Mike Wilhelm

Michael Ray Wilhelm (March 18, 1942 – May 14, 2019) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known as a founding member of the influential Bay Area band the Charlatans, who have been widely credited as starting the Haight-Ashbury psychedelic scene during the 1960s. He later played with the bands Loose Gravel and the Flamin' Groovies.

Early life and the Charlatans Wilhelm was born in Los Angeles on March 18, 1942, and first learned to play blues guitar in his teens, from the Tennessee bluesman Walter "Brownie" McGhee. He served for a short time in the U.S. Navy before starting his professional music career as an opening act for the Chambers Brothers.

In 1964, Wilhelm became a founding member of the Charlatans. The band's music had more pronounced jug band, country and blues influences than many other Bay Area groups, while their distinctive late 19th-century fashions exerted a strong influence on the Summer of Love in San Francisco. The Charlatans' recorded output was small, with their one and only studio album, The Charlatans, appearing in 1969, two years after the band's 1965–1967 heyday. Despite being influential on the San Francisco counter-culture scene during the late 1960s, the Charlatans never managed to break into the national Billboard charts and broke up at the end of 1969.

During the 1960s, when the photographer Herb Green asked Jerry Garcia who his favorite guitarist was, Garcia responded "Mike Wilhelm" without hesitation.

Later career Wilhelm also released several solo albums, including Wilhelm, Wood & Wire, and Mean Ol' Frisco. The latter album featured musical contributions from original Charlatans member Richard Olsen, ex-members of Quicksilver Messenger Service John Cipollina and Greg Elmore, and songs by harmonica player and photographer Sandy Guy Schoenfeld. Wilhelm, Cipollina, Schoenfeld, and Eric Rhein from the Mean 'Ol Frisco album sessions can all be seen in the 1988 film '68 as musicians playing a 1960s-style free concert in the park. In 1987, Wilhelm performed with Schoenfeld as a duo at the San Francisco Harmonic Convergence Festival and two weeks later with members of the Bay Area Supergroup Dinosaurs, at the 20th Anniversary of the Summer of Love concert in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. In addition, Wilhelm also participated in the recording of the as yet unreleased Austin Sessions album with Freddie Steady Krc.

In the mid-1990s, Wilhelm was involved in the remixing of unreleased demos and recording sessions by his old band the Charlatans for Big Beat Records' The Amazing Charlatans CD. This remixing work for the album was largely done during his spare time, when he was not roofing his house. In 2005, Wilhelm was involved in a reunion of the Charlatans for a performance at a memorial concert for Family Dog founder Chet Helms in Golden Gate Park. The band reformed again, two years later, for a free concert commemorating the 40th Anniversary of the Summer of Love in San Francisco.

Wilhelm later performed with the Bottle Rock Blues & Rhythm Band in Lake County, California, where he lived with his wife, Ana Maria, their cat, Felix and dog, Boogity.

Selected album discography The Charlatans

The Charlatans (1969) The Amazing Charlatans (1996)

Loose Gravel Frisco Band b/w Waiting in Line (45) (1975) Loose Gravel EP (1982)

The Flamin' Groovies

Flamin' Groovies Now (1978) Jumpin' in the Night (1979) The Goldstar Tapes (1983)

Mike Wilhelm

Wilhelm (1976) Mean Ol' Frisco (1985) Wood & Wire (1993) Live in Tokyo: At Grateful Dead Land (1997) Junko Partner (2002) Live at the Cactus (2007)