One local musician plays acoustic piano, B-3 Hammond organ, and programs computers, but at the core he is Nat “King” Cole and an OG funkster. Another is a guitarist who may play Girl from Ipanema, but is steeped in the polyglot of flamenco. Frank Sinatra, Jack Benny, and funky accordion music are muses of still another musician. All have watched Reno devolve from exclusive destination for the most exciting entertainment in Nevada to Las Vegas’ second chair.

While Nevada’s music mecca has moved south, keyboardist/vocalist Ron Perry, guitarist Phil Amundson, and pianist Corky Bennett have survived after enduring 30- to 40-plus years in the Reno music scene. They learned only the lonely are free, and accomplished solo artists in Northern Nevada have a market among dwindling opportunities for older musicians.

Phil is flamenco

Arriving in Reno in 1974 from Spain, Amundson was lucky to meet some players — Dana Blanc and Jim Griffel of the MGM before it became the Hilton.

“I got a lot of work when I first came here because I was a soloist, playing guitar,” said Amundson, who admits he’s a worker, coming to the job, playing his unique music, and then “going home to cut the lawn.”

“I played a lot of conventions — people from St. Louis were listening to my music,” he said. ”I had to learn how to arrange other music, because I had spent six years in Spain learning flamenco.”

Amundson grew up in Southern California and arrived at Restaurante Orozko at John Ascuaga’s Nugget in Sparks, where he still plays.

During his six-year odyssey in Spain, Amundson said he was immersed in flamenco, old-school players drilled the Gypsy-spawned music into his psyche, until he learned each nuance of this intricate folk music.

Marrying his wife, Olga (who he met in one of the many flamenco venues in which he honed his craft), Amundson returned to the United States, began his career, and quickly learned playing his flamenco was not enough.

“I had played on the same bill with (flamenco guitarist Carlos) Montoya and his daughter, but I realized I had to learn a wider variety of music,” he said.

Show tunes, blues, and such have become part of his musical mix, although, he said, “I couldn’t do any of it without the flamenco technique.”

Corky’s quirky

Bennett started his Northern Nevada experience on July 4, 1963 at the newly rebuilt Golden Hotel on Center Street (now the site of Harrah’s), playing piano on the afternoon shift.

“Music was everywhere, 24/7,” Bennett said. “There was even music midnight to 6 in the morning.”

He remembered working early and handing off to folks such as Harry James, Billy Eckstine, and Della Reese.

“This is where I got my education,” said the Seattle, Wash., native.

All the while he was developing his comedy act, and in 1993 he took a gig at Columbo’s, a restaurant once situated by the Truckee River.

“It was an after-hours kinda place where dealers, waitresses, bartenders from the casinos would come and hang out,” Bennett said. “It was a steady gig, I enjoyed it until 1997 when the flood washed Columbo’s and my piano upstream.”

But Bennett got to open other venues, such as Roxy’s in the Eldorado Hotel & Casino (“They built that piano bar for me, he said”), and later was a featured act at Lexie’s lounge at the Siena Hotel Spa Casino.

Bennett believes he survived the decline of live music in Reno because of his versatility.

“I remember I was sitting at the piano at the Eldorado talking, doing comedy,” he said, “and a guy sitting nearby looked up and said, ‘Hey, are you gonna play that thing?’”

Pared-down Perry

If not for then-Columbia Records Group president Clive Davis’ infatuation and commitment to Sly and the Family Stone’s Family Affair album, Perry may not have discovered the charms of Northern Nevada.

“My ex-wife and I had a group that did funk and R&B, sort of a sweetheart group like Peaches and Herb, but we could burn,” he recalled. Attention paid to Sly cost Perry and his wife, Lorne, a recording contract.

“We were doing quite well performing in Ventura County (California), but our agent John Foster had booked us a gig at Sahara Tahoe for three days,” Perry said. “It turned into three weeks, then three months, almost three years.”

Pine Cone Lounge at Tahoe Sahara was where people came to hear Ron and Lorne, but also to watch Bill Cosby drop in and play drums, Liza Minnelli come and sit in on standards, Tom Jones sneak away from his lakeside gig and belt out a few.

“There were acts galore up there,” he said. “It was the best.”

Things began to change in the mid-’70s, Perry said. “Some of the lounges stopped paying as much as they used to,” he said.

Ron and Lorne eventually migrated to the Truckee Meadows, performing at places such as the old Ponderosa, Hobo Junction (on the spot that now is Famous Murphy’s) and a myriad of other venues.

“I started to try something different,” Perry said. “I began to take some gigs outside of the group,” which had grown to a family quartet and was named Martha’s Children. “I started to do solo gigs, singing a wider variety of music, things from Nat ‘King’ Cole and some jazz standards.

“I found more work,” said Perry, who now is a regular pianist at Peppermill’s Steak House restaurant. He also still plays with bands at the Speakeasy and EJ’s Jazz Café, from which there are live broadcasts.

“I love doing this,” Perry said. “I’m expressing myself.”

These musicians’ talent and a love for their brands of music have kept them in the game. And locals still enjoy listening to them.

Michael Martinez is city editor at the Reno Gazette-Journal.