Piano awaits as Fifth Stone prepares for CMU speech
BY ROBIN ERB
May 1, 2008
www.freep.com

It was 1982. The Allman Brothers Band -- for which he played keyboard -- had fractured. His own band, Sea Level, had dissolved. Leavell's wife listened as he told her he was leaving music behind.

"She laughed and said, 'That's fine, but the Stones just called.' I was on a plane in 24 hours."

Leavell -- a legend among musicians who's known as the Fifth Rolling Stone -- will become an honorary doctor of music Saturday at Central Michigan University. He is to speak at 1:30 p.m. during the second commencement ceremony on the Mt. Pleasant campus.

Leavell's link to CMU is board member John Kulhavi, who occasionally visits Leavell's tree farm and hunting plantation in Georgia.

Leavell, an ardent conservationist, spends much of his time there while he's between his keyboard gig on the Stones' tour last year and the impending release this month of his double CD, "Chuck Leavell Live in Germany."

He has been polishing up the commencement speech. It's his first.

So what kind of life lessons will come from a guy who has spent his time with the likes of Keith Richards and Mick Jagger as well as Eric Clapton, George Harrison, Indigo Girls, Montgomery Gentry and Lee Ann Womack? By the time Leavell reached the age of most college graduates, his musical talent had locked down his place in history. And CMU grads can't rely on Mick and the boys to bail them out when life lurches and twists on them.

Leavell, 56, is not giving away any hints about his speech, but the university confirmed that he ordered up a Yamaha C3 baby grand piano. Leavell said only that the music would appropriately celebrate the graduates' success.

So perhaps his advice will come from 1982, the day after the Stones' phone call. He introduced himself to Jagger, who had returned from a jog and slipped into a game of pool with Richards and guitarist Ronnie Wood. That evening they started jamming, launching first into Chuck Berry tunes.

Leavell said he wasn't nervous: "My attitude was 'I do what I do, and either they dig it or they don't.' "

Success, he said, shouldn't be measured by bank accounts, world tours or album releases. It's about building life's work around a passion.

"Search until you find it," he said. "Once you find it and you know it's there, pursue it with every fiber of your being."

More than a quarter century after that session, after countless stages and tour dates, Leavell said he's nowhere near retiring from his work, as a conservationist or musician. "Oh God, no!" he said.

He doesn't think the Stones are done, either.

"We're all just getting started, darling," he said.