Local musicians a fair tradition: Homegrown chops get a chance to shine

Eric Sciaky first played the fair in 2009, sitting behind the drum kit for three bands. He played country in one, blues rock in the other and a hybrid of alternative metal in the third.

Twenty-three years old then, Sciaky is 29 now, the closest thing the Valley has to what could be considered a working musician — he’s making a living pounding the skins for numerous bands as both a permanent and rotating fixture in addition to his gig teaching drums at Clark Baker Music.

In that way Sciaky is an anomaly, but in every other way, the Brawley resident is what local music at the fair is all about — getting that chance to perform in front of family, friends, fans and … farm animals?

Well, yes; that is, if a local band or musician gets a chance to play on the Rabobank Center Stage, smack dab in front of the livestock barns, the beer garden and adjacent to the midway, a prime traffic area to live out those locally bred and honed musical chops with a professional lighting and sound crew to make local musicians look and sound their best.

“It’s fun times. You see people getting into the music that have never heard you before,” Sciaky said. “It’s fun to see people you haven’t seen in years; sometimes they’re surprised to see that you’re in a band.”

For decades, the California Mid-Winter Fair & Fiesta has been bringing in entertainment from around the country, sometimes big-name touring acts, sometimes tribute bands club-tested and audience-approved to sound like the real thing.

Yet the local fair, from animal projects to homemade jams and jellies, has always been a forum to gather the Imperial County community to interact, reconnect and, most important, entertain each other. No better example of that exists than in the bands and musicians who call the Valley home.

Sciaky that first year performed his debut show with Nick Wells and Big Bad Wolf, the band he plays with on a permanent basis with his bassist father, Raul. Big Bad Wolf has so far performed at the fair several times, most recently Thursday night.

The fair, he said, “is probably the biggest amount of local exposure in the Valley.”

The band’s namesake, Nick Wells, who divides his time under the 10-gallon hat as city manager of Holtville, sees the fair as the ultimate community experience for local players.

“I’m always pretty excited about it. I consider it one of the annual gigs we do that I get most excited about,” he said.

Wells said one of the benefits of growing up in the Valley is getting to hang around the barns as part of 4-H or FFA like he did as a student in Seeley and later Brawley Union High School. And to return to that stage and see old acquaintances is important.

“Now all these years later, I get to see all these friends,” he said.

Fair board President Joe Montenegro, who in years past has been the entertainment coordinator, said he sees the Rabobank stage as Grandstand Light, a smaller area to put on a good show and maybe earn a spot on the fair’s largest stage. That was considered for Wells’ band this year because of the sizeable following the group has built over time.

“It showcases that we’ve got some pretty damn good musicians here,” he said. “And you get all types of people from all walks of life.”

Born and bred in Brawley, Danny Tomboc spent some of his youth checking out his friends’ bands and local musicians at the various stages around the Imperial Valley Expo. It’s only been the last few years, though, that the 42-year-old BUHS teacher has the made the fair a regular stop for his diverse group of local longtime musicians, Pure Majik.

“It’s really exciting to play with friends and family. I think of it as our hometown crowd,” said Tomboc, whose band will also make annual stops at the San Diego County fair in Del Mar. “They’re more energetic, more loyal.”

It’s not all about local garage bands, though. On any given day someone can run across a high school jazz band, a community chorus, even a (jugless) jug band on occasion.

Montenegro said the DeVoy brothers performed at this year’s fair, men who the community at large know but likely wouldn’t associate with jam sessions in sweaty garages. Dan is human resources chief at the Imperial Irrigation District and Scott owns Green’s Jewelry and Gifts in El Centro.

Imperial County Superior Court Judge William Lehman is another one of those unlikely characters, Montenegro said, playing lead guitar for Megan Strahm & The True Blues.

Strahm herself is living proof that there is a stage for everyone when you have talent. While she spent much of her youth performing musical theater and North County Coalition for the Arts productions, even doing bigger stage work and pro sessions in San Diego, she hadn’t had any real time in a band setting.

As lead singer of the 2-year-old True Blues, this is Strahm’s first experience in fronting a group of musicians.

“It’s fun for me. I didn’t actually grow up spending a whole lot of time at the fair,” the 26-year-old Holtville native and Imperial High School teacher said.

Strahm said the fair is “nice, because it reaches a wide variety of people … something for everyone.

“It lets people have their day job, but they get to live out their passion as well.”

For Sciaky, the fair is by no means the pinnacle of success. Yet for local kids, making noise in the garage with nowhere to play but a house party sure to be raided by the cops, the fair is a musical Mecca.

“For younger kids that want to play in bands, it’s kind of hard to find gigs,” he said. “If you can, if you have the chance to play the fair, do it … and don’t stop playing music.”

Related story: Local bands bring back funky fair memories

Photos by Elizabeth Varin.

This story originally appeared in Imperial Valley Press, March 6, 2015.