Columbia dobro player, Strawberry stage manager dies at 40
Max Delacy, dobro player with the band Skull Country and a figurehead of the Columbia music scene, died Tuesday morning at the age of 40 after an ongoing battle with adenoid cystic carcinoma.
That night, more than 30 people attended an impromptu jam session dedicated to his memory at the downtown gazebo and the Jack Douglass Saloon.
“He was happy, fun-loving, music-loving,” said his sister,
Macejko Delacy, 43 of Sonora. “He was just an easygoing, good person. He had a good heart. He was a great uncle to my son. Max is someone who we’re all going to miss.”
The cause of death was a recurrence of adenoid cystic carcinoma, a form of cancer which commonly occurs in the face or neck. He died early Tuesday morning at his home in Columbia.
For those who attended the jam session on Tuesday night, Max Delacy was a notable — and audible — absence. His music, most specifically his skillful, twangy aptitude at the dobro (a resonator guitar played on its side and with a slide) had come to define the downtown Columbia music scene in the last decade.
“Some days he would spend hours and hours just on one song to do it justice,” said his bandmate, Nicholas Lefler. “Max always wanted to perfect his playing, but when we started playing together in Skull Country, I could tell it was different for him, since we often improvised on the spot.
But Max became a master at improv very quickly.
“He was a great man and great friend. I am honored to have been able to be in his life and to create such beautiful music with him. Through our music, he will live on forever.”
Before his first cancer diagnosis, Max Delacy may have been considered equivalent to some of the many guitar and string-instrument players that populate the Columbia and county music scene.
But after his first cancer diagnosis in 2010, he discovered the dobro and shocked even his closest friends with how rapidly he came to excel at it, said his friend, Emery Nelson.
“I don’t know if he had a sixth sense about him, that he didn’t have all the time in the world,” Nelson said. “He applied himself musically and found his niche in this world and actually became an incredible musician. The whole time his body was being ravaged and was failing and going through things he could not share with anybody, it was pretty incredible to see him suffering so hard, but thriving and flourishing so hard. It was a beautiful, weird, sad thing to see that.”
Max Delacy modeled himself on the world renowned dobro player Jerry Douglas, becoming the face of the instrument in regional clubs, venues, bars and street corners where he so frequently played.
“Any stringed instrument he could play, but his big love was the dobro. He fell in love with it and went to dobro conventions in Nashville and the Carolinas,” Macejko Delacy said.
Max Delacy’s death follows the death of his parents, Suzanne and Ron, who were also well-known Columbia residents. Su
zanne died in 2008 of esophageal cancer, while Ron, himself a well-known musician as a member of Doo Doo Wah, died in 2013 of bladder cancer.
Max Delacy was often jokingly referred to as “tax baby” by his parents because he was born on Dec. 31, 1980, Macejko Delacy said.
As a child, Max Delacy could be seen running through Main Street in Columbia Historic State Park
or at Camp Mather for the Strawberry Music Festival with his first instrument: a fiddle.
“It drove the family cat insane,” Macejko Delacy said.
Tom Jepson, 75, of Columbia, added, “He had this little fiddle case which would be filled with money. That’s how he started.”
Nelson was Max Delacy’s childhood friend from Columbia Elementary to Sonora High School, even
though by their adolescent years, Nelson said, they tended to deliberately spend less time at school.
“Once we started to play, that bond was a lot deeper. It definitely forged a different relationship between us and it was pretty deep and instant,” said Nelson, who plays drums.
Professionally, Max Delacy was a proud union member of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and
was considered a master stagehand, audio engineer and rigger. His friends and family said he worked at every large venue in the Bay Area, setting up lights and sound for acts as large as The Rolling Stones.
Jepson said Max Delacy was the longtime stage manager at the Strawberry Music Festival, for a few years at Camp Mather and later when it moved to Grass Valley and the Westside Pavilion in Tuolumne.
“He really kept a positive attitude about life, he was just a wonderful person,” Jepson said.
He was first diagnosed with adenoid cystic carcinoma in 2010 after complaining of tooth pain and a tumor was found in his sinus cavity. With great determination and after bouts of chemotherapy and radiation, he beat the odds and beat the cancer. After that, he had a prosthetic palate and at least half of his teeth were removed, Macejko Delacy said.
The cancer was recurring as long as two years ago, but he was no longer eligible for radiation after the first treatment.
“There is no good treatment for it. Maybe he had a 10 or 20 percent chance in halting the growth,” Macejko Delacy said. “They called it a mystery cancer. It doesn’t discriminate. It doesn’t have anything to do with bad habits.”
The family is planning for a celebration of life that is open to the public, but they may wait until June to find a proper venue big enough for the amount of people who plan to safely attend under the pandemic conditions.
“I know people will want to be there, and we will need time to plan,” Macejko Delacy said.