Gentle Don Light

My life has been blessed with many mentors. Some were just ol’ country folk who had the gift of wisdom and common sense. Too, a good plenty of them were successful. Some are even famous.

From the age of 18, I received some of the best world/business learning from a Nashville legend named Don Light. He arrived in Nashville about the same time that folks like Chet Atkins, Ray Stevens, Jerry Bradley, Jerry Reed, and such arrived. They were all good friends who stayed friends until the end, meeting every Saturday morning for breakfast at Shoney’s. They all called themselves “hillbillies” with pride. That meant they had been there from the beginning of country music. Most of them could tell a few Hank Williams or Patsy Cline stories.

Don Light was already a legend by the time I came to know him. He was the first drummer on the Grand Ole Opry because the Opry didn’t have drummers for 30 or so years. He was a co-founder of the Gospel Music Association and opened the first Southern gospel music booking agency called Don Light Talent. By the time I met him, he still owned the agency but it was run by Herman and Ed (back then I knew him as Eddie) Harper. Eventually, they bought the agency and, for years, have booked my best friend, Karen Peck.

Don had gradually moved over to country music. His life could be a book. And should be. He kept a diary of every day of his life then, every morning, he would come in and flip back the journal and read about the previous year. If I had been part of it, he would call and say, “I was just looking at my journal and saw where we had dinner in Charlotte a year ago.”

At his funeral, I told his brother, “Please, please, turn those journals into a book.”

This about the recently departed Jimmy Buffett: Don Light (I often called him by both names) told great stories in a quiet, understated way. He let the story itself boom loudly. Two Buffett stories are among my favorites. So, here to celebrate Jimmy Buffett are those stories.

Don heard that a writer over at Billboard magazine was a singer/songwriter and he was getting good feedback by playing little clubs around town. Don went to hear him. “I knew he was a star from the first song. He was ordinary looking and an average singer but he had a charisma that was remarkable. The audience went crazy over him.”

Don Light made an appointment with him and asked, “If I can get you a record deal, can I manage you?”

“Yeah,” said Buffett. “Get me a record deal and I’m yours.”

It took over three years and persistence for that to happen. Every label in Nashville turned him down at least three times and some even turned him down four times. The excuse was always the same: “We can’t get radio to play him. What is he? Folk? Country? Rock? He doesn’t fall into a radio category.”

So true.

Don Light said, “It didn’t discourage me. Those record labels turned over management about every six months. That’s about how long it took me to make my way through the labels, then star over. I figured that one day, New York would send someone in who would get Jimmy Buffett. They couldn’t all be that dumb.”

ABC-Dot Records decided to open an office in Nashville. This would have been the very late 1960s not any later than 1971. Don Gant, a beloved songwriter and friend of Don Light’s, was put in charge of the label. Don Light’s call about Buffett was the first one that Gant received. He wasn’t fully, if any, aware of the many times that Buffett had been turned down.

Gant signed him and recorded an album on him that included a soft pop ballad called “Come Monday.” Unfortunately, it came out at the same time that Kenny Loggins’ “Please, Come To Boston” released and the two similar-sounding songs fought each other all the way up chart, both ending up outside the Top 10. I think Buffett’s stopped at 17.

Los Angeles’ ABC-Dot management told Gant to release Buffett because the A&R (Artists and Records; this is the promotion department) said that they couldn’t get radio to play him. Gant called to tell Don Light the news and he said, “No way. We have a contract and I’ll see to it that it sticks.”

Margaritaville

While Buffett was dangling at the end of a fragile string, he had a date to play at the fames Roxy on Sunset Blvd. in L.A. where all the music “in crowd” hung out (like Cher, Linda Rondstadt, Don Henley, and record executives).

“One thing about Buffett,” Don Light said. “I had no problem booking him in clubs and listening rooms. He was so great on stage that he stayed booked in the most prestigious places. That’s why I knew if we could get an album out on him, he’d be a star.”

Don Light flew to L.A. to see Buffett at the Roxy that night. He checked in to the hotel and was walking down the hall to his room when he encountered Buffett walking up the hall, guitar in hand.

“Hey,” said Buffett, “I just wrote this song. I want you to listen to it.”

Don unlocked his room, Buffett came in, sat down on the bed, and played Margaritaville.

“Whatta you think?”

Don Light, always one to understate, replied, “Not bad. You can’t do any better?” Then chuckled a bit.

He told me many years later, “It was the most perfect song I had ever heard. There wasn’t one wrong word in it. It was sheer poetry.”

That night at the Roxy, Buffett and his band brought down the house filled with stars and influencers. He took his bow and they all left the stage. But the audience roared, demanding more. In a few minutes, Buffett, somewhat shyly, came back on the stage by himself with only his guitar. He pulled up a stool and played the song he had written that afternoon, “Margaritaville.”

The crowd went nuts. He encored with that song five times before they would let him leave the stage.

The rest is music and branding business history.

That first album that Buffett recorded – including “Come Monday” – got NO airplay but his fans were such, that it still sold 250,000 albums.

Shortly, before the history-making album, “Margaritaville", came out, Don Light recalled standing backstage at a large music festival. “The album had gotten no air play but that entire audience sang every word of every song on the album. It was astounding. More than ever, I was convinced that I was right – he was going to be a huge star as soon as the record label got on board.”

With Don Light’s full cooperation, I told this story in my book, There’s A Better Day A’Comin’. It is a tremendous example of why we should never give up. Every opinion is subjective. It only takes one “yes” to wipe out a thousand “no’s.” Had Don Light and Jimmy Buffett not kept going through five years of “no’s”, Buffett would not have died as a billionaire or one of the best-recognized brands that the world has ever known.

Tink and I attended Don Light’s funeral about five years ago, which I still say, is the best funeral I’ve ever been to. It was like going to the greatest show of the biggest music stars who, had in some way, been touched by Don Light. Buffett couldn’t make it in person but he was live by satellite. He told a couple of funny Don Light stories but he also said, somberly, “If there hadn’t been a Don Light, there wouldn’t be a Jimmy Buffett. I will always be grateful.”

To end on a light note, Don Light had a dry, wise sense of humor. It was so dry that sometimes it would take me three or four seconds to get it. One day, Don Light called up to see how I was doing. He was very good at checking in regularly and always on my birthday. Always. One time he called and said, “I can’t sing but I have someone here to sing for you.” And it was the Oak Ridge Boys singing a cappella Happy Birthday. Now, that was a treat.

Anyway, Don called that day, just chitchatting. He said, “I just got off the phone with Buffett.” Don had not managed him for years but they were still in the publishing business together. “We just did an audit.” Music stars used to regularly audit record labels to make sure they were getting all their royalties and they always found money. Streaming has changed that somewhat.

Don continued, quietly, understated, “We were going over the numbers and I said, ‘You know, Buffett, you haven’t done too bad for someone who only had one and a half hits in his career.”

No one laughed harder than Jimmy Buffett.

Photo Credit: Dianne Kelley/The Tennessean