This interview is the third installment from a lengthy conversation I had with Charlie Lange a few weeks ago. The first two installments are also included in this month’s ezine so as to retain some continuity. Those interviews are under tabs that read, “Charlie Lange” and “Bluebeat Music.”

David Mac (DM): How did you get started in radio?

Charlie Lange (CL): I was playing music in my ceramics booth at a festival and some guy from the radio station here in Santa Cruz heard the music and we started up a conversation. He then asked, “Hey, do you want to do a radio show?” I said, “Sure!”

DM: When was this?

CL: It was 1977. I started doing a Saturday afternoon blues program. I did the blues program from 1977 until 2007. Then the management of the station decided to take most of the local programming off the air, put in a satellite feed and replaced us with talk shows from NPR.

DM: You also hosted a soul program.

CL: Yes, there’s always been a soul program on Saturday nights on that station, and there’d been a number of hosts. In 1993, because it was a Saturday night thing, the guy who hosted it didn’t want to do it every week because his wife was getting pissed at him.  So I took it over every other week and one thing led to another and he gave it up and I carried it on. I eventually took on a co-host.

DM: Do you remember when you first started getting into soul music?

CL: I went to a Catholic high school and many of my friends were Mexican. Soul music was really, really big with them.  They were my best friends so that’s what we listened to. We were into Smokey Robinson, most of the Motown stuff, Donny Hathaway was really popular, Robert Flack, Aretha Franklin and others. So when I do a soul music show, I’m channeling not only music but feelings and some fond memories for me. 

DM: It’s not that far away from blues. 

CL: Not at all. In fact I tried to break those barriers down on both of the shows. I played bluesy soul on the blues show and soulful blues on the soul show.

DM: Both genres have fed off each other for decades.

CL: Absolutely...nothing is new in music. Everything is a permutation of something that came before it. No one got to where they are on their own. It’s like the economic system now. The 1% didn’t get to where they are on their own. It’s like that Willie Walker song called, It Ain’t Your Ladder So Don’t Go Pulling It Up.

DM: What brought you back on the air doing a blues show?

CL: I enjoy it and to put it mildly, I have a massive collection of blues; you know four or five thousand LPs. I have the same number of CDs, plus in the 70s when I was out there doing interviews, I was buying 45s.  I’ve got a hellacious 45 collection of blues. During that period no one was looking for blues. Everyone was looking for something else. I had some big scores.

DM: Let’s talk about your thought process as it relates to programming your show, Two Steps from the Blues.

CL: Let’s start with the concept that there is no such thing as random.

DM: That sounds like a great place to start.

CL: I would rather listen to a program by a DJ who is intimately involved in the music that he’s playing even if its music I don’t like. I would rather listen to that than I would the Sirius/XM satellite blues station where they know nothing other than shuffle button programming. 

To me the important thing about being a DJ is the segway. The segway is all important. It is the reason why one song follows another. It shows the deeper intelligence and deeper understanding that you can’t express in words. Do you know what I mean? 

DM: I know exactly what you mean. It is painful to hear a blues program when a guy doesn’t know what he is doing.

CL: You know when a show is good you don’t want to turn it off, you sit in your driveway in your car until it’s over.

DM:...or get up at six in the morning on Tuesdays. Thanks a lot Charlie! In our previous conversations you use a word that perfectly describes this concept, “context”.

CL: I always try and put the music in a context, but I don’t want it to be in an intellectual context. I want it to be in an emotional context. There is a difference.  For years and years, when I first started out being a broadcaster, I would talk about the history and talk about the interconnections. When I listen to those broadcasts now, I realize that they’re boring.  People want to be entertained. You can put the music in a context that works musically, still be entertaining and still give a brief synopsis of what you just played.

I don’t know how many blues programs there are in this world or in this country, but I’ve heard quite a few of them and you can tell the DJs that actually listen.  Most people seem to just reach for the current releases by the major blues labels and they feature those records and that’s it.  There is no reason why one song follows another other than it’s a new release. I have never programmed like that.

I listen to music every day for anywhere from 2-10 hours a day. The way I program is a reflection of what happened to me the week before. It’s always something that will catch my ear, catch a feeling or catch an emotion in me while I listen. Then I can put together the thread that’s taking me through the show.

DM: You did a Lloyd Glenn piano thread last week.

CL: That’s because its six o’clock in the morning and I’m only half awake. I’ve been searching for the magic six o’clock hour thing to play.   I did my blues show for years on Friday afternoons.  It was from 1 - 3 in the afternoon when a lot of people were getting off work. I was pretty raw and wild on that show. I had the “Rocket Ride to Nowhere” and it was fuckin’ wild. It was a show that had a big audience. People loved it.

The context of Tuesday morning at six is different. The listeners are different. The feelings the listeners have are different, therefore the context of the show is different. Piano blues is something that I find really innocuous and entertaining at the same time. It works well for that time period.  I’ve done that for the last three or four weeks actually, tying in Lloyd Glenn, Fred Kaplan and early Ray Charles, that whole style of playing. 

DM: I listen to a lot of blues radio and I hear people try and compartmentalize the music or create artificial boundaries that on paper might make sense but don’t necessarily work on the air.

CL: I like to use ideas as the signpost on the road. That’s the way I look at it. I could program a whole show around two or three songs. I start with a song, get the three songs that fit together well and then leave those three songs and do two hours just off of that. It doesn’t happen all the time, but it does happen. The way I program a show is I’ll pick songs that go together stylistically, musically or the lyrics are similar. I will use those during the show. I’ll drop them in at different spots. I pick songs that will take me from one sound to another. They tie together.

DM: Not only that, you are reading all your own public service announcements and underwriting sponsorship spots. That’s not easy.

CL: Especially at six in the morning (Laughs).

DM: I did a blues radio show for a few weeks a few years ago. When on those rare occasions I want to torture myself, I will listen to some of those broadcasts. Even though I have a background in public speaking and was very familiar with the material, I sounded somewhat stilted.

CL: It takes a long time to get to the point where you’re comfortable with that. It’s difficult because you’re essentially talking to no one. You have to develop a conversational style with yourself. I picture other people. That’s what I do. There is no real way to learn about radio. You have to do it. When you do it long enough, you get it.

DM: You got it Charlie.

Note: You can listen to Charlie’s Blues Show Tuesday mornings at 6:00 am PST on KZSC 88.1 in Santa Cruz or around the world at www.kzsc.org