Scotty Correa-Mickel is currently playing in two bands, Cruzin’ and the Cabrillo Collage Jazz Band. He also performs in the duo format with Cruzin II, and performs solo playing acoustic guitar and singing. He is married (30 happy years) and makes his home in Santa Cruz.
Like many of us, Scotty started music lessons with Piano and Clarinet in elementary school. By High School he was playing rock and roll guitar, as well as playing sax in the high school band. In the ‘70s Scotty was frequently playing with local Santa Cruz bands like Morgan, and Funky Aptos. Later came Junk Food, a band Scotty led in the ‘80s.
A science teacher for some 30 years, Scotty has played guitar in countless classrooms and assemblies. He taught Music at Renaissance High School – and when that program was cut due to ... (don’t get me started on that!) – he continued to teach the program during the lunch period.
Scotty approached Billy in 2004 with the idea for a new project; a band with a broad base of styles with a foundation in Rhythm and Blues. Scotty serves as band manager and sings, plays guitar and saxophone.
Some of the songs Cruzin’ performs are his compositions. His love and joy bring a great sound to the music which he dedicates to you.
Bill started playing guitar as a teenager when he traded his Olds trumpet for a Silvertone electric guitar belonging to a neighbor girl's boyfriend. And he has been playing guitar ever since.
Bill moved to Santa Cruz in 1966 and started the Sunday Matinee Jug Band with Jerry Best, David Adams, and Nathan Dennison. They modeled themselves after the Lovin' Spoonful and the Jim Kweskin Jug Band. Musical advice and help came from Ed James and Dick Yount of the Tikis, who later became Harper's Bazaar. They had a hit with Simon and Garfunkel's 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin' Groovy), if you recall.
The "Sunday Matinee Jug Band" was the first band to play at the
Catalyst when it was located in the old lobby of the Saint George Hotel.
Bill's first rock band was Loose Caboose, with Ed James on lead guitar, David
Adams on bass, Gary Lamb on drums, Jerry Best on lead vocals and rhythm guitar,
Wayne Goodwin on violin, and Bill on rhythm guitar and harmony vocals. He has
been in a lot of bands in Santa Cruz since those early days, and picked up the
bass as a second instrument along the way. Bill performed on radio stations
KKUP, KPIG, and KUSP as well as local and national television (Charlie Daniels
Talent Round-up). Bill also won first place for an original song, "Thorns
on the Vine", at the Redwood Mountain Fair.
For the past five years he has been playing in the band, "Cruzin'", with his friend Scotty Correa-Mickel. Bill and Scotty were joined in their second year by friend Buck Hoelscher on bass guitar and mandolin.
Bill is a teacher second grade at Watsonville Charter School of the Arts, where he is able to be involved with a lot of music as part of the academic program. His "Cruzin'" band mates joined him for a show at the Mello Center this June called "Looking for Elvis", with his son William singing a solo on the title tune to open the show.
Buck started playing guitar and singing in a folk singing band , Los Coplas
at age 15 in Seattle, WA. Next year, 1964, he joined a rock band “The
Centuries” while attending an Air Force military base housing Narimasu
High School in Tokyo, Japan. This band was great and performed many Beatles,
Beach Boys, and Blues tunes. Most gigs were for his local high school teen clubs
but the group was so good, they played on NHK TV. They also toured Japan in
a VW Van, and were slated to be The Beach Boys warm up band when they toured
Japan. Carl Wilson gave the lead guitarist Ray Hayase, a Rickenbacker twelve
string guitar!
In ’67 Buck was playing lead guitar/rhythm and vocals, for a group called
“The Coachmen” for his teen club gigs in Japan. In 1969 he joined
“Spiral Staircase” in Hong Kong. Buck was 19 years old.
Buck's younger (4 years) brother Dennis played Bass guitar. Together they played for Hong Kong Shanghai Bankers Association parties up on The Peak, Hilton Hotel, Embassy parties, and regularly in the red light zone, Wanchai, where the Vietnam troops U.S, Australian, and British often came for R&R direct out of combat from the jungles of Vietnam. That was quite an experience in the seamier side of life!
After this, Buck focused on graduating 1971 from the University of Washington, got married, got a teaching job with Junior High kids in Washington, coached, and played guitar for his students … no bands for many years! Living near Seattle, WA, he was preoccupied with building and completing a 36ft offshore cutter sailboat named ”Pacific Crystal” launched in 1977. She’s currently moored up at Brisbane, CA. In the meantime, he retired from several careers: Teaching Math & World Geography, coaching Jr. High football & track, building custom yachts, building custom homes, radio telegrapher and communications engineer for Radio KFS ITT Worldcom, and finally he retired in 2005 from VISA International, San Mateo, CA, where he was Director of Computer Systems Engineers, where he built systems test environments to test new Visa programs/code.
In the mid-80’s his brother Dennis, introduced Buck to playing Mandolin. After some lessons, he started playing every Friday night at “Sunshine’s” Fri. Night Bluegrass Jam in Redwood City. He did this in earnest for many years until he moved to Santa Cruz in 1999. Also, he built several F5 mandolins during this time. Scotty, came to one of his Bluegrass parties, and asked Buck to play Bass and Mandolin for his band, “Cruzin”. We love playing rock-n-roll and classic favorites!