The Dusty Chaps was an American

country rock Country rock is a genre of music which fuses rock and country. It was developed by rock musicians who began to record country-flavored records in the late 1960s and early 1970s. These musicians recorded rock records using country themes, vocal ...

band based in

Tucson , "(at the) base of the black ill , nicknames = "The Old Pueblo", "Optics Valley", "America's biggest small town" , image_map = , mapsize = 260px , map_caption = Interactive map ...

, AZ from 1969 through the early 1980s. In 1975 they released their first album Honky Tonk Music on a small Tucson label, Bandoleer Records. The band subsequently signed with Capitol Records and rerecorded Honky Tonk Music with an added track in 1977. They released another album on Capitol, Domino Joe (1978). Band members included Peter Gierlach (vocals,

accordion Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a ree ...

); George Hawke (

bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in the bass range: ** Bass (instrument), including: ** Acoustic bass gui ...

acoustic guitar An acoustic guitar is a musical instrument in the string family. When a string is plucked its vibration is transmitted from the bridge, resonating throughout the top of the guitar. It is also transmitted to the side and back of the instrument, ...

, background vocals); Pat McAndrew (

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gu ...

); Leonardo Lopez (

drums A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair of matching drumsticks ...

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

); Steve Solomon ( keyboards,

saxophone The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of Single-reed instrument, single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed (mouthpi ...

clarinet The clarinet is a musical instrument in the woodwind family. The instrument has a nearly cylindrical bore and a flared bell, and uses a single reed to produce sound. Clarinets comprise a family of instruments of differing sizes and pitch ...

vibraphone The vibraphone is a percussion instrument in the metallophone family. It consists of tuned metal bars and is typically played by using mallets to strike the bars. A person who plays the vibraphone is called a ''vibraphonist,'' ''vibraharpist ...

); Bill Emrie (

violin The violin, sometimes known as a '' fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone ( string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument ( soprano) in the family in regu ...

); Red Davidson (

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

marimba The marimba () is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars that are struck by mallets. Below each bar is a resonator pipe that amplifies particular harmonics of its sound. Compared to the xylophone, the timbre ...

); and Ted Hockenbury (

pedal steel guitar The pedal steel guitar is a console-type of steel guitar with pedals and knee levers that change the pitch of certain strings to enable playing more varied and complex music than any previous steel guitar design. Like all steel guitars, it can ...

). For some time the Chaps were the house band at Tucson's renowned Stumble Inn as well as the Poco Loco. Steve Solomon (1949–2005) was a lifelong musician and played saxophones, keyboards, and flute for the Dusty Chaps in the late 1970s in Tucson, AZ. On their album, "Honky-Tonk Music" (Capitol ST-11614), he was featured on "Juke Joint Daddy", "Invisible Man" and "Rounder". Steve's talents were also featured prominently on their album, "Domino Joe" (Capitol ST-11755). Steve Solomon's composition, "Houd-Da" was used as the introduction to the song "Domino Joe", though not credited on the album. The introduction to the song "Annabelle Walker" was actually Steve Solomon's composition "The Kool School" though he was not credited. Peter Gierlach is a horticulturist of native desert plants, and currently resides in

Cochise County Cochise County () is a county in the southeastern corner of the U.S. state of Arizona. It is named after the Native American chief Cochise. The population was 125,447 at the 2020 census. The county seat is Bisbee and the most populous city ...

, AZ. Concert pianist David Syme, who now resides in Houston, Texas and in Ireland, played on several tracks on the "Domino Joe" album. The original pedal steel guitar player was Neil Harry, who later played with Chuck Wagon and the Wheels and recorded with Howe Gelb of Giant Sand. The Chaps' album ''Domino Joe'' was notable in that it was a concept album in which all songs segued, forming two continual suites (sides A & B of the LP) and maintaining conceptual continuity throughout. The songs were well written and executed, even if the lyrics occasionally included the irresistible pun (e.g. chilli today and hot tamale)

References

American country rock groups Swing revival ensembles Western swing musical groups {{US-country-band-stub