Air apparent

When an Allman Brothers tune booms out of a dark corner of the Old Timer's Tavern in Gloucester, Samo Frontiero and James "Turk" Matthews instinctively move away from the bar, raise their imaginary guitars, and start picking.

Frontiero and Matthews may not be as well known as such air-guitar luminaries as Tom Cruise and Jerry Remy, but for locals the two are in a different league. While the men do not play guitar, they are considered local rock gods who have participated in one of the longest air-guitar contests in the United States, and helped inspire a couple of generations of wannabes.

"It's dexterity and choreography," said Frontiero, 49, who has worked as a fisherman for 32 years. "I just feel the music; every note and every riff I know from the songs."

On Wednesday, sometime after 9 p.m., the air guitars will be pulled out again for the tavern's annual competition. About a dozen acts are expected to perform. The winner earns $100 and, more important, bragging rights for the year.

In Gloucester, there's a long tradition when it comes to pretend guitar playing. But air guitar is big business all over the country these days, as the subject of video games, instructional books, American and international contests, and even a film documenting the ascent of working-class men to rock stars. For Frontiero and Matthews, all that seems impossible to believe.

"We do it because we love music," said Matthews, who is 47 and helps select fish for a local market.

While no historian has stepped forth to tell the story of the movement, one day a chronicler of air guitar will undoubtedly make the trip to the Old Timer's, down by the docks on Gloucester Harbor. It was inside the tavern in 1978 that a group of fishermen, carpenters, and builders participated in what aficionados believe was one of the first air-guitar contests in the country. And 29 years later, the contest is still going strong.

"This town is big on tradition," said Mike Favazza, who owns the Old Timer's. As children, Favazza and his friends would peek in the back door of the bar to see performers take the stage during the air guitar contest. "It was a good time then and it is now. It links generations," he said.

For locals, the air-guitar contest is the unofficial kickoff for St. Peter's Fiesta, an annual Sicilian tradition that dates in Gloucester to 1927. Initially a religious event on June 29, the feast day for the patron saint of fishermen, by the 1970s the Sicilian festival ran from Thursday through Sunday on the last weekend in June, and included an outdoor Mass, a blessing of the fleet, and a procession of the statue of St. Peter through the city.

As the fiesta grew over the years, events were added, such as the carnival next to the open-air altar where the statue of St. Peter sits. In addition, there are seine boat races, and a greasy pole contest -- a daredevil walk along a 52-foot- long, grease-covered telephone pole reaching out over the Atlantic; the winner is the first one to grab a flag at the pole's end.

By 1978, some city residents, like Peter Asaro, were eager to put their own spin on the fiesta. Asaro, who helped manage Old Timer's, also was the bar's disc jockey, and would end each night standing on the bar and pretending to strum a guitar while listening to Pablo Cruz.

The music helped transform the tavern, which had been known as a fishermen's bar for decades. "It was your typical old-style fishermen's bar, and they would put a bottle on the table with glasses, and you would drink as much whiskey as you wanted," said Asaro, who spoke by telephone from his home in Hawaii.

A few weeks before the fiesta that year, Asaro asked some friends to participate in an air-guitar contest at the bar. On the night of the first show, he showed up wearing a pink sports coat, red sneakers, and sunglasses. With over 300 people jammed in the tavern, and a line around the block, he hopped up on the small stage. "It looked like a small little arena; the people were stacked up on top of one another," said Asaro, who is 54 and still works as a bartender.

There were 12 acts that night, which ended prematurely when the sound system's speakers blew. Asaro was not surprised that so many people wanted to be part of the contest. "Everybody aspires to be a rock star. You can be up there for five minutes and be king of the world and the next day you can go back to being yourself without the trappings of fame," he said.

Wesley Prevost said the contest's timing around the fiesta, and the confluence of rock 'n' roll and relaxation, helped secure the future of the event.

"Once it became entrenched in the festivities, it stayed that way," said Prevost, a Gloucester lawyer who performed Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Free Bird" in the 1978 contest.

In the contest's early years, most of the guitarists were fishermen, who saw the event as a way to relieve the pressures of life at sea. It was also the only weekend of year that they would not be working. As part of the fiesta's tradition, the fishermen would paint their boats and spend several uninterrupted days with their families, awaiting the blessing of the fleet -- often by Boston's Roman Catholic cardinal.

"It did cut the ice," Matthews said. "Everybody started having fun and it just jelled after that first year, and the anticipation built and built."

Some fishermen, like Frontiero, used to polish their air-guitar moves at sea. "Back then, we had cassettes, and when I was at the wheel steaming home, I'd be practicing my song, getting my dexterity in line. It's an incredible vibe. I'd feel like Jimmy Page," said Frontiero, who advises aspiring air guitarists to choose a song no longer than five minutes that's dominated by lead-guitar solos.

Matthews still practices occasionally on the job. "I've got a shovel at work, and I'll pick it up if I hear a good tune on the radio. I'll just crank the music and I'll go crazy with it," he said.

At the bar, Frontiero, wearing a Jimi Hendrix shirt, said he is considering performing a song by Hendrix or Stevie Ray Vaughn. Frontiero, who won the contest in 1982 and 1988 with performances of songs by Humble Pie and Jimmy Barnes, predicted a third title this year. He said the key to winning is not to lose the crowd.

A few stools away, Vinnie Scuderi and Jon Gaipo talked about their own dream of repeating as champions. The two men, who graduated from Gloucester High School in 1995, have won six of the last seven contests. Unlike the early acts, the men perform a farrago of tunes, mixing bands such as the Beastie Boys, Run-D.M.C. and Rage Against the Machine, and don't rely solely on their air-guitar skills, incorporating break-dancing and other steps.

The two plan to practice once or twice in the coming days; they never reveal the precise medley they'll sing before the event.

"A lot of people get bored. When they're in this atmosphere they don't like to pay attention -- they liked to be moved and captivated and you have to be in their face," said Scuderi, 30, who wants to be a police officer.

Frontiero considers himself an air-guitar "purist" and abhors the idea of doing anything onstage besides pretending to play guitar. "Air guitar is not lip-synch," said Frontiero, who also helps carry the St. Peter statue during the Sunday procession through the city.

Matthews said he prefers a stark stage with no props.

"I'm a left-handed guitar player," he said.

"All I need is an empty mike stand or maybe a pair of headphones."

Northtalk
So, who is your favorite air guitarist and why? Log on to boston.com/northtalk. Or e-mail globenorth@globe.com, or write to Globe North, Suite 200, 1 Corporate Place, 55 Ferncroft Road, Danvers, MA 01923.