Longtime Colorado Daily music writer Wendy Kale, a fixture of Boulder’s rock clubs for decades and a staunch supporter of homegrown music, will be posthumously inducted into the Colorado Music Hall of Fame in December.
Colorado Daily music columnist Wendy Kale
Kale died in 2011 of severe acute pneumonia. She was 58. For years, Kale was a staple of the Boulder music scene while working as a music promoter with the University of Colorado’s Program Council and as a writer for the Colorado Daily since the 1980s.
“It’s been a big loss for the music industry, not having that grassroots storytelling about music that she was so good at,” said Colorado Music Hall of Fame publicist Phil Lobel, who was the director of CU’s Program Council in the mid-’70s. “I’m just delighted to be able to honor her memory. It’s a well deserved induction.”
Her music writing helped ignite the careers of Big Head Todd & The Monsters, The Samples, Chris Daniels and many more, according to her nomination.
“So many of these bands, when they were just struggling and starting in Boulder, Wendy was the one who was telling their stories and helping break them out of Colorado,” Lobel said. “Their first media interviews probably were with Wendy.”
Several of the other inductees also have ties to Boulder.
Boulder-based Otis Taylor is a prolific, award winning blues artist and the founder of the Trance Blues Festival.
Tommy Bolin, a ‘70s rock/fusion guitarist, lived in Boulder in the late 1960s to the mid-’70s. He co-founded Boulder’s Zephyr and performed with Deep Purple. He died of a drug overdose at age 25.
Other inductees are Zephyr and its lead singer Candy Givens, Freddi Gowdy and Henchi Graves of the the Freddi Henchi band, and concert promoter Tony Spicola.
Scheduled to perform at the induction are David and Anna Givens, the Otis Taylor Band, Freddi Gowdy and members of the Freddi Henchi Band backed by Chris Daniels & The Kings, and the Tommy Bolin Tribute Band.
If you go
What: Colorado Music Hall of Fame inductions and concertWhen: Doors open 6:30 p.m., show starts at 7:30 p.m. Dec. 3Where: Mission Ballroom, 4242 Wynkoop St., DenverTickets: On sale at 10 a.m. Oct. 25 at AXS.com
