On February 3, 1959 Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J. P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson, as well as the pilot, Roger Peterson all died in a plane crash in Clear Lake, Iowa. They were on a 24 city tour in the Mid-West and had been traveling in an old bus with a broken heater. It was that cold that the drummer was treated for frostbite. Apparently, Buddy was frustrated with the bus and not having any clean laundry, so he proposed that they charter a plane to the next city. Three of the musicians each paid $36 for the flight. Richie Valens won the right to his seat in a coin toss with one of the other band members.

Waylon Jennings was going to fly, but when he heard the Big Bopper had the flu, he gave him his seat. From an interview years later, it was reported that when Holly learned that Jennings wasn’t going to fly, he said in jest, “Well, I hope your ol’ bus freezes up” and Jennings responded, also in jest, “Well, I hope your ol’ plane crashes”. This exchange of words would haunt Jennings for the rest of his life.

On Tuesday of this week, I got the news that my friend Bruce Jackson had just died in a plane crash in Death Valley, CA. He was piloting and alone in the single engine plane. Bruce was a mentor to me on the 1978 Bruce Springsteen tour. He was the lead audio engineer and house mixer, while I was the sound roadie that hung the PA system and helped mic the stage. In the parlance of the time, he was a wheel and I was a puke.

I was 21 years old and trying to figure out what it meant to be a man. Bruce Jackson, George Travis (the rigger) and Bruce Springsteen all modeled some great attributes that have stayed with me.

At every show, Bruce Jackson, Bruce Springsteen and I would walk every seat, listening to the E Street Band play and critiquing the audio delivery for that evening’s concert attendee. When Springsteen didn’t like the sound, Jackson would make suggestions, then tell me to go and make the changes (generally tilting speakers or adding more speakers). Since Bruce Jackson mixed monitors for Elvis and Bruce Springsteen was a big Elvis fan, I remember they’d often talk about Elvis.

I stayed friends with Bruce Jackson over the years. When I was building my first large building project for Pelger Engineering and Construction (Clair Brothers Audio), Bruce came out to the job site and reviewed my work. I was acting as Job Superintendent and Project Manager and neck deep in details. I’ll always remember Bruce saying to me, “Nedly, this is really impressive, this is something I couldn’t do.”

Since Bruce’s confidence was almost limitless, I took this as one of the highest compliments of my life. We are all going to miss you, Bruce Jackson. You took your God-given talents and used them well, you had fun, you changed the audio world.

My prayers are with your wife Terri and three children.