Swing City Music’s 50th Half a Century of Serving the Musicians of Metro St. Louis

I  guess they were Fenders,” says Art Rivasy, Sr., founder of Collinsville, Illinois’ Swing City Music, when asked about the first lines carried by his store 50 years ago. “When I opened the first Collinsville store at the Orchard Shopping Center, we were probably also selling an amplifier by Baldwin back then. It was sort of blue and brushed silver. [Likely the Baldwin Professional line – Ed.] I recall going over for the first time to the wholesale house and they were trying to sell us all the banjo strings and violin strings and we didn’t even have any of that. [laughs]. We just did guitar strings, from what I can remember. But, anyway, it was a lot different back then. First I had to get Epiphone and then, after another three years, I got Gibson.”

Cut to the present day, and Swing City is a full-line operation and beloved local institution, carrying everything from Fender and Gibson guitars to Mesa Boogie and Orange amplifiers, Roland and Yamaha keyboards to Mapex drums, as well as pro audio gear, DJ & Lighting products, and more.

Do It Yourself
Art Sr.’s motivation to open a store was borne more out of necessity than an innate attraction to MI retail, as a concept. “I had to play a [gig] one time and I didn’t have any drumsticks,” he recalls. “I forgot them and I was downtown in East St. Louis, and I walked in to Sonny Shield’s music store to get a pair and he wouldn’t help me out.  So, I tore two legs off of a chair and I played with the two legs [laughs]. I told myself, ‘One of these days, I am going to open up a store, so I wouldn’t ever have to do that again!”
Initially, Rivasy was very much starting from square one: “I didn’t know anything about anything!  From what I recall, I had a whole store full of high-impedance microphones and everybody said, ‘Why don’t you try low-impedance?’ Except I had no idea what the hell low-impedance was! [laughs] That’s the way you get started, though, and that’s what you’ve got to do. You kind of just have to take a chance.”

Many Hats
For most, launching a musical instrument retail operation with zero previous experience would be more than enough to keep a person busy, but Art Sr. was a multi-tasker from jump. “In addition to selling at the store and being a music teacher, I was an agent, also – the agency was named Artco – and I booked a lot of bands,” he says. “There was a gentleman that had come through town who said that he was going to go to Phoenix and he was going to try to handle all the 300 Ramada Inns in the United States. He wanted to do all the bookings. He wanted to be an agent for all these bands and I said, ‘Sure, that’s a great thing.  Why don’t we have another drink?’ So, he goes and calls me in two days and he had closed them all! Then he tells me that I am going to meet 175 groups in two weeks. And I said, ‘Hell, an agent has a hard time trying to handle 50!’ But I met up with the groups and sent almost all of the talent, which had almost all become my customers, on the highway.  And that was my whole customer base. I didn’t have any more customers. So, we had to start teaching, so we would have somebody to put groups together. The agency didn’t have a whole lot to do with the store, but it helped me get through the hard years. It made me a lot of money.”

But, wait – there’s more! Musician, MI store owner, operator of an active talent-booking agency… Surely, that’s sufficient to occupy one’s time. Right? “What about the recording studio, back then? Golden Eagle Recordings?” chimes in Art Rivasy, Jr. who, these days, is co-owner of Swing City Music. “My father would book the bands and send the bands out. He had an in-house recording studio and also a store at the same time. So, he had it going on from three different angles.”

“There was a gentleman named Neil Connelly, who had a job with the Shure Company,” adds Art Sr. “He saw me handling all of these bands, because then I started to sell them Shure PA systems. I was shipping them out all over the States. I was actually still handling the store myself.  He left Shure and came to work for me. I had him for like eighteen years. Neil is the one that helped me start the recording studio.  

“So, we would actually take these bands from California, we’d take them to Texas, we’d take them to Oklahoma, we’d take them maybe into Kansas and they would come to Illinois or to Pennsylvania or Kentucky and we’d book them.  We’d then keep them here for a week and record them. They would do an album and then we would send them on their way again. Of course, we’d sell them some gear, also.” 

 ‘Oh, And I Also Ran Sound for The Stones – No Big Deal…’
The business of booking and recording bands ran through the 1980s, but Art Sr. was also involved with the Mississippi River Festival (MRF), an outdoor summer concert series held on the campus of Southern Illinois University from 1969-1980.

“Who were were some of the groups that came through town that you guys ran sound for?” asks Art Rivasy, Jr. “Was it the Rolling Stones?”
“The Rolling Stones, The Who, all kinds of them,” replies Art Sr. “They were just coming through town and they had to have PA systems. Ampeg give us 22 V-4s and each of them had two cabinets with four 12-inch speakers. We had them on stage for Mick Jagger.”

“At the time there were a few stores around, but Swing City was always known for handling the big PAs for the big bands that would come in,” adds Art Jr. “So, he did most of the stuff over on the Missouri side, because we were about 10 minutes down from downtown St. Louis.”

“And all the bands were hiring for six days a week,” recalls Rivasy, Sr. “That doesn’t happen anymore. It is good to get two nights in a row now.”

Of course it all eventually was tied back to the MI retail operation, even then. “I was still playing as a drummer, myself,” Art Sr. says. “I used to keep a car full of gear and every time I would pull out to see a band, [the musicians] would come out. They would know I had gear with me, so they’d buy drumheads or keys to tighten the drums, or sticks, or strings. So, I did a whole lot out of the back of my car at night. “

“He used to talk about how difficult it was to be the only salesman and the first teacher [in the area],” offers Art Jr. “He would be trying to teach a lesson and he would have to take a break because he would get a phone call here and a phone call there. He’d also be trying to give 10 or 12 drum lessons a day. He had to kind of juggle everything until he got a couple of people on board and hired.”

That Time Metallica Almost Dropped By…
As an established MI retailer with a reputation for stocking quirky, vintage gear as well as new product, Swing City gets plenty of out-of-town visitors eager to check out the goods – including the occasional celebrity.

“Musicians and bands that are travelling the country tend to gravitate to music stores.  So, when they land over in St. Louis or over here in Illinois, a lot of times they kind of wander out to check out the local music stores and they’ll always end up over here. I think that is a compliment, because they always come in looking for old gear. We do a lot of trades and we have a lot of vintage gear.  Just recently we bought a huge amount of vintage drums and keyboards. People come looking for that.  We also have some pretty famous people coming through here every once in a while, just when you wouldn’t expect it. A lot of people don’t really know it, but Gretchen Wilson bought her first microphone from my dad at Swing City Music. That’s a little different, having famous people wander through our store and sometimes you don’t even know who they are.” 

“Well, you know in the ‘60s, a customer of mine was Mike McDonald,” adds Art Sr. “He was just a kid. We had no idea he was going to get famous. I bet he wouldn’t even remember us if you talked to him. Peter, Paul, and Mary also came to our store. She [Mary Travers] stayed in town a couple days and kept coming back to Swing City Music.”

“There are a lot of rappers from around here, too,” says Art Jr. “We’ve rented stuff to guys like Nelly and Juvenile. And then Art even had Mick Jagger, I think, come through the store in the beginning, way back. Another day – this is, like, eight years ago – we had a guy come in who was the manager of Metallica.  They were playing in St. Louis and he asked me if he could set it up for the band to come by our store. I said, “Absolutely, I’d be glad to.” Who wouldn’t?  The day of their show came and we started to have people line up at the front of our store.  They’d show up and just sit down with their families. They stayed there all day long ! In the end, Metallica didn’t show up. [laughs] All these people had camped out at our store and I hadn’t even told anybody. It is interesting how word travels like that. That was a real interesting day when we thought Metallica was coming.” 

The Honor System
“There is one story that Art, Sr. didn’t tell you about that is always kind of fascinating to me,” says Art Jr. “He approached building his business just like when he couldn’t get any drumsticks, you know, and he went and he took the two legs of the chairs, which is actually a true story. We have had tons of musicians through the years coming to the store and he would just give them stuff and keep track of it. But, that was before computers, so he’d have it all written down on little pieces of paper in his pocket of people that owed him money and open accounts and, I mean the list would go on and on and on. I am talking about hundreds and hundreds of people and, to this day, we still have people who remember those times and kind of expect to come to the store and just get the equipment they need and just sign for it and leave. What is really kind of amazing to me, there have still recently been a time or two when a customer walks in, remembers not paying, and just kind of pulls Art [Sr.] to the side saying, ‘I remember you helped me out and I owe you this,’ and they pull out the money and put it on the table. And this could be a transaction going back 30 years – and that’s the truth!”

“Then there was the guy who showed up one day, who had never paid for a bass guitar back in the ‘70s or ‘80s – I don’t remember – and gave it back to me,” adds Art Sr.

Evolution & Family Ties
“I have had four locations here in Collinsville,” Art Sr. relates. “We’ve changed locations four times.” In 2005 Swing City opened a second location in Edwardsville and, back in the ‘70s, there had also been a location in St. Louis. “We had that store in Lindbergh (St. Louis) for about three years before I closed it. Neil, the guy I hired, told me if I had a store in St. Louis, I could have all the lines. So that is what I did. I opened up a store over there and I got all the lines and I closed it up after three years and I kept the lines!”

Art Sr. seems content with the current two-outlet setup for Swing City Music and is particularly thankful to have Art Jr., who joined the business in the late ‘90s, on board as a full partner.  

“I am glad I’ve got my son here, because I am getting tired,” he says. “I’ve been blessed with two children, one is an attorney and the other has taken over the store. If he hadn’t taken it over, you know… He has done all the things I stopped.  You know, I quit handling a lot of keyboards.  He got back into it. I quit handling horns, I didn’t want anything to do with them anymore, but [Art Jr.] got back into it, which is a big, big deal. You have to spend a lot of dough to handle a lot of horns. But, if he hadn’t done it, I wouldn’t have ever done it myself.  I got tired of it.  As you get older, you get tired.”

When asked how he feels the stores today operate differently compared to 20 or 30 years ago, Art Sr. responds, “Well, I didn’t have a computer. I carried all the open accounts in my pocket – it isn’t that way anymore!” [laughs] ”Art Jr., adds, “Well, also we went from 250 square feet to 20,000, so that’s a big difference. Another thing is, one of the biggest commitments over the last ten years has been trying to stay connected with our customers by keeping our site updated and being active on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.”

But are the core values that drove Swing City in the early years still in play? “I think in order to stay in business today you have to have service,” says Art Sr. “That is what a whole lot of stores have forgotten.  They sell the customer and they are through with them. We work with our customers. We have great-grandparents coming in with the grandparents and the parents and the kids, all holding hands. When you deal with customers you’ve had for over 45 years and you see them still coming in the door, you have had to do something right, you know what I mean?” 

“Art [Sr.] is constantly emphasizing that we need to have a full service store, so we have full-time band instrument technician, a speaker technician, a guitar technician and an electronics technician,” explains his son. “In addition to our sound system/PA installation department, we are constantly going out to service our customers, which means dealing mainly with schools and church sound systems and also restaurants and gyms. We are constantly trying to stay busy with the service end of it, because we know if we take care of people, it is going to come back to us. That is kind of something that our seniors instilled in us over the last 50 years of business.”

“We don’t have the studio anymore (Art Sr. closed down the studio in the mid-‘90s, largely because he felt it was becoming ‘competition’ for his customers, more and more of whom were building their own home studios by that point), but what we’ve done over the last 10 years is we really committed back to our students and we are trying to get all of our students in little bands, so that they can get out and we can kind of revitalize the music scene in the industry. So in both of our stores we have teachers who are now coaching the young musicians to get in bands, start playing together, and we organize little festivals, at least five to 10 times a year throughout the community. We actually get the kids on stage and we get a big PA system up there so they can feel what it’s like to put on a show of their own. We have had a lot of success with that, because students are really one of the backbones of Swing City Music. You know, Art [Sr.] was just telling me the other day, he really feels like live music is going to make a big comeback and we are starting to see it right now. We feel like people playing out, we are going to start seeing that emerge more, like it used to be back in the seventies.”

In addition to generations of repeat customers, another metric that demonstrates Swing City’s half-century of success is a number of multi-year (in many cases, multi-decade) employees.  “We have maybe 17 or 18 employees across both stores, plus 20 or so teachers,” says Art Jr. “In fact, most of our employees are long-term. Like our guitar tech, Darin Meskil – he has been working here for 20 years. Our installation guy has worked here 10 years. Recently, our lessons coordinator, Carol Frisse, retired. She had been with us for 35 years. Most of our employees stay with us. That is one of the reasons Swing City has been able to survive. I really do want to thank all of our employees for their dedication and also all of our customers for their 50 years of business, because without them, we wouldn’t be here today.”