After seeing singer-songwriter David Wilcox perform at the Cincinatti Zoo in the early 90’s, we found out from the program (that we hadn’t read since we arrived late) that he had attended Antioch College in the mid 70’s. The bunch of us (that I had convinced to go to the show) ran up to the stage where he was chatting with folks and changing his guitar strings and proudly exposed our Antioch College T-shirts.
He told me that he did indeed attend Antioch in 1976 but left after a year or so because he realized he was ‘Paying tuition to have sex and learn guitar, and I could do that elsewhere for free.’. He also specifically asked me if I played guitar and asked if the Science Building was still there and explained that he loved to play guitar there. I found this in an excerpt of David’s bio on a compilation CD from the New Music Series by Music Direct Review, entitled “Volume 10”.
“Cleveland-born Wilcox was inspired to play guitar after watching a fellow student play guitar in a stairwell at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, OH.”
I LOVE this, because I played guitar in that stairwell alot.I even wrote a song and played it there at 2 AM in May 1992, (wish I had recorded it) as a good bye to Michael Anthony Groteke (a friend killed in a car accident in the early morning of February 8th, 1992. But that’s another story). The echoing acoustics of that stone stairwell in the Science building are truly amazing, perhaps second only to the showers in the Birch dorm (when they were all in one room, not curtains, dividers etc).
So… I played and learned guitar in some of the same places that David Wilcox did. It’s a small world…
(I also have his coop papers file from 1976, but that too, is another story).