Nick St. Nicholas

Nick St. Nicholas (born Klaus Karl Kassbaum on September 28, 1943) is a German-born Canadian musician who was the bassist of the rock band Steppenwolf in the late 1960s.

He was born in Plön, Schleswig-Holstein and his family moved to Toronto after World War II and became Canadian citizens. His sister Maren joined the Royal Conservatory of Music, (Canadian Ballet Company & Conservatory of Music), as a pianist. He also has a younger brother, Gary who entered the Merchant navy.

Kassbaum spent a brief period as bassist with the Epics, then Shirley Matthews and the Big Town Boys before organizing a set of musicians who eventually coalesced as the Mynah Birds, featuring singers Rick James, Neil Young, and Jimmy Livingston.

In 1965, Kassbaum replaced Bruce Palmer as bassist with Jack London and the Sparrows, became Nick St. Nicholas, and played on most of the tracks on their only LP, which was released in that year. As the band leader, St. Nicholas hired East Prussian-born front man John Kay when Jack London left the Sparrows, and they became Sparrow. He moved the band south to New York for a modest record deal with Columbia Records, then drove Sparrow non-stop to California.

St. Nicholas was one of the driving forces in music of the hippie counterculture movement, the Summer of Love. Having booked the band at the Matrix club in San Francisco, on May 14, 1967, two live shows were recorded, including a 20-minute version of "The Pusher." These are the live recordings released by ABC Dunhill Records as Early Steppenwolf.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.