Music

Tim Herron Corporation: 15 Years of Making Music

Jessica Novak
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Keeping a band together for any period of time is a challenge. Keeping a band running for 15 years is a miracle.
Keeping a band together for any period of time is a challenge. Keeping a band running for 15 years is a miracle. The Tim Herron Corporation will celebrate 15 years with an outdoors performance at Coleman’s Authentic Irish Pub on Thursday, Aug. 7 at 7 p.m. The band started with a core trio: Tim Herron on guitar and vocals, bassist Eric McElveen and drummer P.J. Bullock. Herron and McElveen are still with the group, along with Steve Orlando on drums and vocals and often Dave Solazzo on keyboards. Occasional guests, including drummer Josh DeKaney and keys player Mark Nanni, also plug in. “Luckily, I love what I do,” Herron says. “I love to play. Even if it’s not a great crowd, I enjoy what I’m doing. I can find something good to take out of it. There are still some gigs you can’t wait to get out of, but I still enjoy it. I still look forward to playing. I don’t look at it like work like some guys do.”
Tim Herron (left) and Eric McElveen (right) Michael Davis Photo | Syracuse New Times

Tim Herron (left) and Eric McElveen (right)
Michael Davis Photo | Syracuse New Times

With a 1996 degree in music performance from SUNY Oswego, Herron is fluent on piano, bass, drums and guitar. He also teaches lessons on all four instruments, runs interactive music groups at PACE CNY and Elmcrest Children’s Center, is the primary songwriter for his band and handles booking and promotion. After Herron got his start with groups like Dexter Grove and touring the country following graduation, he formed the Tim Herron Corporation. Herron, however, has never been a fan of the band’s nickname: THC. “I hated that name,” he says. “Eric came up with that name. I didn’t want to be known as a pot band. But Eric was into a book with all these acronyms, so it couldn’t be the Tim Herron Band. It had to be the Tim Herron Corporation. It’s all good now.” Herron backed off from playing from 2000 to 2005 when he became national director of operations for Guitar Center/American Music Group. The group slimmed down to playing a few shows a year. “I was on a plane every day,” he recalls of his five years on the job. “I’ve fired between 200 and 300 people.” When the headquarters moved to Maryland around 2005, Herron opted to stay behind. By 2008, the band was picking up gigs with even more vigor. Meanwhile, Sterling Stage, a festival series run by McElveen each summer, was also ramping up. The band found itself getting increasingly busy, leading to the full schedule they now maintain. “You gotta always have somebody pushing the band,” Herron says. “That’s the only way a band survives. It’s better if you have multiple people pushing it, but the likelihood of that is so few and far between. But if you have somebody who’s just constantly pushing it, that’s the key to keeping a band together.”
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