Calling All Minstrels

There was a time when I felt bad about having had so many names connected to the group that I created.  I had envisioned a musical family like the Ames Brothers.  They didn't change personnel every ten minutes.  They kept the same people for years, and their audiences knew all the performers by name.  The problem with real life, of course, is that it seldom conforms to what we plan on paper.  For one valid reason or another, there had been no less than thirty performers who'd worn the uniform of The NCM, by the time I sold my majority share of stock in the corporation in 1964.  After that, the folks who ran the company seemed to care only about the bottom line, rendering the personnel department of the group virtually a revolving door.  If a youngster had done a few shows for minimal money, and asked about a raise in pay, he or she was reportedly liberated in favor of a new wannabee right off the street, someone who was a wee bit hungrier for the bright lights of showbiz.  That's embarrassing to me.  It also makes me angry that Columbia Records, in effect, put me in business with those hoodlums-in-suits in the first place.

However unsatisfactory the motives for recruiting new players might have been, The New Christy Minstrels family now numbers in the hundreds, and we have compelling reasons to want an accurate record of our alumnae.
Gordon Adams, a dedicated fan and trusted friend of the group, is in charge of genealogy, compiling the Master List of NCM Personnel, and I urge anybody who may have any helpful information about our former Minstrels to contact Gordon at gadams1970@hotmail.com

RS