Don Mancuso may be the best kept secret in rock today, even though he has been ripping up the stages for over 30 years now. At the age of only 18, Mancuso was a member of the Rochester NY based band -Black Sheep, which also featured vocalist Lou Gramm. Black Sheep went on to release two critically acclaimed albums on Capitol records during the mid 70's. The band also toured with some of the greatest artist of that era, Ted Nugent, Kiss, Peter Frampton and Hall & Oates. However, it was shortly after that vocalist Lou Gramm was recruited by ex-Spooky Tooth guitarist Mick Jones to front the new super group Foreigner. After that Mancuso found himself bandless, but he carried on playing locally in several bands and perfecting his guitar style.

A few years back, Mancuso reunited with Lou Gramm and he currently performs with the Lou Gramm band. The band has several dates lined up for this summer. In addition, Mancuso also recently released the second CD from his other band  D Drive. This band also consists of ex-Talas vocalist Phil Naro. On their new CD "Straight Up The Middle," Mancuso brilliantly fuses blues with classic rock in a way that no one has done in years. Check out the CD and you will most certainly agree that Don Mancuso is a true Guitar Star.

We caught up with Don and asked this guitar wiz the following questions about guitars, gigs and gear and here’s what he had to say.

How many guitars do you own? 
26

What was your very first guitar?
A Kay with the action 2” off the fingerboard!

What is your most favorite guitar that you have ever owned and what makes it so great?
I think it’s my Jeff Beck Strat. It just has a great feel and sound. Tough though because I have a 63 SG that has a different thing going and it’s just as cool. Actually all my guitars have some kind of magic nitch and that’s why I own them..

What kind of Petals and effects do you use when playing live?
With the Lou Gramm Band I use nothing. Just straight into the amp.
With DDRIVE & the Regi Hendrix Band I use a pedal board built by John Nau at Nau Eng. (pronounced now) It has a tuner Boss, Wha (VOX stock), Fultone Choral/Flanger/Memory Man Delay & a Pro-Co Rat distortion. The only thing I’m using now is the Memory Man, the tuner, the flanger(for the leslie sound) and a Voodoo labs Proctavia pedal. I used to carry a Leslie with me in the old days!!!

What kind of amp do you use?
Live it’s a Marshall JCM2000 TSL (Swiss army knife amp) in the studio I use 1972 Marshall Super Lead 100’s and a 50 along with my 2 Class A Nau Eng. Amps. One is a clone of an AC15 and the an AC30, but they’re way better than the VOX, or Matchless amps. Also a 1955 Fender Deluxe and a 60’s Bassman.

At what age did you start playing guitar?
The first time 8 years. The second 14.

What inspired you to start?
Watching local bands and seeing Jimi Hendrix, ELP and a couple of other bands that toured through here.

How long do you use to practice when you first started ?
The usual hour, or 2 a day. Then as I got older I worked up to 6-7 hrs and now it fluctuates.

And what did you practice? (Songs, scales, ect…)
Mostly songs and technique that I saw other people use that I wanted to incorporate into my style. Bending technique and whammy bar stuff, but I did do dexterity scales, modes and such too. I also took a year of classical and had to work pretty hard at that. Finger picking.. You know.
Now I play around 30% of the night without a pick to get a few tones that I can’t with.

Do you still practice often, if so how often and what do you play when practicing?
I do, but nothing regimented. It’s pretty much free form and things that I hear that I can’t do very easily. I’m not really a technician on guitar. More of a feel player with some chops thrown in that I like.

Who were some of your favorite guitarists ?
Paul Kossoff, Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, Duane Almond, Clapton, Arial Bender.. To many to mention. I like a lot of different stuff from R&B To metal and classical.

What gave you the greatest degree of difficultly when learning the guitar.                            Bending notes and controlling vibrato the way I wanted. Also being in a Celtic Rock band proved to be a “reel” challenge! There were a lot of dynamics and speed in that music that were very cool, but took me a lot of work to hone.

Did you learn how to read music? If no, can you read music now? 
Yes. I do know how, but don’t do it enough to be great at it. I do read notation and TAB though and it’s a great thing to know!

At one point where you able to play by ear?
From the beginning. I was always better at that.

What advice would you give someone who is struggling playing by ear?
Get with a teacher like myself to see if it helps and keep working at it. It’s all vocabulary and having a big enough one to relate it to what you hear.

How do you go about composing a solo for a song?
By feel. I listen and jam. If it doesn’t work in 1, or 2 takes I come back to it latter and listen more until I start playing something that gets me excited and then I know I’m in the pocket.

Do you ever write in alternate tunings?
Way to much actually.. I have to carry at least 3 guitars with specific tunings for Lock Lips & I’m A Little Outside.. I’ve been trying to stop until I make it to a point where I have a bigger budget for shows, but it’s impossible. I love those sounds and the Nashville type of tunings. They have these new Strats out now that do all the tunings and have a hex pick up. I may look into one of those, Even does 12 String in alt tunings!! I wonder what happens when it goes out though... hmmmm...

What other styles of music are you competent in?
Celtic Rock, Blues, Punk, Metal, R&B, Pop, Gospel, Hard Rock (of course), Reggae, Fusion Rock, but I’d need a month to get my chops back for that depending on the degree of difficulty.

What other instruments can you play?
I play bass with the Lou Gramm Band and if you check the new Straight Up The Middle cd I’m actually doing the bass on a few track including the title track. I play a little keyboards and drums as well. And the big deal on this CD was me doing the Rap singing on the title cut. We had Regi Hendrix (Jimi’s second cousin) that I play with periodically sing it and the producer chose to use my voice. Regi sang it to good I guess. LOL!! He does the scary voice intro and all the cool whispers and parts that make me sound so good. Thanks Reg!! 

When playing live if you hit the wrong note, what do you do?
Usually laugh.

Gigs
You’ve played so many amazing gigs over your career. Please tell us your five most memorable.

1) 1976 Kiss (the Alive tour) at the Miami HiLi Sold out show.  30,000 and hotter than blazes. When Peter Criss did his drum solo and they raised the hydraulics to the drum riser 50’ in the air with all the smoke and stuff he passed out from the heat! One of the crew went up with smelling salts and revived him. Scary!! Gene Simmons was wild. He came up behind me after our show while I was waiting to see them and he was about 7, or 8 feet tall in that suit! Looked to me like a mountain walked up behind me from the shadow and he told me he really dug the band.

2) 1976 Peter Frampton at the New York Academy of Music
We were the sub for a new band out called Montrose who had gotten a better paying gig and were on their way up the charts. Unfortunately no one was there to see Frampton (he wasn’t popular yet) and when we came out people booed and through shit at us!! To add insult to injury the guitar and keyboard rigs both lost power and Lou, the bass player and the new drummer for the second album had to finish the set alone.. The UGLIEST thing I’ve ever experience.

3) 2005 Mexico City with The Lou Gramm Band. Sold out bull fighting ring with 8,000. Great crowd! People were awesome and we had a little disagreement with the promoter that led to the armed guards there not letting us leave until we did 7 encores... You don’t want to know. I thought I’d never make it home when I saw armed guards surrounding our van pointing to the stage!! The write up in the paper the next day praised us for doing so many encores! If they only knew.. At least we got to be the heros though.

4) 2005 The Arrow Festival in The Netherlands. Every act I’ve idolized for decades was there from Styx, Meat Loaf, Glen Hughs to Crosby, Stills & Nash and more! I did meet Glen at the bar and got extremely hammered with him though. Great guy and musician. I never realized how much he’s done until then. What a voice.. I still keep in touch with him.

5) 2006 Hurricane relief show in Florida K-Rock Relief With Bad Company and AC/DC Was awesome. 7,000 people helping the relief effort and we got to play with Dennis Eliot the original Foreigner drummer for Hot Blooded!!
It was awesome.. The singer from AC/DC came into the dressing room Brian Jones and said hi. He proceeded to sing an amazing rendition of “I Wanna Know What Love Is” in the bath room for Lou. Lou was impressed.

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