Al Hirt was on the Tonight Show several times. Hirt was much more well known to the general public than MF was, and Hirt also sold a lot more records than Doc ever did. So I'm not sure that I buy the argument that MF was not on the Tonight Show because he was some kind of rival to Doc. Hirt must have been MUCH more of a rival to Doc than Maynard ever was.

Tom Barreca
musicians@thetee.com