R2RB Podcast - Women Entrepreneurs and Indie Artists Series

Journey to Musical Success with Sol Knopf

• Deb LaMotta

Share episode

Send us a text

What if you discovered the secret to thriving in both music and life, all from a small-town artist? Join us as we chat with Sol Knopf, an extraordinary singer-songwriter from Delaware, whose rich baritone voice and poignant lyrics have earned him a place in the Delaware Rock and Roll Society's Hall of Fame. Sol opens up about his unexpected journey to fame, his initial self-doubt, and the emotional roller coaster of being honored at the Smyrna Opera House. Through light-hearted questions and profound reflections, Sol's story reveals the determination and grit required to rise in the music industry.

Travel back to the roots of Sol's musical adventure, starting from his school band days to the pivotal decisions that shaped his career. Sol gives us a glimpse into the world of pre-internet music, filled with daring auditions and bold trips, like an unforgettable journey to Michigan. Balancing a business degree with an unyielding passion for music, Saul's path is a testament to perseverance and risk-taking. We explore the challenges of finding gigs, forming bands, and the unforgettable moments that come with performing live to enthusiastic crowds.

In this episode, we also tackle the future of music amid the rise of AI, emphasizing the necessity of authenticity in art. Sol shares the touching story behind his award-winning song "My Baby Girl," which has resonated deeply in father-daughter relationships worldwide. We delve into the dynamics of a musical family, the highs and lows of raising children, and poignant memories, including a 1987 national TV talent show appearance. With invaluable advice for aspiring songwriters and insights into modern music production, this episode is a treasure trove of inspiration and practical wisdom for anyone passionate about music.

Support the show

https://linktr.ee/deblamotta

Speaker 1:

Thank you. Thank you, hi, and welcome to the R2RB podcast series. Today, I have with me Saul Knopf, a singer-songwriter from Delaware. Hi Saul, welcome, and how are you?

Speaker 2:

Hey Deb, I'm doing great.

Speaker 1:

Good, good. So I always like to ask two questions to get us warmed up. If you could have a superpower, which one would you have?

Speaker 2:

That one's real tough, I guess. What I would want is the power to make people that hate each other love each other.

Speaker 1:

That's a good one.

Speaker 2:

That would have to be it for me. That's what gives me the most distress these days is the people that so many people are hating on each other. That really hurts me.

Speaker 1:

It's awful, awful, it really is yeah I agree, if you, uh, I'm sorry. What three items would you bring with you on a deserted island?

Speaker 2:

okay. Well, you know, if you're trying to survive, you need the items to survive, right? Right? So you know, I guess I would want something to be able to fish with if I'm on an island, I'm guessing. So I would need something to fish with, I would need something to start a fire with. So I guess a big old torch that had a huge amount of butane.

Speaker 1:

There you go, okay that had a huge amount of butane.

Speaker 2:

There you go, okay, and then like a big old, like a huge or a multi-utility knife kind of thing that had tools on it and stuff, you know. So I can do different things.

Speaker 1:

I like those.

Speaker 2:

So I think that's what you know. From a survival standpoint, that's what I'm thinking first, Because, of course, the first thing that came to my mind is I'd want to bring my guitar, but if I can't eat, my guitar's not going to really do me any good.

Speaker 1:

That's true, right, that's right. And maybe somewhere down the line you can make a guitar while you're on the island. There you go, right, I like it.

Speaker 1:

All right, award-winning American singer-songwriter and 2022 Delaware Rock and Roll Society Hall of Fame inductee, best known for his distinctive baritone voice and timeless original songs like my Baby Girl, which became one of the most requested independently released father-daughter dance songs in the USA. So what was it like being inducted into the Delaware Rock and Roll Society's Hall of Fame? What was it like being inducted into the Delaware Rock and Roll Society's Hall of Fame?

Speaker 2:

It was wonderful. It was a tremendous honor. I have trouble feeling like I was deserving of it.

Speaker 1:

Really.

Speaker 2:

Uh, haven't accomplished in my life what I set out to accomplish. Okay, so I have, you know, part of that part of me that feels like I, like I really haven't achieved what I wanted to, so I didn't feel worthy of being in anybody's hall of fame. But so many of my friends and the people that have followed me for so many years worked on me on that one, yeah, and have made me feel worthy in my own way of it, absolutely.

Speaker 1:

I think we're always the hardest on ourselves.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, right, yeah, right, yeah, yeah, I've. Just I'm not a big one for wanting. You know, we get enough adulation as it is, so it's hard, you know, when people do something like to feel like you're worthy of it. That's all, yeah. So, but once I got over that part of it, it was just a tremendous honor.

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah, that is really a fantastic honor. How do they let you know that you are nominated? Do you get something in the mail? Do they come and visit you?

Speaker 2:

Originally, paula and George Walkind were pretty much heading and they let me know verbally that I was going to be inducted.

Speaker 1:

Do you go to the event? Is it up in Wilmington?

Speaker 2:

Well, it used to be, and starting this year it will now be at the Smyrna Opera House in Smyrna, Delaware. In fact they're going to have a physical location there In the opera house. On the first floor was the library, the town library. They're moving out and the Rock and Roll Society's Hall of Fame will be taking a good portion of that space.

Speaker 1:

Oh, that's pretty cool. Was there a particular reason? Do you know that they were doing that? Because it just seems to that kind of makes it like center almost being, you know, center of Delaware.

Speaker 2:

Well, the opportunity came up and Brian Hill, who's the executive director at the Smyrna Opera House, was in touch with them and made the suggestion and the proposal to them, and I think it's just a wonderful idea for everyone yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1:

And what? What a great opportunity for smyrna to get involved with with that. That is great. That'll be great for everybody. Oh, that's fantastic.

Speaker 2:

That is good to hear, but when, when I did my induction with several other bands, uh was up in wellington okay, all right, I knew he was up there.

Speaker 1:

That's great about the Smyrna and that's such a beautiful building. Also, to be back in there doing something like that, that's great. Oh, wow, yeah, very, very good, all right. So you started playing guitar at age 12. Did you realize then that music was going to be a big part of your life?

Speaker 2:

Well, certainly not when I first started. You know it was. You know I had this desire to play the instrument and I asked my parents if they would let me take guitar lessons. But I had an older brother and an older sister who had both taken lessons with instruments and quit. So my dad said no, doggone it, you're just going to quit.

Speaker 2:

So what I would do is my brother, larry, would go out back to play basketball or go go out to, you know, play with his buddies or whatever. And he had a 1969 Gibson SG guitar that he kept under the bed. I wasn't allowed to touch it but I would slide that guitar out under the bed. And he had a little book of Rod Stewart songs and so I started to teach myself guitar out of that book because it had like these little diagrams that I kind of figured out Wow, you put your fingers on the neck of the guitar and what the name of that chord is Right. So I started to do that, you know, and that's how I got started. But never did I dream at 12 years old that I would still be playing at almost 62. Wow.

Speaker 1:

That's great. That is really really great. Now in school you were playing guitar. Were you playing in a band, or in the band at school, or in a band for school?

Speaker 2:

I played in a band at school. Three of my other bandmates were actually in the band, okay, saxophone, and one was the drummer, or two of them were drummers and one of the fellows was a saxophone player. But then we put together what we called a select ensemble. Oh, the seventh grade, seventh and eighth grade band teacher, mr orillo. It was at central middle school in central uh and dover, delaware. He agreed to let us go ahead and perform as a little rock ensemble at one of the shows, one of the school shows, and so it was just four of us.

Speaker 2:

It was my friend charles joiner who played drums, and, uh, pat dillon, who also played guitar, and kathy austner who played drums, and Pat Gillen who also played guitar, and Kathy Austin who played piano, and so we just did some popular music. I think our first song that we ever played in front of the school was Smoke on the Water. Wow, and I will tell you this, okay, that it was such a huge success. I mean everybody went nuts and, and that theater was large. A huge success. I mean everybody went nuts and that theater was large. You could get 600 people in there.

Speaker 2:

So, 600 screaming kids to that. That's when I knew that this was what I was going to do for my life. Absolutely Right then and there.

Speaker 1:

I knew there had to be a moment. There's always that aha, always an aha moment, and it's usually when you're young.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. You know, yeah, that adulation, that of course we all want adulation, but of course a child, we really want it, and so when you get that, it's just this tremendous rush, absolutely. So I think that I was like wow.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so that was middle school.

Speaker 2:

That was middle school.

Speaker 1:

And then seventh grade, middle school, and then into high school. You were still in the band.

Speaker 2:

Well, yeah, we we still played a little bit, uh, into high school, but then I think we we kind of we stopped playing as a band and got involved in all kinds of other things, you know.

Speaker 1:

So yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 2:

I'm sorry, so, yeah, I would say, my junior year of high school I started to play as a duo with my girlfriend Her name her name was Martha Hutchins before she was married, and she was a keyboard player and I play guitar, and so I think I was 16 and she was 18 and we started playing restaurants in the Dover area very young and we had to sign all these special documents that allowed us to go in and play right in a place, establishment that served alcohol and so forth. Yeah, we started Leone's Lamplighter in Dover, delaware. So it must have been, I don't know 1978, 79, something like that.

Speaker 1:

Oh my gosh, that was the start. That was very tough, your start. So, high school and then after high school, did you then go off to college?

Speaker 2:

I did. I went to Salisbury State College in Maryland Okay, I went to Salisbury State College in Maryland Okay. So I went for you know, I researched going to Berkeley, but it was incredibly expensive. My grades weren't quite good enough to get the kind of scholarships to help me out. I wasn't a. I was a self-taught musician too.

Speaker 2:

Okay, it probably would have been difficult for me to audition and make it. I think that probably would have been the case in those days. It wouldn't be the case today. But also, you know, my father was a businessman and he was like you know, you were already making quite a bit of money playing music. You don't need to go to college for them to. You know, you're going to go to college. I'm not going to pay for you to go for a music degree. I'll help you if you want to go for business or something like that, and I think he was right to tell me to do that. So I went to Salisbury for a business degree, but I was in the music building all the time, couldn't get out of the music building. I was trying to teach myself piano. So ultimately I dropped out of college after two years because I wanted to tour.

Speaker 1:

I wanted to be a musician, and so when you started touring, were you solo duo in a band.

Speaker 2:

No, I played in a band In those days.

Speaker 2:

of course we didn't have the internet, we didn't have the ability to reach out to people who we didn't know like we do now. We didn't have the ability to reach out to people who we didn't know like we do now. It's so easy to research and find anything. We weren't able to do that back then. One particular day my mom came home from work and a friend of hers gave her this little piece of paper. It was Professional Musicians Referral Service professional musicians referral service this little like mimeographed pamphlet of groups all over the country looking for singers or guitar players or whatever. And it was also singers and guitar players looking for groups.

Speaker 1:

Wow.

Speaker 2:

And some of those groups were famous groups. You know, I don't know, the box tops are looking for people and groups that had had their day and, and you know uh, were still touring, but they needed new musicians to replace the ones that were retiring. Right I found a group out of canton, ohio, called the back streets show band. They were looking for a lead singer. So I lied about my I was supposed to be 21 and I was not 21. And I sent him a little cassette. I ended up flying out to the Playboy Club in Michigan. Oh wow For them. You know it took pretty much all the money I had in my bank account to get that plane ticket and to go out and rent. I rented a Camaro.

Speaker 1:

Oh nice.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I wanted to show up and be the rock and roll guy. You know, golly days, right. But I, of course I got the job and I toured with them for two years and it was wonderful, wonderful experience. It was hard work, six days a week. We'd go out on tour for 14 weeks at a time. Wow Shoot. The first two months, uh, you know, I only made. I made like $250 a week and we were doing six, six nights a week, two, three dance sets, two floor shows $250 a week. And I was like, yes, I couldn't believe it. I thought, you know, I was cutting people's yards for $3 a yard, so $250, I was like, oh my God, that's a lot of money, absolutely.

Speaker 1:

Can you imagine this generation, though, picking up a piece of paper you know, a mimeograph piece of paper and running down it to see who might hire them these days, you know? Then jumping on the you know the computer and say, bang, you know, I've got it. It's just, it's changed. I mean it's. I mean not for the, for worse or anything but so different. Right from where you were started to now where the this generation is, it's like wow, I know right, it has definitely changed, for sure.

Speaker 2:

The other technology has opened up so many, so many amazing opportunities for musicians and it's changed the industry in a lot of ways, not for better, but also it's offered opportunity to people who would not normally have been have had the opportunity. Right, absolutely.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely, because now you can all be in different countries and come together and record and do everything you need to do to release a single or an EP. So you know you couldn't have done that when you started out.

Speaker 2:

No.

Speaker 2:

No, and while we're talking about technology, just real quick, AI your thought on it. You know I haven't spent a whole lot of time contemplating it. I think it's just another tool that people can use. There's going to be human beings that abuse it like people abuse. Some people abuse things and other people just use them as a tool. The people that lean totally on it for their lyrics or totally on it for their melodies or whatever. You know, I'm not in favor of that for sure, Right, but I don't think that it's all that bad. I haven't used it yet, but I do know that there's been times where I really toiled over a second verse on a song.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Speaker 2:

And I just couldn't come up with a particular line. So sometimes a tool that just helps you, sometimes if something shows you something that you don't want, it'll inspire you for something you do want. So I think, as a tool, as another resource, I think it's beneficial and just fine. But if you're leaning on it too heavily then it's a crutch and it's not. I don't think it's really good for art.

Speaker 1:

I agree, and I think when AI first, you know, hit the scene full force, you know it scared everybody, as any new thing would do. And I think now, though, we're, you know, a year into it or more, or it's been around forever, but a year into it and, as you said, I think more people are using it as the tool it was meant to be, and I don't think it's going to take over anything, unless, unless we do allow that, but I think now people are are more understanding of it and using it more correctly or, you know, using it the way it was intended. Now, exactly the technology once again, and it'll change again.

Speaker 2:

Oh, it always does Right, but each one of us has a spirit and a soul as artists, you know. I think that being authentic to yourself is what makes artists who they are Right and what makes their art different than other people's. And so when you're using a resource, that's just an amalgam of everything that's already come before Right and it's just sifting through that to try to fit things you know there's going to be some emptiness to that, absolutely, absolutely All right. So your to that.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely, absolutely All right. So your career timeline Wow, from solo duo lead guitars, opening a recording studio, first full length album in 2007, writing a fantastic award-winning song, my baby girl, full-time indie artist and just to name a few things on your timeline. Walk us through some of your accomplishments.

Speaker 2:

You know what I think it is. For me it's just been the longevity. I don't necessarily think that there's anything that I've done that's really extraordinary. I think I've been really good at what I do and since I'm not a brilliant person and I'm not an extraordinary talent, I've had to work really hard and just stick with it and I think that that's been my major accomplishment is to that I've never given up. I've constantly tried to continue to learn and try to get better and I've seeked out mentors and people who I can learn things from. I don't really look at anything that I've accomplished as anything major.

Speaker 2:

The my Baby Girl was a pleasant surprise for sure, because we take our ego out of it and just think in general what we want to accomplish. We want to touch people's lives. Of course we're artists, you know that's what we're looking to do. When you finally touch on something that touches people's lives all over the world and people are sending you the most amazing letters, photos of them with their daughters or them with their fathers, and I think that of all the things that have kind of happened or, as my career goes, that's the one that's been the most satisfying is to know that something that you did really touched people's lives in a profound way.

Speaker 2:

So I've had so many stories where people would say, you know, my father and I were trying to find a song to dance to. We couldn't find it. We both said, well, you try to find one and I'll try to find one, and then we'll come back together. And they both came back in my song, or song that I wrote with Jerry Smith, you know, my Baby Girl ends up being the one that they both chose without knowing. I've had multiples of letters where people where their father's health was failing or they had cancer and they were trying to speed up their wedding so that their father could actually make it to the wedding, the last song they ever danced to was my Baby Girl. These are just heart-wrenching or very powerful stories that have that have come up to me and touched my life because of this song yeah, and it continues to be to be a hit even today.

Speaker 1:

When did you write that song?

Speaker 2:

we wrote it in 2012, it was recorded in 2012, released, released, 2013. But it wasn't until my nephew did a music video for it in 2015 or 2016 that it started to take off. Wow, I entered it into a contest, smoky Mountains Songwriters Festival 2016. It won first place oh, wow, the folk category. It's gone on to all kinds of other things that it's accomplished, so it's been really wonderful.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely. When I was reading about the song it was like that is fantastic, absolutely. And a beautiful song, Thank you Alright. So your family you have your wife and four children between the two of you, so tell Thank you All right. So your family you have your wife and four children between the two of you, so tell me about them.

Speaker 2:

Well, tony is my wife. We met in 2005, the day after Thanksgiving in 2005. We had both gone through divorces and failed relationships and you feel like such a loser when things don't work out, and I think neither one of us were really in the mood of finding somebody new at that point. But you know, you find somebody and you may have a connection and and we went ahead and started to date. We fell in love with each other and we've been together ever since and so we got married got married the next year.

Speaker 2:

We both had a son and a daughter from our previous marriage and they were all relatively in the same age group. They were from like 11 to 15 in age. At that time. We experienced all the teenage years with all four of them, watched them all graduate high school and go to their proms and homecomings and all that kind of stuff involved with their high school activities and athletics and stuff, and we saw them all through college and and and getting married. They're all married and now having children and it's been. It's been wonderful. So you know we've been together since November of 2005.

Speaker 1:

That's really, really nice, and are any of the children into music?

Speaker 2:

Yes, both of our sons are into music. Oh cool Tony's son Brandon, and he's my son too. I call him mine too, there you go.

Speaker 2:

He's been mine since 13 years old and he's 30 or 31 now, so he's mine too. So he plays guitar, he plays bass, he's a producer, he's a songwriter. He has a band called Year of the Knife knife, which is it's a hardcore metal band. Um, they're they're actually very popular all over the world. They um they get air pit airplay on liquid metal on sirius xm radio. Oh nice, it's a very small genre. It's not as big as, maybe you know, rock and roll or pop or r&b or whatever. It's got a smaller audience, but that audience is very loyal. They're artists and so forth. So that's Brandon. My son, andrew plays guitar and sings and he does a lot more country. He doesn't really do any original music but I think somewhere down the line he probably will. He's such a brilliant person and such a creative soul that I kind of picture him getting more into some original music at some point in his career.

Speaker 1:

Oh nice, Very nice yeah.

Speaker 2:

But he doesn't do it full time, whereas Brandon's more of a full time musician and Andrew is a paramedic. In the state of Maryland he's a firefighter and a paramedic.

Speaker 1:

Oh, nice Great field. Is Tony into music as well?

Speaker 2:

Well, tony loves music and she's actually a wonderful singer, but she's not one to sing in front of anybody. She won't do it. She just won't do it. Her father is one of the greatest singers who's ever lived. Father's name is Mike Hodgman. He never made it big, but he's as good as any singer that's ever lived. He's in the Maryland Entertainment Hall of Fame. Oh wow. His drummer was Liberty DeVito, who ended up going to be Billy Joel's drummer for over 30 years. Pop is one of the all-time great singers who came out of Baltimore.

Speaker 1:

You have an interesting family.

Speaker 2:

I do.

Speaker 1:

But it's funny with the heavy metal because I follow quite a few metal bands on Facebook and they are they're very loyal to each other.

Speaker 2:

And it's hard because it's so different than what I do. It's really not melodic as far as the singers are not melodic. It's a different thing, right, and so it's a little harder. It's harder to understand it, I think is what I want to get at, but I sure do value their commitment to it and their hard work with it and what they've accomplished. I mean, when they started out in the basement I was like, oh my God, what is happening here?

Speaker 1:

Who's taking?

Speaker 2:

over the house. What is going on here? Don't you guys know any Sinatra?

Speaker 1:

Oh my gosh, yeah, but it's funny. And then once you really listen to it and understand it, then you get it and there is like a learning curve. But, yeah, there's some great, great bands heavy metal, hair metal, all of it, absolutely. Do you have any memorable moments that stand out? You must have a lot of memorable moments, but one that really kind of like stays with you.

Speaker 2:

I can give you a few or a couple maybe. I was on the National Network in 1987. You know how the big shows now are America's Got Talent and the Voice and things like that. Well, the National Network had a show like that back in 1987, and it was called you Can Be a Star. So I went, I appeared on that show, oh wow. So I won one of my daily shows. I didn't win the weekly championship, but but that was a. That was a real cool moment for me to go and actually be on national TV.

Speaker 2:

I think the next one would probably be sharing the stage with uh golly, some of the greatest writers who have ever lived. Anytime I get on stage with, with some of the fellows that I've, I, that I've been fortunate to share the stage with, they are pinch me moments. I've had so many of them. Probably my friend and mentor of mine, craig Bickhart, has written hits for the Judds, and Alison Krauss and Martina McBride and Johnny Cash Wow, the list goes on and on and I've shared the stage with him many, many times, and every time I do it's extraordinary. But through Craig, I've been able to share the stage with many of his friends and co-writers Tony Arata, who wrote the Dance for Garth Brooks, which is one of the greatest songs ever written. Oh yeah, I've shared the stage with him and he's singing the dance and he's two, three people down from me and I'm watching him from the stage sing this song. That's one of the greatest songs ever written and I'm crying on stage. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1:

Oh, my God Wow.

Speaker 2:

Michael Johnson, who had a huge hit with a song called bluer than blue in 1980. I remember that song Real, unique, fabulous voice of his that I grew up with, this person that I just revered and I'm sharing the stage with him oh my God, you know these are. I've had so many of these moments Wow, with people like that over the last 10 years that it's hard to pick one of them out.

Speaker 1:

I can understand now why it would be absolutely. Oh my gosh. You have had an amazing career and you have had some you know such wonderful people in your life through your music career. Where you were talking a little bit before and I was going to ask the question, you kind of answered it. But I'm going to go ahead and ask the question what advice would you give somebody starting out in this business?

Speaker 2:

Don't ever think you've got it all figured out. Don't ever stop learning. Don't ever stop working at your craft. One of the things that I learned and it took me many, many years to learn it because I didn't you know, you don't know what you don't know and I didn't have anybody that could tell me, because I lived in an area that was not necessarily a music mecca. Delaware was so small and really there weren't a whole lot of us that were doing this, especially in Kent County, delaware or Sussex County, delaware. It just wasn't that many folks doing it.

Speaker 2:

What I've learned is, if you're a songwriter, you have to write every day, or almost every day. You don't wait for inspiration to get better at songwriting. You have to exercise that muscle. So you sit down every day, and I think it would apply to being an author.

Speaker 2:

Now, of course, there are seasons to our lives and of course there's going to be moments where you step away from anything Right and yourself just time to just be and to live and experience life so that you have something to write about. You know it needs to be more of like going to the gym and working out. You know you have to make that kind of commitment. So I think that would be probably the biggest piece of advice is really work every day at it and seek out people that you can learn from, that have actually done it and are in life where you want to be. There's all kinds of people that we learn from in life and in our families and that's great, but if you want to be a great writer, find some other writers you can learn from, or at least just study their material, really pay attention to how they craft their lyrics, how they structure their songs.

Speaker 2:

That doesn't mean you have to do the exact same thing. If your spirit sends you in a different direction, by all means do that. But I do think that there are certain elements that need to be learned.

Speaker 1:

And you have followed your own advice, and that's what has gotten you right to this moment in time and your longevity in your career that you just continue to learn and to do what you do so well. Thank you, you're welcome.

Speaker 1:

Wow yeah, Because I think this generation I think they're more open to asking or sometimes they're I think this generation is more apt to seek other people's advice. Or you know, for myself, that was always a hard thing to do was to ask for help, because I always thought, well, I can do it myself, I can find out what I need to do. Because I always thought, well, I can do it myself, I can find out what I need to do. But it's not, it's not, that's not a good way to go, because you know there's a wealth of people with information out there that are always willing to share it with you.

Speaker 2:

Well, I think when you and I were kids, you know we didn't have the technology to be able to reach people in a way that was wasn't quite as direct, correct. So, you know, we had to either speak with somebody on the phone, which was usually hard to do, or we had to meet them in person.

Speaker 1:

Right, and that was hard to do as well.

Speaker 2:

And that was hard to do. You know so many gatekeepers in the world that kind of keep you from being able to reach people, so, but yeah, so it's much easier now to try to find ways to reach people and contact them.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely. Have you been writing songs from the very beginning, or when did you start writing?

Speaker 2:

I think I started writing in the early 80s. I think I was more talented musically, just naturally I was not a well-read person, so I wasn't in love with literature okay, I was more of a mathematical mind and a melodic mind oh wow, so the lyrics have been the part that I've had to work the most on is because it, you know, it's just not. I'm not, it's not a natural gift.

Speaker 1:

Yes, some people are just wordsmiths and they just flow. They are, they are.

Speaker 2:

Right, yeah, yeah, I've written some really good songs lyrically, but I can't say that I am gifted at it. Okay, all right, I had to work at that craft.

Speaker 1:

Well, you're doing something right. Well, thank you.

Speaker 2:

Something, I'm not quite sure what, but you're doing something I know, I don't know either.

Speaker 1:

I don't know, I don't know. So on the same lines of the singer-songwriter. And then you have your own recording studio and you go in and you record the different tracks and you do all the instrumental parts of the whole song. Yeah, how does that work?

Speaker 2:

Well, the technology allows me to do multi-track recording and since I play guitar, bass and keyboards, you know I can play all those instruments and then have them synchronized together. Whenever I'm doing a recording now, if I'm working on something original, I'll usually lay down either keyboards and guitar or just one or the other of the instruments, and then I'll sing over that. I may program some basic drums so that I've got a feel for where they're going to come in and what the basic pattern is going to be. But I like to bring my friends in to play and I also don't like everything to be from the same perspective. So when you bring other people's spirit into a project, I think that it gives it a different life.

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah.

Speaker 2:

You know what I mean? Yeah, absolutely. You tend to. If you're playing the guitar and you're playing the bass and you're playing the piano, unless you're really able to separate yourself from all those instruments, you tend to play them all rhythmically the same.

Speaker 2:

And it starts to sound too one-dimensional. It just doesn't have a nice life to it. So I like to bring in other really talented people to give me ideas that I wouldn't have thought of myself. And the great thing is, most people have their own recording gear. So I can call somebody. My friend Tom Hampton, who's in Nashville, can put lap steel, pedal steel, joe bro, mandolin, whatever I want banjo. He can put stuff on it and send it to me through email and I can hit a download link and there it comes. My friend Marsha Ramirez, who's also in Nashville and she's toured with Christopher Cross and Patti Loveless and so many wonderful people and she could put background vocals on songs for me and do it right at home and then send it to me yeah, it's amazing right michael ronstadt.

Speaker 2:

Linda ronstadt's nephew has put cello on a lot of my songs. He's in cincinnati and I'll say michael, can you do such and such for me?

Speaker 1:

sure, yeah, yeah, I mean, with the technology that we have today, it it is amazing what you're able to do with putting it all together from all different parts of the world.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and then co-writing is a big thing that I do, and I do it with Zoom or Facebook Messenger, video or whatever, and I write with people in Canada, people in nashville and knoxville. My friend, mitch townley, who's a brilliant lyricist, is in knoxville, tennessee, and he and I've written a lot together. We haven't written in in a lot of years now, but one of my albums uh, six out of eight songs, uh, mitch and I wrote, oh Wow, so, but that's the technology, it's just super.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. And and it just gives, like you said, it gives it a whole different dimension when you can work outside of your, just outside of your own realm. But let me ask you this question what would you, what advice would you give somebody that you know they've been they, that you know they've been, they're seasoned, you know they've been around a while, but they want to take their career to a different level, where you've taken it to. Is there something that they should do differently or just keep going the path they're going?

Speaker 2:

That's a tough question for me to answer. I think it depends on different things. If they're just trying to get their songs cut by major artists, they need to write a lot okay and they need to collaborate a lot.

Speaker 2:

I really believe that collaboration is important when you're trying to get songs cut. It's also cool to write with artists young and up-and-coming artists yeah, because then you know the song is going to get cut, right, you're not waiting for a record because, uh, you know, so many of my songs have been pitched to major you know publishers and producers and right, and I've just not been able to break through that way and I live in nashville so I don't not not been able to make the contacts with those producers, uh, and it's always been tough.

Speaker 2:

So if you want to get, if you want to, say, play songs with country artists in Nashville, it's beneficial if you can live there. But if you can't, you just have to write a lot, you have to collaborate, because when you collaborate, those other co-writers are going to be helping you to try to pitch the songs and get people to hear them too.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, absolutely too, yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2:

Wow. I think that if you're looking to be a singer-songwriter as an artist different ballgame, of course, depends on if you want a tour, if you want to stay close to home then you better start learning some cover songs, because you're not going to be able to work a whole lot just as an original artist.

Speaker 1:

True, very true. You do a tribute show to neil diamond, ultimate diamond, oh my gosh. Um yeah, how did that idea, how did how did that idea come about?

Speaker 2:

well, first off, he's one of those artists that's in my wheelhouse to do and at the cover gigs that I've done since I was a kid. Uh, for some reason, when I do a neil diamond song, you remember the old commercial when you be of hunting, you know whatever people listen, they listen, remember that and everybody in the in the room would turn and look.

Speaker 2:

Whatever, when I do a neil diamond song, I swear deb, that's what happens. You know people will go, will stop talking and turn and look at me because I sound naturally like him. You do, I mean that vocal range, yes, and so I sound like him, without trying to sound like him.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

It's real natural, and so people have been wanting me to do a tribute to him for many, many years, and I just didn't want to do it. No, I just could not. No, I never wanted. I always wanted to be an original artist.

Speaker 1:

Oh, I just could not know. I never wanted. I always wanted to be an original artist.

Speaker 2:

I didn't. You know, I play cover songs, great Right, I didn't want to be the Elvis guy coming out in the costume or the wig or whatever. I could use a wig now. But but when COVID hit and the quarantine came in, it was a very scary time and I was out of work for the first time in my life. Wow, I just literally could not leave the house and could not go to work. I had a lot of time to kill and after the basement was clean and the backyard was all fixed and everything I did all the little honey do I could possibly do I was like now I've got to do something. So I thought, you know, let me record an album. But I wasn't writing at that time. I was just.

Speaker 2:

I was not in a good frame of mind with our politics. I was not in a good frame of mind with what was going to happen. It was a dark time. It was so dark, yeah, and I was so distraught with all the hate and the divisiveness and I felt like I was living in an alternate universe and I just was not creative. That's when I decided to record an album, somebody else's music, and I was like, well, let me do Neil Diamond, that's what people have always wanted.

Speaker 2:

I called Brian Hill at the at the Smyrna Opera House. They were closed and I said, brian, would you mind I uh move my recording gear to uh the stage at the smart opera house and record an album? And he said sure, you know, we're not allowed to open it up to the public. Anyway, come on, and brian happens to be my brother-in-law, his, his, uh, his wife and my wife are sisters. Oh, wow. So I had an in and uh. So he let me. Very graciously, for many weeks, probably more than he really wanted or expected, he allowed me to set up there and they have a magnificent baby grand piano there. It's just to die for.

Speaker 2:

Wow, I had to learn all those songs. I had to learn the piano parts, bass guitar parts, acoustic guitar parts, you know. And then I had to learn all those songs. I had to learn the piano parts, bass guitar parts, acoustic guitar parts, and then I had to sing them. So, yeah, that's where it started. By the time the album was done and I started thinking about releasing it, things were starting to open back up party with just my acoustic guitar. So I put a little band together and then the band went over so well and we were all old friends anyway, we had so much fun that we said well, let's, let's maybe see if we can do this some more. And we've been doing it ever since.

Speaker 1:

That is fantastic. I don't know which part of your career I like most, oh my gosh. Yeah, because you even have a separate web page right for your tribute. Yeah, I saw that as I was doing my research.

Speaker 2:

So we're still growing. We're still but it, the show is just absolutely phenomenal. We love doing it and people really love it and they start they're starting to follow us. Cool, we've had people. We did a. We did two shows at the milton theater in milton, delaware a few weeks ago, where we did a matinee and an evening show. We had people that went to both shows that is fantastic so fantastic. Wow you're on the right track absolutely well.

Speaker 1:

you certainly have had a awesome career. I am so glad that we've had a chance to talk tonight, so let everybody know where they can find you on social media, your websites.

Speaker 2:

If you do a Google search for Saul Knopf, that's S O P F is my last name, so my website is Saul Knopfcom and from there you can find me on Facebook and Instagram and all the different platforms. Spotify I'm on all of the digital platforms. Musically, all my albums are on there, so you can go back to the 2007 album and all the way through. That's where you can find me.

Speaker 1:

Do you have a schedule online?

Speaker 2:

I do it's at solanoffcom, and then you can go to calendar and they can see my calendar for the whole year.

Speaker 1:

Okay, wow, and you're booked the whole year, because I did look.

Speaker 2:

I am, I am, I'm busy.

Speaker 1:

And for those who don't know, you do this full-time. This is your full-time career.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Yep.

Speaker 2:

Over 40 years.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so it is possible. I know that a lot of the new artists find it a little bit difficult to get going and go full-time. I know it's not easy.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, certain areas of the country are more difficult than others.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Delaware has been. I think I've just been very fortunate to live here because we live so close to, you know, the ocean and Rehoboth Beach, yeah, and so a lot of people from New York and Washington DC and Baltimore and Philly have all moved down there to retire because the tax we have no sales tax here and our property taxes are very low and they can buy a lot more house for a lot less money?

Speaker 1:

Absolutely Somebody has to entertain them.

Speaker 2:

That's right, and I'm one of those guys.

Speaker 1:

You're the guy. Oh my gosh, is there anything that I haven't touched on, sal, that you would like to tell us about?

Speaker 2:

No, no, we're good. I'm tired of talking about myself. I'm happy to talk to you, but I'm tired of talking about myself.

Speaker 1:

Well, Sal, thank you so much. I have enjoyed this conversation 100%.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, debbie, me too.

Speaker 1:

Oh, great, okay, You're welcome, take care.

People on this episode

Contributor

Debra LaMotta

Host