JOHN DENVER

My friend

By Harold Thau

For nearly three decades John Denver earned international acclaim as a songwriter, performer, actor, environmentalist and humanitarian. He is idolized and revered by millions. Yet when I’m asked about John, my first thoughts turn to friendship.

In many ways, he was the brother I never had. We were close for more than 30 years. In 1965, I was an accountant from the Bronx just beginning to establish my self as a business manager for some promising young comedians and jazz artists. Through the latter I met Milt Okun, a major folk music figure who produced records for Peter, Paul and Mary and The Chad Mitchell Trio and others.

From time to time, Milt and I would meet in his studio and discuss the music business. It was during one of those cracker-barrel sessions that Milt first mentioned John Denver. He had been searching for a lead singer to replace Chad Mitchell who was leaving to do a Broadway show. Among the 250 demo tapes Milt had received was a not very good one from John, who had been trying to establish himself as a singer on the West Coast. Anyone other than Milt would have rejected it.

Instead, Milt invited John to audition in New York. As luck would have it, John had a terrible cold and the audition was unimpressive. When he left for a singing engagement in Phoenix, it was with Milt’s quietly modulated “don’t call us, we’ll call you,” in his ear. For the next ten days John wouldn’t leave his Phoenix hotel room other than to perform, for fear of missing Milt’s call. It came ten days later and informed him he was the new lead singer.

At the time, Milt didn’t think John’s voice was fully developed yet, but he saw something uncommon in John: a friendliness and potential star power that he wanted to nurture and promote.

For three years (1965-68), the Trio withstood a rigorous touring schedule. John, who had been an army brat, born Henry John Deutschendorf Jr. on New Year’s Eve 1943, lived the itinerant lonely life of most children who move around a lot. Music was a refuge from the time he was in his teens. In 1963 he made a lame attempt to go to Texas Tech, chiefly to please his father, but dropped out after a year, moving to Los Angeles to try his luck as a singer. He sang at Ledbetter’s, a club in Westwood Village, owned by Randy and Diane Sparks who also recognized a special charisma in this downhome, boyish lad. “The people just love him,” Diane told her husband. It was Randy Sparks who suggested the name change from Deutschendorf to Denver. John lived with them, made $5 a week and played music nights-until his audition for Milt Okun.

Milt’s and my enthusiasm for the Trio was unshaken until we realized that the more dates the Trio played the more indebted it became. The only practical solution was to disband the group. John, however, refused to allow the Trio to declare bankruptcy and determined to pay off all debts himself. It was a staggering load for a budding performer to take on, especially since he had just married Annie Martell, a young woman he’d met in Minneapolis 18 months before.

But good things were starting to happen. Peter, Paul and Mary took John’s composition “Leaving’ on a Jet Plane” and had their first-and only-number one hit. It was also John’s first breakthrough as a songwriter. In those early years, John frequently turned to Milt for direction. Milt encouraged John to continue developing his own sound. The dynamics were there and John was becoming one of the best composers and vocal technicians in pop music.

Milt worked hard to land him a record deal. He was rejected by 16 record companies before finally scoring at RCA with the four-album guarantee. The first three albums were moderately successful, but his fourth-Poems, Prayers and Promises - became a real hit.

When “Take Me Home, Country Roads” hit second place on the charts in 1971 and became the Country Music Association’s Song of the Year, John’s career took off. In 1973 he released his Greatest Hits album and in 1974 Back Home Again set a record as the best-selling album in the world. By 1975 John was the country’s biggest-selling recording artist.

Mostly due to his travel schedule and career pressures, John and Annie’s marriage had its ups and downs. They needed a fresh start and moved to Aspen where John was the happiest he’d ever been. He loved the outdoors, learned to fly, loved the Colorado mountains. In four very heady years, he had zoomed from Unknown to Superstar. Nobody sold more albums at the time. He and Annie adopted two children, Zak and Anna Kate. But John, who was among the first celebrities to take up environmental causes, became deeply involved in them, often at the expense of his family life. His song “Calypso” honored his good friend Jean-Jacques Cousteau, the great Undersea explorer.

Still those were halcyon years. Everything he touched turned to gold. He teamed with Frank Sinatra in Tahoe and made the movie Oh God! With George Burns (1977), another success. But his intense activism also was beginning to swallow him up. Later records did not sell as well. He slipped into a mid-life crisis of sorts, became short-tempered and defensive, a situation made worse by his father’s sudden death of a heart attack. After 15 years of marriage, he and Annie divorced. And after 17 years of another kind of marriage, RCA, for whom John had made huge sums of money, dropped him as a recording artist, leaving his life and career in limbo.

And yet John went on trucking. Not long after, on a performing tour of Australia, he met and married Cassandra Delaney, but the marriage was short-lived. His life continued to be somewhat rocky. In the mid 1990’s, he rented a house in the Monterey area and tried California living. He was killed when a new plane that he had just purchased went down in the waters off the Monterey coast.

John was only 53. On the day he died he was doing the two things he loved best outside of performing: playing golf and flying. His ashes were scattered in his beloved mountains above Aspen. His death was not without its quotient of irony. John Denver’s career had just begun to show signs of picking up again. Four months after his death, he won his only Grammy for an album of songs written for children.

“My music and all my work stem from the conviction that people everywhere are intrinsically the same,” John had said about the universal appeal of his music. “When I write a song, I want to take the personal experience or observation that inspired it and express it in as universal a way as possible. I’m a global citizen. I think we all are-at least we’ve got to start thinking that way. I want to work in whatever I do-my music, my writing, my performing, my commitments, my home and personal life-in a way that is directed towards a world in balance, a world that creates a better quality of life for all people.”

John Denver was an extraordinary man-warm, caring, an uncommon friend and a rare human being. I feel privileged to have shared so much of the journey with him.

Harold Thau was John Denver’s partner, business manager, personal manager and one of his closest friends.