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A skeleton key opens many different doors, and that is how Rich Spaulding sees his music. Spaulding and Tom Burton are local musicians who form the core of the band Skeleton Key. The long-haired, mirthful and remarkably mellow music makers play a variety of venues in Big Bear Valley. The musical doors they open are the traditional sounds of country western, rock and roll, blues, Southern gospel and a bit of hillbilly jazz.

Spaulding has been picking on his 1960 Fender Stratocaster for the last 30 years, a guitar popularized by Buddy Holly and later played by Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton. Burton strums on an Epiphone Casino-the same type of instrument used by John Lennon and BB King. With Spaulding on rhythm guitar and Burton on lead, Skeleton Key is predominately a duo. Occasionally they are joined by founding member Glen Coates, Bongo Billy on percussion, and once in a blue moon somebody on keyboards or a mandolin. Hank Kalvin plays bass. Sometimes.

The band members are both in their 50s and their portal picking prowess comes from a long history of accumulated experience. Burton, who ran away from home at the age of 15 and joined the circus, had parents who were saloon keepers. No stranger to the bar scene, he was listening to music regularly and could turn a billiard trick by the time he was seven.

Burton is a self-taught musician who started with an accordion, saxophone, drums, and traded lawn-cutting services for piano lessons. Heavily influenced by John Lennon, Burton learned to jam at 17 with his first guitar and a Beatle’s songbook. When it comes to playing, “I know what to do, but Rich knows what it’s all called,” Burton said.

Spaulding’s training is classical and his musical history is a maze. He began in the fifth grade with a violin and continues to improve his folky repertoire. Spaulding attended the Musician’s Institute in Hollywood, has a degree in cultural anthropology from U.C. Santa Cruz and studied ethnomusicology and sound engineering from Cabrio College.

The name Skeleton Key also reflects Spaulding’s major musical influence, The Grateful Dead. “As a student I would listen to Jerry Garcia play with different bands in local clubs. I learned a lot from listening to him and watching his fingers,” Spaulding said. “I adopted Garcia’s approach to music-electric folk.”

Initially, Spaulding wanted to play like celebrated folk artists Mississippi John Hurt and Doc Watson. Hurt was a Mississippi Delta sharecropper who became famous in the 1920s. During the depression Hurt disappeared until folk musicologist Tom Hoskins tracked him down in 1963 by using clues in Hurt’s song lyrics. Hurt experienced a second wave of popularity in the ’60s during the folk revival on college campuses. Hurt’s music influenced Garcia, who influenced Spaulding.

Skeleton Key plays covers, but not of contemporary musician’s songs. They focus on the music of traditional icons such as Dave Dudley, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Marty Robbins and Dwight Yoakam. “In our music we focus on dynamics,” Burton said. “We go from real soft to real loud. We just don’t stay loud.” Both musicians agree that the best thing about playing to an audience is when the audience is attentive, involved and tuned in to the energy that comes from the music.

Skeleton Key plays throughout Big Bear Valley. For more information or a calendar of events visit www.SkeletonKeyBand.com

Contact reporter Julie Wallace at 909-866-3456, ext.136 or by e-mail at jwallace@bigbeargrizzly.net.