A music Archeologist
Barry Cuda – A Music Archeologist
Barry Cuda at Higgs Beach Pavilion at a beautiful sunset.
Kent Smith (aka St. Petey Twig, aka Barry Cuda) was born and raised in Pensacola, Florida. His father was a “hip” eye surgeon who could have easily been an R&B musician. Barry Cuda, as he is known to most Key West locals, listened to his dad’s 78’s and LP’s while growing up and loved the cool jazz and Big Band swing. While an art major in college, Cuda was drawn toward an older style of music rather than pop which seemed formulated mostly for profit.
Rolling his 400 lb piano down Duval Street heading for BO’s Fishwagon.
Nothing lasts forever but Kent Smith, a fifth-generation Floridian, pushed a 400 pound upright acoustic piano down the streets of Key West for almost forty years. Until recently, Cuda just refused to perform on what he termed a “robo piano.” I remember more than a few days during brown outs where Cuda and horn player Ken Fradley would continue to play.
There is a fair amount of dignity in this saga of Barry Cuda. His performance statistics are almost insurmountable, like the Hank Aaron of Key West musicians, with 25,000 performances over 40 years. He rolled his piano down Key West streets over 7,000 times. A special ramp was built for his piano rolling for 18 years at the Hog’s Breath Saloon. For his 25 years at Sloppy Joe’s, a special hydraulic lift was built to hoist his piano six feet to the stage.
Rolling past the Western Union.
The saga began with his good friend Bill Blue. Cuda and the Silver Kings band were touring the same areas of Northern Europe in 1983 as Bill and his band. They would meet often and on one occasion, Bill had over spent his budget and Cuda offered to pay for his plane ticket back to Key West. In return, Blue offered Cuda a month or so at his home, with the promise of some piano gigs.
The Silver Kings were planning a breakup and Cuda was on his way to New Orleans to continue his roots blues and boogie-woogie career. Key West had the same effect on Barry Cuda as it had on many musicians, and his four weeks turned into almost forty years.
Arriving at BO’s Fishwagon.
He built a special frame with inflatable tires to cushion the roll of a variety of 400 pound acoustic upright pianos. He claimed to get twenty miles to a tune-up. He learned every pothole on every Key West street he rolled. He developed his own philosophy of piano moving: “It’s like surfing, you have to move around and use the momentum of the piano to help. “
A recent performance at BO’s
Barry Cuda has performed at the biggest and the smallest venues. He has played at the fanciest and the funkiest of places. He performed with a long list of the best musicians in Key West. He wrote his own ragtime and boogie-woogie blues tunes and has perfected covers of standards and forgotten tunes. He calls himself a “music archeologist” – he digs up old songs and makes them like new.
After four decades of performances, his favorite venue was the funky little fish wagon of Buddy Owens on Caroline Street. The roof leaked a little during a downpour and there was barely enough room for his upright. BO’s Fishwagon is the first place that comes to mind when you think of Barry Cuda. His audience there was a little different than most venues, accepting the funkiness of both Cuda and BO’s. For over 20 years, he rolled his piano from Hog’s Breath Saloon along Lazy Way to BO’s.
Unabashed promo – thanks Cuda.
This saga is not really ending, Cuda will be performing music as long as he is above ground. He no longer lives in Key West but visits in the winter, performing at some of the local ‘hangouts’. He lives about half the year with his 95-year-old mother in Pensacola. He also has a home in Provence, France and a condo in Sicily. He brags about “leaving Key West after almost 40 years and having still never played a Billy Joel or Elton John cover.”
Cuda at the Little Room Jazz Club.
Former long-time Key West resident/musician/sound engineer, Dan Simpson worked on many projects with Barry Cuda and considered him a favorite. “Ever since he hit town with the Silver Kings Band, he’s been one of my favorite musicians. We worked a lot together, everything from a raunchy album sold in a brown paper bag to scholarly works based on Cuban composers.” His projects always had the best musicians on them.
He thought of Cuda as “the canary in the coal mine”. In 2013, Dan said “As long as Cuda is still playing downtown with his acoustic piano and his roots music, then Key West still has a f__ing future.”
Want a grin? Check out this link to see a young Cuda with the Silver Kings in 1983 Norway: https://tv.nrk.no/serie/reisende-i-swing-og-show/1983/FTRO10006883
Cuda in his element at BO’s Fishwagon 2015.
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