The Buzz

Musical honors

Petaluma native Mitch Schuster grew up in a musical family. Schuster's dad, John, was the music instructor and band leader at Petaluma High from 1968 until his premature death in 1976, and his siblings, John and Gigi, are both musicians.

Mitch has made his mark as music director at Valley View Middle School in Simi Valley, where he has taught for 23 years. Schuster was recently honored by the Simi Valley Education Foundation with the Lew Roth Award (Roth was a school board trustee for 23 years who founded the education foundation in 1989). Sister Gigi flew in from New Jersey and brothers Joe and John went down from Petaluma to attend the awards dinner as a surprise to Mitch and his family. As a gift, Joe got a conductor’s baton and gilded it with gold leaf, put it in a shadowbox in front of black velvet and had Palmgren’s Engravables create an engraving for it.

Valley View Principal Terry Webb told the Simi Valley Acorn newspaper that Schuster is well deserving of the honor, noting his uncanny ability to help first-time musicians quickly gain control over their instruments. “He miraculously transforms beginning students into polished students within a semester,” Webb said.

“He’s done a phenomenal job.” Schuster’s classes are among the most popular at the school. He has 230 students with another 50 on a waiting list. He is also a trumpet player who tutors at his home when he has time.

Schuster, 51, lives in Simi Valley with his wife of 22 years, Vicki, and their four children, David, 20, Amy, 18, Anna, 17 and Joshua, 14.

“He is revered down there,” said Joe’s wife, Anastasia Schuster of Petaluma. Google his name and you’ll see YouTube clips. I’m blown away by the size of just the strings alone in his middle-school orchestra. It’s so exciting to see him really recognized for all he’s done for the music community,” she said.

The worlds of groupies and glass-swirlers collided Feb. 18 at Whole Foods Market in Petaluma when the band Tool’s Maynard James Keenan and winemaker Eric Glomski appeared for a three-hour wine-bottle signing.

Keenan, also of A Perfect Circle and Puscifer, may not be the first rocker to start a wine label, but there’s little doubt that his fans are among the most enthusiastic. Maybe not so much about the wine, but certainly about Keenan.

Fans started coming to Whole Foods in the morning to buy bottles of his wine, which also got them a ticket with a pre-assigned number in line to meet their music idol. At 5:15 p.m., the line of people in the parking lot and queueing down the street numbered more than 200. By the end of the session at 7:30 p.m., an estimated 500 fans had come to see him.

As fans waited their turn outside the store for their moment with the rocker turned winery owner, they didn’t mind the strict rules for the event: You don’t buy a bottle of his wine, you don’t talk to Keenan. No cameras, large bags, coats or photography. No one under 21. Keenan was sitting behind a curtain, so no one got to see him unless they bought a bottle of wine and waited their turn.

Keenan and his business partner, Glomski, own Caduceus Cellars, Merkin Vineyards and Arizona Stronghold. Whether his music fans actually drink Keenan’s wine is another question altogether.

“I was trying to explain to some of the kids about what temperature to drink the Tazi at, and it was like showing card tricks to dogs,” he told the Yuma Sun after a tasting in Phoenix.

Dan Connick, like most of those in line, said he is more of a music fan than a wine aficionado. “I’m here to see Maynard,” he said as he clutched ticket No. 263 and a paper bag with a wine bottle, “but I bought a bottle of his wine and am going to try it.”

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