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WHO ARE WE?
A short history of the adventures of Keith &
Rusty McNeil (written in 2009)
Starting Out
Both California natives, Rusty was born
and raised in Los Angeles and Keith was born in Santa Maria, but
raised in Ventura. They grew up during World War II when labor was
scarce and jobs were plentiful for youngsters, so their work
experience started early. Rusty worked as a maid, waitress,
telephone operator, collection agent, clerical worker, and bank
receptionist. Keith worked as a lemon picker, packing house worker,
electrician's helper, professional musician, electrical appliance
repairman, warehouseman, grocery clerk, florist delivery man, school
bus driver, oil field worker, pipeline construction worker, and
construction worker on the Matillija Dam.
Music was a major influence in Keith's
early life. His parents both grew up on California cattle ranches,
and loved to sing. He learned to play harmonica as a first-grader,
clarinet as a third-grader, and saxophone in junior high. While in
high school he became leader of the "Stardusters," a dance band that
played for school dances, service clubs and military bases in
Ventura County. History was Rusty's passion, and she spent her
formative years haunting the museums and libraries in Los Angeles.
Keith and Rusty met while working at
Badger Pass ski lodge in Yosemite National Park. When Keith returned
to continue his education at Stanford University, Rusty left her
pre-med course work at UCLA, and they married. They had five
children over the next 17 years, Michael, David, Mary, Jennifer, and
Sarah.
After graduation, Keith went to work for
Pacific Telephone in Southern California. Fifteen years later, he
was the District Plant Manager for Pacific Telephone's Riverside
district, in charge of 200 employees - installation, repair, central
office maintenance and the plant service center for Riverside and
San Bernardino Counties.
During the telephone company years,
Keith taught himself to play the 5 string banjo using Pete Seeger's
book. Soon thereafter, Keith and Rusty started singing with the
Riverside Folk Song Society and organized the Young People's Folk
Song Society, where many people interested in traditional music
shared songs they collected or grew up with. Keith and Rusty were as
interested in the history presented in the songs, and the background
of the songs, as they were in the songs themselves. They found that
when performing at these meetings, as well as at local coffeehouses
and church events, they were doing as much teaching as they were
singing. The teaching and performing accelerated as they became
active in the civil rights movement in the early 1960s, when, for
Keith and Rusty, the effectiveness of music as a teaching and
bridge-building tool became more and more apparent.
Going Pro
In 1966 Keith left his comfortable
middle management job when he and Rusty decided to spend full time
teaching American history through folk song. Their goal was to build
bridges of understanding and appreciation between Americans of
different religions, nationalities, ethnic and racial backgrounds,
economic status, ages, gender and political persuasions, using
history through folk song as the tool. They researched and presented
assembly programs, classroom programs, university extension courses
(for teachers and parents) on teaching American history through song
using as many as 30 different musical instruments. They also created
classroom lecture-performances for students in secondary schools,
community colleges and universities.
Keith also performed professionally with
two friends, Clabe Hangan (African American) and Joe Rael (Mexican
American) as "The Mixed Company" during their early years as
professional musicians, demonstrating the contributions of European,
African, and Mexican Americans to American popular music in school
assembly programs around Southern California. Keith left The Mixed
Company when he and Rusty became so busy that he could not
participate in both groups.
Keith and Rusty soon realized that
travel was a major requirement for their new profession, so they
purchased a 79 passenger school bus (remember those five children?).
In 1973, the McNeil family spent a year rebuilding the engine
and converting their 1949 antique bus into a comfortable motor home
that would accommodate eight people complete with kitchen, bath,
beds, and instrument and sound system storage. They have driven the
bus across the United States 30 times in subsequent years.
Eventually Keith and Rusty contracted
with Columbia Artists Community Concerts Division to present
concerts across the United States and Canada. They presented 550
Community Concerts over a 15 year period in nearly every state in
the Union.
Expanding the Business
In 1983, the McNeil family began
producing CD volumes of American History through Song. Each is a
multi-disc CD volume with historical narration preceding each song
to establish the historical context. Keith plays a number of musical
instruments on their recordings, including 6-string and 12-string
guitar, tenor and 5-string banjo, mandolin, autoharp, clarinet,
saxophone, highland bagpipes, harmonica, tin whistle, recorder,
Native American drums and mouth-bow, and African drums. Rusty plays
guitar, autoharp, African and Native American drums and various
rhythm instruments. Their children and friends sing and play a
number of instruments, including guitar, piano, keyboard, flute,
accordion, mandolin, and conga drums.
In 1987, Keith and Rusty began taking
groups of Americans on tours to different countries, exploring the
traditional music and dance of England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland,
France, Spain, and Zimbabwe.
Their publications include Colonial &
Revolution, Civil War, Moving West, and California Songbooks, all with historical commentary. Their recordings
include American History Through Folksong -
six volumes (15 CDs) of recorded songs and narration; American Religious Songs (3 CDs); and
California
History Through Folksong - two volumes (4
CDs).
The McNeils reside in Riverside,
California.
UPDATE: Rusty
McNeil passed away December 15, 2010, due to complications from a
stroke she suffered in February of 2009. Two excellent
obituaries are here and here. She was eight days shy of
her 60th wedding aniversary, and had been surrounded by family and
friends for the two weeks prior to her death.
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