From playing spoons and horseshoes to washboards and rocks, percussion has been a major thread in Bill Bailey’s life. He was raised in Ohio with a drum set and two older brothers, who were also drummers. Following his school years, where Bill played in the Drum and Bugle Corps and Dixieland bands, there was a time in his life without making music. After moving to Indiana, however, he was inspired by two neighbors who were old-time musicians to pick up percussion again. Astaple at the Indiana State Fair’s Pioneer Village for nearly thirty years, Bill has honed his craft as a self-proclaimed “idiophonist,” playing a variety of traditional genres on an assortment of everyday items. Today, Bill values teaching younger generations how to play and hopes, “they will pick up where I leave off.”
His apprentice, Isaac Gleitz, is a sophomore at Franklin College. He was first intrigued in middle school by the idea of “hitting things” to make music, and he has been active in school bands since. Like Bill, Isaac recalls, “I knew I'd always been tapping or drumming on tables and chairs and everything growing up. So that prospect was appealing to me.” Issac met Bill at the State Fair, where he initially taught Isaac about the Irish bodhrán before piquing his interest in spoons and other idiophones. During the Covid Pandemic, Bill brought multiple suitcases of instruments and the duo practiced traditional rhythms under the gazebo in a public park. Bill gravitated towards Isaac because he sensed a strong internal rhythm, “a heart rhythm” as he calls it, while Isaac appreciates the level of enthusiasm Bill brings to the music. Isaac notes, “I guess we’re both pretty rhythmically oriented.”