a Les Paul disciple when I heard Eric Clapton play with Cream on the group's first U.S. tour.

Clapton wasn't a speedster like Rick Z. He was a bluesman, an acolyte of B.B. King.

And his musicianship opened up doors for me.

Suddenly, it wasn't just about three chords and a beat you could dance to. It was far more complex and soulful and deeply rooted in American culture.

It was also 1968 when I listened to that guy named Jimi Hendrix, the same one who popped up in TV footage this weekend playing "The Star Spangled Banner" at Woodstock a year later.

That was in Muncie, of all places, at a crappy building at the fairgrounds.

Impressive as Hendrix was - and he was impressive - I don't think Les Paul would have approved of the act.

The music, Les would like. The reverb and the intentional distortion, I think he would have liked that too.

But the theatrical destruction of a musical instrument would probably have struck him as going too far.

The fourth great guitarist played a Les Paul model.

That was Jimmy Page.

I was studying in London the spring of 1969, and someone in the boarding house insisted we needed to go hear this new band by the name of Led Zeppelin.

So a bunch of us took the tube and located a pub with the unlikely name of Klook's Kleek.

The band played upstairs. There was no dancefloor. It wasn't music to be danced to.

My friends and I sat in the third row. My ears are ringing still.

Page rocked.

I doubt Les Paul would have enjoyed the performance much from a volume standpoint.

But he knew a great rock guitarist when he heard one.

After all, he was father to them all.[[In-content Ad]]