![]() I had played in 1963 with the Golden State Boys at the Monterey Folk Festival. “The diversity of the lineup, from Otis Redding and Jimi Hendrix to Janis Joplin and Ravi Shankar, was remarkable. “To this day, I believe that Monterey was the best music festival ever,” Hillman declared. Hillman’s 315-page “Time Between” takes its name from what has long been regarded as the first country-rock song ever recorded, which he wrote for The Byrds’ fourth album, 1967’s “Younger Than Yesterday.” He is perhaps the only musician whose credits include performing at the seminal Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 and the Grand Ole Opry in 1968 (both with The Byrds), then at the bloody, decade-ending Altamont festival in 1969 (with the Flying Burrito Brothers). I couldn’t believe it! ‘Oh, we get paid?’ ” We played a gig and we each got paid $5 or $10. “The Barkers was probably one of the best bands I ever played in, but I didn’t look at it like: ‘OK, this is step one in my musical career,’ ” Hillman said. “I still feel blessed to have met people who were always pointing a way, a direction, for me and saying: ‘Why don’t you try doing it this way’?”īy 17, Hillman was a member of top San Diego bluegrass band The Scottsville Squirrel Barkers, with which he would record his first album a few years later. “Billy was fantastic,” Hillman said, speaking recently from the Ventura home he shares with his wife of 41 years, Connie. While attending San Dieguito High School, he found an invaluable musical mentor in Bill Smith, a custodian who was well-versed in nearly all things bluegrass. After becoming hooked on bluegrass, via albums by Flatt & Scruggs, The Stanley Brothers and Bill Monroe, Hillman bought a new Kay mandolin at Singing Strings in Encinitas.Īs he had first done with guitar, he learned to play mandolin by listening to his favorite albums, over and over, at a slower speed than they were recorded. It was followed by a used Epiphone, for which he paid $50. These were likely the best investments either of them ever made.Ī year later, the self-taught Hillman moved up to a Goya acoustic that cost $100. ![]() She paid the $10 price and promised her son that, if he stuck with the instrument for a full year, she would pay half the cost for him to acquire a better guitar. He and his mother found it in a shop in Tijuana when he was 15.
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