Friday
Cheers 2009
Celebrating
25 years of free music!
Fridays,
May 8-June 26
Produced
by:
Venture Richmond
6-9:30 p.m.
Brown’s Island
Venture Richmond’s
free signature summer concert series, Friday Cheers, presented
by Coors Light and Yuengling, is back on Brown’s Island
for its 25th season and promises to feature some of the nation’s
hottest touring acts, along with some regional favorites.
The series kicks off Friday, May 8, and continues every Friday
through June 26, from 6-9:30 p.m. All events are on Brown’s
Island along downtown Richmond’s historic riverfront.
Again this year Friday Cheers will offer eight concerts and
is focused on a variety of performers that may only be in
the region once this summer. A special concert on Friday,
May 15, is the kick-off to Richmond’s newest event,
Dominion Riverrock. Dominion Riverrock is produced by Venture
Richmond and the Richmond Sports Backers.
2009 line-up
May
8
Melvin Seals
and JGB (with The Spaceheaters)
Melvin
Seals, whose musical roots seep deep into gospel soil, has
always been seeking that point where music merges with spirit,
what he calls “church vibe.” He found it with
Jerry Garcia more than two decades ago, and he is finding
it again in the new JGB. “Jerry Garcia Band was my absolute
favorite band in the world and I’m honored to be able to carry
on the torch and play homage to the heart and feel and tones,”
said Seals.
Melvin Seals has established a reputation as a recording artist,
producer and record company executive in the field of gospel
music. He first took up piano at the age of 8 and his first
public performances were playing gospel music in church; his
first band, “Gideon & Power,” was a local
San Francisco group. He has gone on to perform/record with
Elvin Bishop, Charlie Daniels, Chuck Berry and for 15 years
with Jerry Garcia. He was the featured organist in such Broadway
hits as “Evolution of the Blues” with John Hendricks,
ACT’s production of “American More Or Less,”
the Joyce Carroll Thomas play “A Song In the Sky,”
and the hit “Don’t Bother Me, I Can’t Cope.” Melvin
formed JGB one year after Jerry Garcia’s death on August
8, 1995 and was originally joined by Gloria Jones and Jackie
Labranch, who were Garcia’s background singers.
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May
15
Rusted Root
(with Jesse Chong) – Kicking off Dominion Riverrock
This
is a special tour for the Pittsburgh, Pa., based band. In
the process of recording their first studio album since 2002’s
Welcome To My Party, Rusted Root is giving their faithful
fans a chance to hear some of the new music they have been
working on.
Rusted Root has sold more than 3 million albums worldwide.
Formed in Pittsburgh by front man Glabicki in the early 1990s,
Rusted Root’s polyrhythmic style quickly charmed fans
of roots music and jam rock. But club goers weren’t the only
ones left smitten by the sextet’s impressively diverse
chops and soaring vocals. Veering into Eastern and African
directions, Rusted Root features three of the Pittsburgh-born
band’s original band members; Michael Glabicki (lead
vocals, guitar), Liz Berlin (vocals, percussion), and Patrick
Norman (bass, vocals, percussion). Joining them on the road
are Jason Miller (drums, percussion), Colter Harper (vocals,
guitar), Preach Freedom (percussion), and Dirk Miller (guitar).
After debuting in 1992 with Cruel Sun, Rusted Root signed
with Mercury Records and bowed on the label with the 1994
platinum selling breakthrough When I Woke, which featured
the light and lovable Send Me On My Way, as well as several
other rerecorded tracks from Cruel Sun. Not long after, the
band scored on tours with Toad the Wet Sprocket, Santana,
The Grateful Dead, Dave Matthews Band, The Allman Brothers
Band, HORDE Festival and, perhaps most notably, the highly-coveted
support role on the landmark Jimmy Page/Robert Plant reunion
tour.
Playing a brand of
rock rooted in the Woodstock generation, but often detouring
into various types of world music, the hard-touring Rusted
Root returned in 1996 with Remember, which was followed by
1998’s Rusted Root. After some time off the band reemerged
in 2002 with Welcome To My Party. The band’s sixth album,
Rusted Root Live is the second album on its Touchy Pegg label,
following the re-release of Cruel Sun in 2003, after a long
tenure with Mercury/Island Def Jam. Along the way, Rusted
Root has also issued three EPs (Evil Ways, Live, and Airplane),
a home video (Rusted Root Live) and miscellaneous film and
TV soundtracks such as from Twister, Mathilda, Home For the
Holidays, Party of Five, Homicide and Ice Age.
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May
22
Zac
Brown Band (with David Shultz and The Skyline)
Playing upwards of
200 dates a year, with more than 3,000 shows in their career
and selling more than 30,000 CDs independently, Zac Brown
Band has only begun its ascent. The band’s aggressive
touring has helped it develop a fanatical grassroots following
by winning over believers one person at a time. Driven by
awe-inspiring musicianship, skillful songwriting and a dynamic
live show that inspires word-of-mouth buzz, Zac Brown Band
is already embraced by audiences who sing along with every
word.
The Foundation, released
in November 2008 on Atlantic Records, debuted at No. 17 on
the Billboard Top 200 Chart and No. 3 on the Top Country Albums
Chart. The first single “Chicken Fried” peaked
at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot Country Chart and maintained
that position for two weeks and also debuted as the second
most downloaded country single on iTunes.
“It’s
kind of crazy how we can go to a place where no one’s
heard of us before and by the time we leave people are singing
the songs,” bandleader Zac Brown says. “We’ve
got a great following.”
It’s not an
easily pigeonholed crowd either; loyal country music fans,
jam lovers and seemingly everyone in between are enjoying
the shows. The Zac Brown Band has already landed support slots
with artists such as Sugarland, ZZ Top, Travis Tritt, Etta
James, Lynyrd Skynyrd, The Allman Brothers Band, Willie Nelson
and BB King.
Members of the band
include bassist John Hopkins, fiddler Jimmy De Martini and
more recent additions of guitarist/organist Coy Bowles and
drummer Chris Fryar. In January 2009 multi-instrumentalist
and songwriter Clay Cook joined the band; perhaps best known
for his co-writes with Grammy-winner John Mayer, Cook rounds
out the ZBB sound on guitar, vocals, organ, mandolin and pedal
steel.
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May
29
The
Lee Boys (with DJ Williams Projekt)
The Lee Boys are
one of America’s finest African-American sacred steel
ensembles. This family group consists of three brothers, Alvin
Lee (guitar), Derrick Lee and Keith Lee (vocals) along with
their three nephews, Roosevelt Collier (pedal steel guitar),
Alvin Cordy Jr. (7-string bass) and Earl Walker (drums). Each
member began making music at the ages of 7 and 8 in the House
of God church they attended in Perrine, Fla. Here they underwent
a rigorous course of training in a variety of musical instruments,
including lap and pedal steel guitars. Born and raised in
Miami, each of The Lee Boys grew up in the church where their
father and grandfather, Rev. Robert E. Lee, was the pastor
and a steel player himself.
“Sacred steel” is a type of music described as
an inspired, unique form of Gospel music with a hard-driving,
blues-based beat. The musical genre is rooted in Gospel, but
infused with rhythm and blues, jazz, rock, funk, hip-hop,
country and ideas from other nations. Influenced by the Hawaiian
steel guitar fad of the 1930s, brothers Willie and Troman
Eason brought the electric lap steel guitar into the worship
services of the House of God church in Jacksonville, Fla.
The Pentecostal congregation embraced the soulful sound, and
over time this unique sound became the hallmark of the church.
The pedal steel guitar was added to the mix and soon became
the central instrument. The Lee Boys are part of the fourth
generation of musicians in this faith.
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June
5
Jerry Douglas
(with The Atkinsons)
Jerry
Douglas is widely renowned as perhaps the finest dobro player
in contemporary acoustic music. His main foundation is bluegrass,
but Douglas is an eclectic whose tastes run toward jazz, blues,
folk, and straight-ahead country as well, and he’s equally
capable of appealing to bluegrass aficionados or new agers
with a taste for instrumental roots music. What’s more,
his progressive sensibility as a composer has earned him comparisons
to like-minded virtuosos Béla
Fleck and David
Grisman.
Douglas began playing the dobro at age 8 with encouragement
from his father, who was also a bluegrass musician. By his
teen years, Douglas was already a member of his father’s
band, and his playing was especially influenced by Josh
Graves of Flatt
& Scruggs’ Foggy Mountain Boys. Douglas was
discovered at a festival by the Country Gentlemen, who took
him on tour with them for the rest of the summer and later
brought him into the recording studio. From there, Douglas
established himself as a hugely in-demand session musician;
during the latter half of the 1970s, he worked with the likes
of J.D. Crowe & the New South, David
Grisman, Ricky
Skaggs, Doyle
Lawson and Tony
Rice. Additionally, Douglas released his debut album,
Fluxology,
on Rounder in 1979; he followed it three years later with
Fluxedo,
which like its predecessor stuck relatively close to traditional
(albeit sometimes jazzy) bluegrass.
During the early
1980s, Douglas continued his session career
with even greater success, adding Emmylou
Harris, Béla
Fleck, the Whites, and Peter
Rowan to his list of credits. He returned to his solo
career in 1986 with Under the Wire on Sugar Hill, which reflected
his interest in the progressive new-acoustic (or “newgrass”)
movement. He subsequently signed with MCA, where he issued
Changing
Channels (1987) and the smoother, strongly jazz-influenced
Plant
Early (1989). More session work for increasingly prominent
artists brought him into the 1990s, with names like Alison
Krauss, Del McCoury, Garth
Brooks, Trisha
Yearwood, Randy
Travis, Clint
Black, Patty
Loveless, Suzy
Bogguss, Reba McEntire, Kathy
Mattea, and Dolly
Parton on his resume. In 1992, he returned to Sugar Hill
for the more traditional bluegrass outing Slide
Rule, which many critics ranked among his finest recordings.
The following year brought the all-instrumental Skip,
Hop & Wobble, a trio recording with Russ
Barenberg and Edgar
Meyer. In 1994, Douglas contributed to the Grammy-winning
compilation Great
Dobro Sessions, and cut a duo album with Peter
Rowan, Yonder,
in 1996. Restless on the Farm (1998), true to its title, was
a return to Douglas’ freewheeling eclecticism, which continued
on 2002s Lookout for Hope. Best Kept Secret arrived in September
of 2005.
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June
12
Old School
Freight Train (with NO BS! Brass Band)
Old
School Freight Train, from Charlottesville combines thought
provoking lyrics with captivating melodies, soulful vocals,
virtuosic instrumentals and imaginative arrangements. Blending
folk, jazz, soul, pop, bluegrass, Latin and Celtic, OSFT offers
a unique musical experience leading the Boston Globe to call
them “the next big thing” and the Chicago Tribune
claims is “accessible but uncompromising in creativity.”
“After 40 years of recording acoustic music, it’s
not very often that a new band catches, and keeps, my attention,”
said David Grisman. “Old School Freight Train has done
that and more.”
“Shades of Jack Johnson, Ben Harper... even a kiss of
Van Morrison... Old School Freight Train is off on a timeless
new track blending roots and rock to create a sound that’s
all their own.” – from Tim Dickinson, National Affairs
Correspondent, Rolling Stone
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June
19
Lucero, (with
Farm Vegas)
Lucero
is a punk/country music infused rock and roll band that is
based in Memphis, Tenn. Their punk rock roots flavor their
now “country-ish” music, while their southern
roots give them the twang that they have come to be known
by. The band played for the first time in spring of 1998.
Since 2001, they have played between 150 and 200 shows a year
across the U.S. and Canada. They have released six full length
albums to date, the latest entitled Rebels, Rogues, &
Sworn Brothers. The members of Lucero are Roy Berry (drums),
John C. Stubblefield (bass), Brian Venable (guitar), and Ben
Nichols (guitar and vocals), with Rick Steff (piano, organ,
accordion). Ben Nichols previous band was Red 40 in which
he played alongside Colin Brooks and Steve Kooms.
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June
26
Toubab Krewe,
(with Crucial Elements)
Blending
American and West African influences into a sound all its
own, Toubab Krewe has set “a new standard for fusions
of rock ‘n’ roll and West African music” (Afropop Worldwide).
Since forming in
2005, the magnetic instrumental quintet has won a diverse
and devoted following at performances everywhere from Bonnaroo
to the legendary Festival of the Desert in Essakane, Mali,
known as the most remote festival in the world. They developed
their unique sound over the course of numerous extended trips
to Mali, Guinea and Ivory Coast, where they immersed themselves
in the local culture and studied and performed with luminaries.
But the group has
its roots in Asheville, N.C., where many of its members were
childhood friends and long-term musical collaborators. It
was there, at home in the Appalachians, where the band chose
to record their sophomore album, Live at the Orange Peel.
The new album captures their outstanding 2008 New Year’s
run at the Orange Peel in their hometown.
All of the songs are previously unreleased and continue to
mix American rock ‘n’ roll with the West African musical traditions
the band fell in love with on their travels. Along the way,
they explore the worlds of surf and zydeco, fusing it all
together into what the Village Voice describes as “a
futuristic, psychedelic, neo-griot frenzy” and Honest
Tune hails as “one of the most innovative voices in
music today.”
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