OH Taxonomy
Eddie Kramer is perhaps best known as the recording engineer for Jimi Hendrix, but he also worked for the Beatles and countless other performers during his long career. Eddie is also a clever innovator who has designed products and tools that have solved problems for recording engineers over the...
Jon Gold grew up playing in area bands and hanging out in local stores. He soon was able to answer customer's questions about guitars hanging on the walls and found he was offered a job. He later worked for the Fender Sound House in London and his love for the industry grew as did his knowledge...
Ron Sfarzo may be the only interviewee within the NAMM Oral History collection who served as a police officer in California! Ron has been involved with music his entire life, with both his father and brother involved with music retail. While working in his brother’s San Francisco store, Ron was...
Sharman Beasley-Vesecky grew up in the music business as her grandfather, William Howard Beasley, served as the president of the NAMM Board of Directors from 1939-1940. Sharman has become the holder of her family's history and was kind enough to share the history with us during her NAMM Oral...
Stu Goldberg established Marina Music in San Francisco at the beginning of the guitar boom. The folk music craze was in full swing and the Beatles just hit the USA and within a few months Stu opened his own music store. His small store had a very big impact on the music industry and soon became a...
Art Wiggs has always admired the Gretsch brand of guitars. He grew up in a musical family, as his parents played in church and on the radio together. As a kid he played the guitar with a classmate and the duo even had a running gig at Disneyland. He gave up playing to focus on his young family...
Mike Greene is the president of Greene Music in San Diego, California, a store he started with his father in 1974. Mike grew up in the business and recalls dressing up like a circus barker to help his dad sell chord organs at state fairs. After the boom of the home organ, Mike focused on pianos...
Robert Walker worked for the retail stores of the Baldwin Piano Company. He was located in the San Francisco store but later traveled the western states repairing and adjusting organs as they arrived in the stores. While the retail arm of Baldwin did not last, the ideas created in the stores were...
Ernie Borr was a band director from Mandan, North Dakota who was an early supporter of the Eckroth Music store. Ernie was on hand for the Eckroth Music Center's 40th anniversary party in July 2012 and recalled the early days of calling on the store to help him with his school band instruments and...
Jeff Eckroth is the son of the founders of Eckroth Music in North Dakota. His parents, Bill and Mary Ann, established the store in 1972 and Jeff recalls numerous stories about growing up in the store and in the industry he would come to love. Jeff helped develop the store’s combo business and...