We caught up with Topeka native Rich Williams, guitarist and original member of the iconic rock band Kansas. Kansas is returning to their home state to play the final leg of their 50th Anniversary Tour.
TCL: Do you have any fond memories of growing up in Topeka?
Williams: Oh, many. Growing up in Topeka in the fifties in my neighborhood, I was Beaver Cleaver. It was just a completely normal, fully-lived childhood that gave me a chance to grow up with an innocence that I don't think exists for many in these times. My, wife grew up in DC., but her favorite place to get a hamburger is Bobo's. The last time we were driving through when we played in Salina, it was just me, Ronnie Platt, and my wife Debbie and we went straight to Bobo's.
TCL: Has the city changed a lot from the Topeka you remember?
Williams: North Topeka, when I was growing up, might as well have been China. We never went there. But now it's the most exciting place in town. They’ve invested a lot of money in there and it makes me very proud. Another positive change is TPAC. It already had a tremendous history long before I was a musician. I used to go there and see the Dick Clark Caravan of Stars. It's a beautiful building. They did a tremendous job renovating it. That’s a shining star.
TCL: How did the band get started? You guys were high school friends?
Williams: The first band I was in was called The Pets. I got a guitar and a friend of mine, Dave Wilson, who I went all through school with, played bass. So we started playing together. And then Greg Allen who graduated from Topeka West with us also, joined as an organ player and singer. Then I met Phil Ehart, a drummer, at the music store where we hung out and suddenly we had four guys.
TCL: Did you ever think you’d make it big?
Williams: When we did our first album, our goal was to break out of the local bar scene and get on the larger midwestern minor league circuit. We thought if we could get an album recording of just our original material, maybe we could break into that. That was our lofty goal. We never dreamed of much beyond that. Our dreams were pretty small.
TCL: The violin was one of the most unique additions because it wasn't a common rock band element. How did that shape your sound?
Williams: Well, most of the time, if you're hearing a violin, it's a fiddle. We did not want to be a fiddle band. That was for sure. Robby was classically trained. We all had varying interests in classical music and the influence of the progressive music coming out of England and Europe was borrowing a lot from that too. So, what kind of what drew us all together was wanting to be more like that, but underneath, we were still an American rock band. We were pretty heavy-handed which I think separated us from some of our British peers. And adding a violin, what do you do with it? We had to start assigning parts. It might be a synthesizer, a violin, and a guitar creating, like, a section in an orchestra. And so the addition of that, by the nature of it, changed the way we wrote and the way it sounded.
TCL: Do you like playing when you come back to TPAC knowing it's your hometown?
Williams: It's always exciting to come back and see everybody. Hometowns are tough, though. There are people in the crowd that you've known since kindergarten. You feel their eyes on you and you know they want you to do well, but also, you don't wanna stumble. So it just adds a lot of pressure. After the show, there are people you wanna talk to and you feel a little hollow because you wanted to spend time with each and every one and you just didn't get the chance. But I always look forward to coming back to Topeka.
Catch Kansas at TPAC Oct. 3rd & 4th
For ticket information, visit kansasband.com/tour-dates
Kansas Band Members
Billy Greer - Bassist, Vocalist
Tom Brislin - Keyboard, Vocalist
Joe Deninzon - Violinist, Guitarist
Phil Ehart - Drummer (Eric Holmquist performs while Phil Ehart recovers from a heart attack)
Ronnie Platt - Keyboardist, Lead Vocalist
Rich Williams - Guitarist