Review from 4/06: Local artist returns home to promote album

... here's a really cool (front page!!) article from the Xenia Gazette published in April 2006.

Local artist returns home to promote album
By MARIANNE WELLENDORF
Staff Writer
mwellendorf@xeniagazette.com
YELLOW SPRINGS

John Batdorf, 54, grew up in Yellow Springs and Springfield with a very musical family. He is now returning to the area to promote his new CD, All Wood and Stones, which is an eleven-song CD of early Rolling Stones songs. "My grandpa was a fine saxophonist and my parents were also very musically inclined but I showed little interest because of sports," Batdorf said. That all changed when Batdorf was diagnosed with a bone marrow disease and placed in a body cast for a year. Unable to get around, he watched a lot of T.V., especially the Ed Sullivan Show. When the Beatles performed, Batdorf said he was a changed man. "Wow, my goals changed completely. I started practicing guitar and piano and started being in a series of bands which finally led me to California after the end of my freshman year in high school," Batdorf said. Batdorf stayed in California and also lived in Las Vegas for awhile, playing in bands, working in coffee houses and trying to get a record deal. John Batdorf and his friend Mark Rodney eventually signed a deal with Atlantic Records before starting a band called Silver and doing an album for Arista Records. Batdorf and his wife of 33 years, Melanie, and their twin sons Brett and Matt currently reside in West Hills, California. "I last played in Dayton in 1976 and I am really looking forward to coming back home," Batdorf said.
Batdorf can be seen May 13, at 9:00 p.m. at the Canal Street Tavern in Dayton.

http://www.xeniagazette.com/index.asp
(to read the article and see the picture that goes with it, click on the above link, go to 'PDF version' and search back issues for April 27th. It's on the front page!!!!).