
He has also produced Wild
West Shows, rodeos, the World Chile Cook-off in Terlingua, TX, several 3-day
music festivals, a 3 day arts
and craft festival on the strip in Vegas, and a concert in a Vegas casino, three
digital film festivals,
several concerts in Guatemala and Coast Rica Central America. He
produced one of
the most
important symposiums in the nation for runaway and missing children, plus
many other events &
shows, and too many club dates for one person to remember, Over the years Benford has
co produced
several record 'projects,
including the Official State Ballad of Montana, and two award winning music
videos,
that were dedicated to runaway
and missing children, a subject he has written two books on, having been
a child
psychologist and working with Autistic Children on some of
the first studies in the early seventies.
He has
produced and co produced
many benefits for children and youth, and written major legislation for
kids and help establish the Runaway
Hotline in Austin, Texas.
Benford's
history in the entertainment business goes back to 1967, when he started
a band while he was
in
college in the West Texas town of Alpine, where he went to ride bulls and rodeo. Playing drums in a
country
western rock 'n roll band in the sixties was
a great beginning for a career that spans these past 4
decades.
Because of his business studies
in college and being raised by a banker, he went to producing
and management
in 1970, after he moved
to Austin, Texas about the time the "progressive country" music
scene was
started, that gave birth to
Jerry Jeff Walker, Michael Martin Murphy and the "Armadillo cosmic
gonzo
cowboy" scene. Then Willie Nelson
moved to town, taking the lead in creating the "Outlaw" sound.
Through
these years Benford was right
in the middle of this "happening," wearing several hats, including
a carnie hat, manager,
promoter, concert and music producer, etc.
Standley began to study
"multimedia" in 1993, while negotiating a one million dollar CD-Rom deal with
IBM.
He was turned on to the
world of multimedia by Dan Jones, Native American producer working with
Kevin
Costner, and while working
with Willie Nelson on Farm Aid 1994, he began to tinker with this new Super
Informational Highway..
After seeing the Internet he quoted Gary P. Nunn saying, "I might have
been born
yesterday, but I stayed
up late last night..." He saw the future and got on board the cyberspace
band
wagon that day on the bus
with Willie, Neil Young, Kris Kristofferson, Thom Steinbeck and Computer Bob.
In 1995, he produced one
of the very first live video/audio Internet cybercast. The webcast
was from the
world famous Troubadour
in Hollywood. On the lineup were some classic LA acts including,
The Bum
Steers, John York from the
Byrds, Greg Harris of the Flying Burrito Brothers, Buck Page, founding
member
of the Riders of the Purple
Sage, county "hit" writer Steve Hill, producer Sid Smith (Circus
of the Stars,
Bob Hope's Christmas Specials
for ten years, Miss Universe Pageants) was playing the cardboard box and
some other LA top acts.
In 1997, while living back in Austin, Tx, he produced a live Internet cybercast
of
Willie Nelson, Kinky Friedman and Friends
playing for the 100 year birthday party of Jimmie Rodgers
( Father of Country
Music). The cybercast was
produced in concert with Sony/Columbia Online and he
produced the
show on a Bob Dylan website. The
show was a Yahoo "Pick of the Week," and a pick by
CitySearch.com,
and was so successful that the
Sony server system crashed in San Francisco.
In 1998, he returned to Los
Angeles to launch his new project the
StudioClub.com.
A Virtual Entertain-
ment InterNetwork on the
World Wide Web. The site was launched on June 22, 1998, with a taped
show
produced on May 26, '98. The
site is still online lasting the wild ride of the Internet's first decade.
In 2006
and 2007 the site has seen an average of
one million visitors per month, with no advertising or marketing
budget to speak of. Using the
StudioClub.com as his web based
platform, Standley has produced
hundreds of shows over the past 13 years,
including webcasting the taped
audio and pictures and text of
the weekly Ronnie Mack Barn dance, which
was from a honkey tonk at the
corner of Hollywood and Vine,
the most famous street corner in the world.
Webcast Productions
In February of 2000, he produced
a 5 hour live audio-video webcast of the First American in the Arts Awards
Ceremony, which went off
without a hitch and was broadcast via YAHOO! In 2001 his company again
produced the First American In the Arts Awards
show with his partners at Yahoo.com broadcast.
Webcast Productions
He's working with Merle Haggard, Bob Dylan, Aaron Neville and others on a documentary DVD,
TV show
and Internet
Cybercast about the life
of "The man that started it all", also known as "The Father of Country
Music,"
Jimmie Rodgers.
JimmieRodgersSaga.com
He
is finishing a ten year writing project on the state and fate of children
in the U.S. during the last quarter
of
a century. See more on his
four decades of work for
children and youth at
StudioClub.com/Colorado.htm
Benford is producing
KickingUpDust.com a online
music history museum with a saga that tell the history
of the entertainment business in the
United States. He has met with the National Endowment of the Arts on
this project in Washington, DC., and is
presently working to establish it as a non profit entity.
Standley is doing the rough edit
on a music documentary he originally shot with the Eric Clapton Camp, Merle Haggard, and Ramblin' Jack Elliott and other greats at
PioneerTroubadours.com, and
has just produced a
trailer forHaggard's documentary movie, working very close
with Haggard on the project for eight months, two of
which were on the road with Bob Dylan and
Merle Haggard. You can see some of the pictures and a journal
from the tour at
StudioClub.com
He is also preparing to
produce the 3nrd PASO DIGITAL FILM FESTIVAL in Central California
wine country Nov. 19--23
www.thePDFF.com