Happy Birthday Robert Moog

What would you do if you turned a corner one day to become nose-to-nose with someone who had a great influence on your life as well as many others?

That happened to me with Bob Moog …

Surely Bob Moog is in the top ten list of people in history that had the greatest influence in the world of music making.

While Antonio Stradivari had wood, varnish and catgut – Moog had solder, wire and bakelite.

I had a few MOOGs in my life. They had quite a fat personality.

I had a ball getting to use a System 100 at the FSU School of Music lab from time to time.

So it was quite a treat running into him one day about 10 years ago.

In one of my past lives, I designed and built guitars – so I displayed at 6 or so NAMM shows in SoCal and Nashville. I was always bumping into someone there … it’s hard not to.

One afternoon I was hurrying along a tight corridor of displayers off the main floor in the Nashville Convention Center. It was such a narrow passage, folks had to turn sideways to shimmy past each other.

I took a blind corner where I nearly bumped into a gentleman who was doing the same as I in the opposite direction.

We both stopped and simultaneously begged pardon of the other. It was a humorous moment.

Then I realized it was Robert Moog himself !

I am very, very rarely “star struck” in the business … where I live, it’s quite common to see all manner of “stars” at the grocery store buying cans of soup – or jamming with some fellows to realize the guy on sax was the guy who played a solo on every hit song in the 70s and 80s … I know where some of the biggest Country stars buy their hair coloring goop …

So, anyway …

There I am – nose to nose with Bob Moog – who it took a few seconds to recognize. He seemed pleased that I did so.

I did a quick “elevator greeting” to him and how much I appreciated his work. He pulled me to one side in a corner and we continued to talk.

The conversation quickly turned into geek-speak … I told him about how I once discovered an early theremin of his in the collections of a science museum and used it in demonstrations and even on television once … he talked a bit about his newest projects and making effects processors …

I told him I once owned a Micro-Moog and it was the best item he ever put his name on – to which
he raised an eyebrow and smirked a bit …

it was among the best 20 or so minute moments in my life!

He gave me a business card and signed his name and private phone number on it – which I still have – and invited me to come over to Asheville sometime.

Thus is a point of learning ...

Take opportunities when they come along as soon as possible. There is no better time than the present.

Because not long after that – he was gone.

Category: Tony Rollo Blog