Music careers not always on key

2 managers recall hard work, low pay in their early days

By Craig Harris, Globe Correspondent, 6/15/03

Nearly everyone dreams of becoming a musical star. While only a few have the talent and the luck to succeed as an artist, others find ways to build careers in music.

''I realized early on that I wasn't going to be a musician,'' said Kimball Packard, manager of singer-songwriters Amy Fairchild, Jenny Bruce, and Karen Jacobsen, during an interview. ''But, I still wanted to be involved with music.''

Ralph Jaccodine, manager of singer-songwriters Ellis Paul and Flynn, started from ground zero in carving out his career. ''I didn't know anything about managing a performer,'' Jaccodine recalled, ''or running a record label, when I started. I went to the library, took out as many books as possible and learned on the run.''

For Jaccodine, it all began with a dream.

''I dreamed that I owned a record company,'' Jaccodine said. He woke up so inspired that he grabbed paper and pen and wrote down what he remembered, he said in the Waltham office of his company, Black Wolf Productions.

A little more than a decade later, Black Wolf Productions has continued to expand. Recently merged with the Boston Video Company of Waltham, the company branched out to book publishing with Paul's ''Notes from The Road'' and Globe music writer Scott Alarik's ''Deep Community: Adventures in the Modern Folk Underground.'' The company recently released its first DVD, ''3000 Miles'', featuring a concert by Paul, with a similar DVD by Vance Gilbert to follow.

Paul ''and I have a great relationship,'' Jaccodine said. ''He comes up with ideas and I find ways to make them happen.''

Although Paul has been his top client for more than decade, Jaccodine has occasionally managed other artists. While he no longer works with Martin Sexton or the Push Stars, he continues to manage Ireland-born and Boston-based singer-songwriter, Flynn. ''I have a very close, intimate, relationship with my artists,'' he said. ''I really love their music, and I love them as people.''

For Wakefield-born Kimball Packard, a telephone call to executives of the Mesa Blue Moon record label in Los Angeles served as an unintended entry into music management. A longtime fan of Scottish singer-songwriter John Martyn, he had called the label to complain that a new Martyn album had been released without publicity. ''I hadn't read about it,'' he recalled. ''I hadn't heard it on the radio. Why weren't they promoting it?''

The following day, the executive called to ask Packard to help book East Coast dates to support Martyn's album. This led to two years as Martyn's manager. Packard later served stints as manager of Jonathan Edwards, with whom he set up the Rising Records label, and bassist/producer T-Bone Wolk.

''Working with these people has taught me a lot,'' he said. ''I learned about touring with Martyn. We did 52 dates, in England and Italy, in 60 days. Working with Edwards and Wolk, I learned how to market a record to retail and radio. I observed and participated in the actual making of an album. When Rising Records signed Pete Townshend's brother, Simon, I learned how to do national retail and radio promotion.''

There was no simple blueprint for Packard or Jaccodine to follow.

''There's nothing cut and dried about this job,'' Packard said. ''Certainly, the biggest part is sales. But, there's so much more to it. I have to take care of all the business - the negotiating, the setting up of tours, and making sure that publicity is done. The artists should be able to focus on their art.''

Although they took different paths to becoming artist managers, Packard and Jaccodine share similar roots. Both studied business and marketing in college - Packard at Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, Mich., and Jaccodine at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Ind., - and both began their professional music careers as concert promoters.

Packard, who produced his first shows when he and his wife, Neysa, were running the Eagle Mountain House in Jackson, N.H., in the early 1980s, went on to become general manager of Cambridge club, Nightstage, in 1987. Although he remained in the position for less than a year, it was very inspirational.

''It was a great gig,'' he said. ''There were so many great moments - Dizzy Gillespie's 70th birthday, the time that King Sunny Ade and his Juju Orchestra played and U2 came to the show. We had Ladysmith Black Mambazo after the Paul Simon 'Graceland' tour. I loved that band with Max Weinberg and Levon Helm.''

Packard later produced shows at the West Main Street Cafe in Northborough and the Charles Playhouse in Boston. ''I had a really good rapport with the artists,'' he said.

A native of Allentown, Pa., Jaccodine was still in high school when he produced his first concerts. ''There had been a riot at a Deep Purple concert a few years before,'' he explained, ''and the mayor had said there would be no more rock concerts in Allentown. A couple of years later, they said, 'we will allow rock concerts now but they have to be promoted by the Allentown Council Youth.' As [council] president, I became responsible for booking the shows.''

Jacodine began his professional career as a salesman for the Wrangler Jeans company, and worked as a commercial real estate agent after moving to Boston in the early-1980s, but he continued to be drawn to music. Although it had been several years since he had heard folk music at Godfrey Daniels, a small club in Bethelehem, Pa., he stopped into the Nameless Coffeehouse in Harvard Square, on a Friday night, where he found his future calling in the music of Ellis Paul.

Paul ''completely blew me away,'' he said. ''He was young. He was hip. He had a lot of charisma.''

Jaccodine was so impressed that he telephoned Paul offering to help him reach an audience. After launching a folk music coffeehouse at Boston College, he produced shows in which Paul opened for such artists as Richard Shindell and Bill Morrissey.

The next step in Jaccodine's relationship with Paul was inspired by the previously mentioned dream. While showing commercial space to Mike Dreece of Newbury Comics, the next day, Jaccodine mentioned his dream. Dreece, who had previously released albums on his own label, Modern Methods, agreed to help finance Black Wolf records.

Jaccodine's enthusiasm was temporarily dampened, however, when he telephoned Paul to tell him the good news. ''I was so excited,'' he remembered. ''But, when I called Ellis, he said, 'Thanks, but it's too late. I'm going into the studio tomorrow.''

Jaccodine persuaded Paul to wait and met with his investors and put together a new business plan. ''We came up with $6,000,'' he said, ''and Ellis said, 'OK, I'll run with you guys.' ''

While success in the music business can bring financial rewards, it can also mean long periods of financial struggle. Packard and Jaccodine initially needed to supplement their income with a variety of jobs. ''When you start working with artists,'' Packard said, ''they're not making a lot of money and you're only making a percentage of that. It could be tough. You've got to have something to help with the income. For me, it was Web design and doing publicity for other artists.''

Packard and Jaccodine have received much support from the Boston Managers Group, a coalition of 35 of their peers. The group, which was founded by Jaccodine and former Aerosmith manager Tim Collins meets once a month. ''When you're a manager, you usually sit alone in an office,'' Jaccodine said. ''When we all get together, though, we try to help each other out.''