THE ANNUAL WINTER DANCE PARTY

AT THE SURF BALLROOM IN CLEAR LAKE, IOWA

PHOTOS FROM THE 1999 EVENT

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The 1999 event was Number 21 in the series, and it also marked the 20th anniversary of the first Memorial Concert and the 40th anniversary of the plane crash near Clear Lake which ended the lives of Holly, Ritchie Valens, the Big Bopper, and pilot Roger Peterson.

A major part at the Friday night sock hop was the return of the Mad Hatter who received a plaque from the Clear Lake Chamber of Commerce: "For bold and visionary efforts from conception to production of the first annual Buddy Holly Tribute. Because of your efforts, the music will never die."



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1:  A view of the crash site which is along the fence line (marked by the pole and the tipped wooden post to its right). Center of photo faces directly southeast, in the direction of the Mason City airport.

2:  Wayne Christgau (who keeps general operations of the Surf Ballroom finely tuned) adjusting the marquee. Among the various historical galleries in the Surf is "Wayne's World" which includes photos of a presidential visit.

3:  Bob Hale with Denny Farland who put together the re-creation of the final tour which finished at the Surf on Tuesday, Feb. 2 this year. John Mueller, who performed Holly's songs has the tour CD available here. Another new site with photos of this tour can be found here.

4:  Bob Hale with Ritchie Valens' nephew Ernie Valens.

5:  George Tomsco and Stan Lark, two original members of The Fireballs.

6:  Chris Montez.

7:  Chris Montez joined by Ritchie's sisters. (Ar Stevens is in back on the far left.)

8:  Freddy Cannon addressing the crowd.

9:  Bobby Vee about ready to launch one of a few dozen "rubber balls" into the audience.

10 & 11:  These shots include The Roses and two of the Vees (Robb on guitar and Tommy on bass).

12, 13 & 14:  The Crickets: Sonny Curtis (12), Jerry Allison (13) and Joe B. Mauldin (14).

15:  Nanci Griffith, an associate of the Crickets and a considerable solo country artist for many years.

16:  The Roses – David Bigham and Robert Linville – performed backing vocals for some songs by Bobby Vee and The Crickets.

17:  J. P. Richardson, Jr. – the Big Bopper's son.

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Some concert photography details:

  • Camera: A Canon TL single-lens reflex unit that is almost 30 years old. It has an exposure meter (not easy to read in the dark!) and is otherwise completely manual. I attach a 70-210mm telefoto zoom lens and have had some luck taking comet photos with it. Flash? NO WAY! I will not be such a distraction.
  • Film: Kodak Gold Max 800. This is the first time I have used it for concerts, and it does seem a bit more "versatile" (i.e., more "forgiving" if your exposure settings aren't perfect) compared to other films – as would appear to support their advertising claims.
  • Exposure: Generally f4 at 1/125 sec. for average stage lighting. Special note added Feb., 2000: For the 2000 event, having noted that many of the faces in the 1999 photos were slightly overexposed, I changed my setting for average lighting to f5.6 at 1/125 sec., and nearly every shot turned out OK. On the web, much will still depend on properly-set monitors (good contrast and not too bright!).
  • In the photo above (taken by Don Larson) I'm apparently about to do my thing with lens cap still firmly in place.

 Go to Main Page, 1979, 2000, 2001, 2002.

Page put on web 2/16/99 and last
modified on 1/15/02 at 11:30 AM, CST.
John Lindquist: homepage&e-mail,
complete site outline.