PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
Arts and Humanities Council of Tuscaloosa County, Inc.
Contact: Kevin Ledgewood
205-758-5195 x6
BLUEGRASS , BIG BANDS, AND MORE SERIES CONTINUES WITH THE STEELDRIVERS
( Tuscaloosa ) The Arts Council's fifth annual Bluegrass , Big Bands, and More performing arts series continues with a concert by The SteelDrivers on Thursday, March 27, 2008. The concert will take place at the Bama Theatre, 600 Greensboro Avenue , in downtown Tuscaloosa , Alabama and will begin at 7:30 p.m. Tickets ($16 each) are on sale now at www.ticketleap.com , in person at the Arts Council offices - located on the 2 nd floor of the PARA Building , or by phone at 205-758-5195. VISA/MasterCard, Discover, cash, and checks are accepted. Seating is available on the floor and tickets are reserved. Sponsors are Alabama Public Radio and Hampton Inn.
The SteelDrivers - http://www.steeldrivers.net/
Thursday, March 27, 2008
7:30 p.m.
Tickets: $16 floor (reserved)
Nashville , Tennessee , the great melting pot of musical tradition, gives birth to a band both original, yet rooted in the best of everything that came before. Five musicians with over 100 combined years of time on the job, come together to form The SteelDrivers, new music with the old feeling.
The Players
Richard Bailey - Banjo
Grammy nominated banjo player Richard Bailey has recorded with such diverse artists as Al Green and George Jones. Featured in the book "Masters of the 5-String Banjo," Richard has performed with Bill Monroe, Roland White, Vassar Clements, Loretta Lynn, Chet Akins, Larry Cordle, Laurie Lewis, Dale Ann Bradley, and countless others. He has also recorded with Kenny Rogers, Michael Martin Murphy, Johnny Cash, Tammy Wynette, and Ronnie Milsap and has performed at Carnegie Hall and on Austin City Limits.
Mike Fleming - Bass/Vocals
Mike Fleming lays down the firm foundation and sings the baritone harmony to round out the SteelDriver's sound. A versatile veteran, Mike has recorded with Holly Dunn,Joy Lynn White, and with groundbreaking singer/songwriter David Olney. In addition to traveling the world during stints with Dunn and Kevin Welch, Mike has appeared on Austin City Limits, Nashville Now, Crook and Chase , and too many Grand Ole Opry shows and festivals to count!
Mike Henderson - Mandolin/Vocals
Mike Henderson is a veteran songwriter and award winning musician on the Nashville scene. He has recorded with such artists as Waylon Jennings, Emmylou Harris, Mark Knopfler, Albert King, Hank Williams, Jr., Johnny Lang, Peter Rowan, Guy Clark, John Hiatt, Sting, Delbert McClinton, Bob Seger, Bo Diddley, Faith Hill, Lucinda Williams, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and many others. Mike's songs have been recorded by a number of acts including the Dixie Chicks, Kenny Rogers, Daryl Worley, Patty Loveless, Trisha Yearwood, Travis Tritt, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, Solomon Burke, Marty Stuart, Gary Allan, and Randy Travis.
Tammy Rogers - Fiddle/Vocals
Tammy Rogers has a life spent in music. Growing up in a family bluegrass band that also included banjo great Scott Vestal, Tammy brings a lifetime of instrumental and vocal experience to the SteelDrivers. No stranger to the studio, she has recorded with many top artists, among them: Neil Diamond, Wynonna, Rodney Crowell, Radney Foster, Bill Anderson, Iris Dement, Randy Scruggs, Patty Loveless, Buddy & Julie Miller, Jim Lauderdale, and others. Tammy has toured the world with Trisha Yearwood, Reba McEntire, Patty Loveless, Maria McKee, and the Dead Reckoners. Her songs have been recorded by Terri Clarke and Frances Black.
Chris Stapleton - Guitar/Vocals
Chris Stapleton is a rising star on the Nashville scene. The Paintsville, Kentucky native whose powerful "sandpaper to silk" voice helps give the SteelDrivers their distinctive sound has recorded with Daryl Worley, Gary Allan, Lee Ann Womack, Trent Wilmon, James Otto, and others. As a songwriter, his compositions have been covered by many popular artists including Tim McGraw, Brooks and Dunn, Julie Roberts, Daryl Worley, Trent Wilmon, Gary Allan, Patty Loveless, Brad Paisley, Trace Adkins, Lee Ann Womack, Montgomery Gentry, and the Lonesome River Band. In addition, Chris recently scored a number one single, "Your Man," by Josh Turner.
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PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
Arts and Humanities Council of Tuscaloosa County, Inc.
Contact: Kevin Ledgewood
205-758-5195, x6
“AN EVENING WITH JOAN BAEZ” AT THE BAMA THEATRE
( Tuscaloosa ) The Arts and Humanities Council of Tuscaloosa County will present “An Evening with Joan Baez” at the Bama Theatre on Friday, April 11, 2008 at 7:30 p.m. This exciting and memorable performance by Ms. Baez will celebrate the 70 th Anniversary of the 1938 opening of the Bama in downtown Tuscaloosa . Reserved ticket prices are $30, $25, and $20. Tickets are available at ticketleap.com, the Arts Council offices, and at 205-758-5195. Concert sponsors include Jim Walter Resources, Inc. and The University of Alabama College of Arts and Sciences.
At various times in our country's history when it was neither safe nor fashionable, folk singer Joan Baez put herself on the line countless times, and her life's work was mirrored in her music. She sang about freedom and Civil Rights everywhere, from the backs of flatbed trucks to the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s March on Washington in 1963. The soundtrack to those times was provided by a stunning soprano whose natural vibrato lent a taut, nervous tension to everything she sang. Yet even as an 18-year-old, introduced onstage at the first annual Newport Folk Festival in 1959, and during her apprenticeship on the Boston-Cambridge coffeehouse folk music circuit leading up to the recording of her first solo album for Vanguard Records in the summer of 1960, her repertoire reflected a different sensibility from her peers. In the traditional songs she mastered, there was an acknowledgment of the human condition - underdogs in the first, inequity among the races, the desperation of poverty, the futility of war, romantic betrayal, unrequited love, spiritual redemption, and grace.
Hidden within the traditional ballads and blues, lullabies, Carter Family songs, cowboy tunes, and ethnic folk staples, were messages that won Joan Baez strong followings in the U.S. and abroad. Among the songs she introduced on her earliest albums that would find their ways into the rock vernacular were "House Of The Rising Sun" (The Animals), "John Riley" (The Byrds), "Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You" (Led Zeppelin), "What Have They Done To The Rain" (the Searchers), "Jackaroe" (Grateful Dead), and "Long Black Veil" (The Band), to name but a few. "Geordie," "House Carpenter," and " Matty Groves " became staples for a multitude of British artists whose origins are traced to three seminal groups: Fairport Convention, Pentangle, and Steeleye Span.
Bowery Songs , the newest album from Joan Baez and her first live album in ten years, is a soaring chronicle of her 2003-2004 tour. The album was recorded in its entirety on the Saturday night after Election Day, November 2004, at New York 's Bowery Ballroom. From her opening acapella benediction, "Finlandia," to the prophetic and telling versions of Bob Dylan's "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue" and Steve Earle's " Jerusalem " that close the album, there can be no mistaking the medium and the message she sought to capture.
Her awards and nominations include:
Eight (8) Gold Albums:
º Joan Baez
º Joan Baez, Volume Two
º Joan Baez In Concert
º Blessed Are...
º Any Day Now
º Woodstock
º Diamonds & Rust
º Live Europe '83
One (1) Gold Single:
º The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down
One (1) Grammy Award:
º 2007 - Lifetime Achievement Award
Six (6) Grammy Nominations:
º 1963 - Joan Baez In Concert for Best Folk Recording
º 1965 - There But For Fortune for Best Folk Recording
º 1969 - Any Day Now for Best Folk Recording
º 1972 - Best Female Vocalist
º 1988 - Asimbonanga for Best Folk Recording
º 1993 - Play Me Backwards for Best Contemporary Folk Recording
One (1) International Bluegrass Award
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