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Musician Takes the Stage Any Chance He Gets: Lucas Hicks Faces an Uncertain Future With a Rare Cancer

Posted on: Monday, 27 February 2006, 15:00 CST

By Michelle Theriault, The Bellingham Herald, Bellingham, Wash.

Feb. 27--Every time Lucas Hicks picks up a guitar, banjo, mandolin or any of the six instruments he plays, he's painfully aware of the irony of the softball-sized cancerous tumor that lies in his shoulder. It makes doing what he loves hurt. But Hicks, 28, is far from a man of constant sorrow. He moved back to Bellingham this fall from San Francisco, and set about playing as much music as possible. If you recognize him, it's probably because he can be found playing all over Bellingham - part of a post-diagnosis strategy aimed at getting the best from each moment. "All I can do for now is live it up," he says. "HE'S ... SPECIAL" Hicks, who plays (at last count) with six bands in Bellingham, is known as a prolific and singular talent amongst a cadre of serious musicians who live and play here. "In my life, I've never met anyone like him, nobody as talented or gifted," says Jordan Francisco, 49, a longtime Bellingham musician and one of Hicks' mentors. Francisco teaches music and repairs instruments in Bellingham. "He's really something special. I've heard some of the best musicians in town agreeing he's a genius." Francisco remembers meeting Hicks at the Darrington Bluegrass Festival, more than five years ago. At the festival, newcomers, like Hicks was then, tended to hang back at the tree line, deferring to the more experienced pickers around the fire. "Each year, you got better and you got closer to the campfire," where the "really good" players would gather, says Francisco. "I left my group and drug him closer to the fire and sat him on a picnic table where we played all five of the songs he knew," remembers Francisco. They spent six hours playing. Later, Hicks by chance moved two houses away from Francisco. "He came up here every day and played banjo with me as long as he possibly could." DIAGNOSIS Hicks was 25 and living in San Francisco when he noticed a mounting pain in his shoulder. He had a job working with emotionally disturbed children in Oakland, and was busking on street corners and playing in a band. He was unhappy. When he finally saw a doctor, the diagnosis was desmoid sarcoma, a rare cancer that develops in soft tissue of the body. Hicks had a softball-sized tumor in his right shoulder - an area essential to his banjo, guitar, mandolin, accordion, piano and saxophone playing. Sometimes, that fact seems beyond comprehension. "It's just so incredibly rare," says Hicks. "I've read every study done on it." Chemotherapy is hit or miss. Hicks tried radiation, which temporarily shrunk the tumor. Surgery, which would include removing Hicks' entire arm, shoulder and a rib, wouldn't guarantee the tumor would stay gone, and would take away his ability to play much of the music he loves. He's currently taking an experimental drug course. The tumor is growing, slowly. Hicks knows he's heading into uncharted territory. The cancer could spread to vital organs. It could debilitate him. "There's not a lot I can do for now," he says. "LIVING IT UP" Faced with an uncertain future, Hicks is living the way most people never quite get around to. The first few months after the diagnosis were the most frightening, but somehow also sweet, he says. In those months, a lot of people told Lucas how much he meant to them. A benefit to help pay for Hicks' medical bills packed the now closed 3B Tavern and choked him up so badly onstage he could barely talk.Hicks, who visited Bellingham during the benefit, decided that he'd move back to the town he calls the "best music community in the west" - and focus on playing full time. He reformed Jill Brazil, a raucous band remembered from the 3B Tavern's glory days, formed The Gallus Brothers, "goodtime ragtime blues with a guitar and a suitcase" and vaudeville stunts, The Brent Coalminers, a bluegrass group, The Tanglers ("sweet minor songs from the mountainous regions of the world") and more. "Sometimes I feel like screaming at the top of my lungs in a smoky, crowded bar where everybody is going nuts," says Hicks. "I love all of it," he says, a smile breaking across his face. He also started calling square dances at the Fairhaven Firehouse, gathering a crowd of hipsters, grandparents and young families. "Coming back was a great decision," he says. UNCERTAIN FUTURE Being back in Bellingham means seemingly endless musical opportunities. But sometimes, they hurt. If he could, he'd play more banjo. "I just can't get my arm up there anymore," he says. But for now, he's adapted.

It's not death that scares him, he says. It's losing use of his arm, and not being able to play the music he loves. "I'd like to think I'm going to approach a severe disability with grace and courage," says Hicks. "But I think about all the things I couldn't do," says Hicks, pausing. "And I'm going to be one grouchy guy." But for now, there's Bellingham, Seattle, Portland and beyond - full of bars and stages and players for him to make music with. Hicks, clad in suspenders and a hunting cap, looks most at home with the banjo he made out of a gourd slung across his shoulder. The long term is uncertain, but Hicks says he knows what's coming next. "I just joined a band yesterday." Reach Michelle Theriault at 756-2803 or michelle.theriault@bellinghamherald.com.

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Copyright (c) 2006, The Bellingham Herald, Bellingham, Wash.

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Source: The Bellingham Herald, Wash.

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