JIM- You were raised down in Calexico and Riverside County?

 

JD- Yeah, Moreno, it was called Sunnymead then. It's where the old Riverside Raceway used to be. It was a big time raceway - it'd been there for years. It's no longer there. It's ten miles east of Riverside proper. On the 60 freeway headed toward Palm Springs.

 

JD- Luaine, (his wife) I moved to the San Fernando Valley in 1968. I met her out there in a place called Perris, California. Where we lived was right there

at March Air Force Base, just north of there. I went to school in Riverside and Sunnymead. I met my wife, who was 16 when we met, and we got married a couple years later and moved to the Valley. Been there ever since.

 

JIM- So you moved to the Valley, what, to be closer to the music?

 

JD- I got a job in music down there, and decided to be closer to where everything was happening. At that time there was a lot going on.

 

JIM- Is that when you started at the Palomino Club?

 

JD- About 1970, became part of the house band.

 

JIM- So you were part of the House Band at the Palomino for umteen years?

 

JD- Yeah, well, it was kind of speckled along the way. I was there part of the time and gone part of the time. I started in 1970 and worked for about three and a half years. In 1974 we moved to Nashville (with my wife and kids).

 

JIM- Oh yeah, out there with Ray Stevens.

 

JD- Yeah. In 1975 we came back to LA, and I went right back to work at the Palomino. I was there most of the time from 75 to 84 with 3 or 4 different bands. Then we started the Desert Rose Band in 84 and I was with them till about 90- then back to the Palomino until 97~98.