Before MTV, There Was Don Kirshner

I was sad to see in today’s headlines that music producer Don Kirshner had died. The news immediately took me back to my youth.

As a teen of the 70′s, we didn’t have cable TV, much less a 24/7 music channel. MTV didn’t come along until 1981 so what was a young rock ‘n’ roller to do during the ‘Golden Age of Disco’?

We had to wait until Saturday night, when we were able to get our rock music fix from producer, Don Kirshner, who was responsible for some pop music acts such as The Monkees, The Archies and Kansas. From around 1973 through the early 80′s, Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert was must-see TV on late Saturday night.

During the show’s run, Kirshner featured some of rock ‘n’ rolls best acts (and a few clunkers) filmed in concert setting. The show also had clips which ushered in MTV’s original format. It was not uncommon to see Led Zeppelin, The Ramones, Journey, ABBA, Johnny Winter, Sly and the Family Stone and Todd Rundgren. Kids play War Pigs on Guitar Hero today; back then, we could play air guitar to Black Sabbath live in concert on our 19″ TV’s.

Kirshner had a certain kitschy way of introducing each band (as was impersonated by Paul Shaffer on Saturday Night Live). It seemed that he personally knew ever band, their members and it was always his daughter’s favorite group.

Ed Sullivan may have given us Elvis and The Beatles, but it was Don Kirshner who delivered a solid 60 minutes of rock and pop every week without having to watch Senor Wences first.

The path had been blazed that gave way to MTV, VH-1 et al, thanks to Don Kirshner, who brought concerts to our TV’s 40 years ago.

Michael Fidanza

Michael is the CEO of Parcbench