Exactly so, GUEST.

Back in 1958, when I first started singing in coffee houses, the musician's union planned to lean on them and make them pay the singers union scale. Fortunately, we (the musicians they thought they were trying to protect) talked them into leaving the coffee houses alone. Coffee houses simply could not afford to pay union scale, and if the union had had its way, one of the best "training grounds" for folk performers—and the source of at least some pocket money—would have be lost to us.

Singing regularly in coffee houses, I was able to hone my skills and turn myself into a seasoned performer, while at the same time add to my income from teaching guitar, pay the rent, feed myself, had "walking around money" and could treat myself to an occasional beer.

While thoroughly enjoying singing. AND often getting hired for fairly lucrative gigs by someone who heard me at the coffee house!

If those who sought to "protect" me had not been talked out of it, all of that would have been lost to me, and I might have had to hang up the guitar and go to work for the Boeing Airplane Company like everyone else in Seattle at the time.

Don Firth