Saturday, June 8th
Guitar Virtuoso Richard Smith
$15.00
Ticket prices reflect an
additional 10% tax and handling fee
$16.50 Total
Richard Smith was born in Beckenham, Kent, England in 1971. One day, at the age of five, Richard was watching his father fingerpick "Down South Blues" (an Atkins-Travis recording) on his guitar. The boy begged his dad to show him how to play it, and finally he did. Despite the fact that Richard is left-handed and his dad's right-handed guitar was not designed for tiny hands, by the end of that day, Richard learned and played both the chords and the melody. Within no time, the toddler outstripped his dad's six-string prowess and it was clear to all who saw or heard him play that Richard was one of those rare phenomena -- a child prodigy.
Concentrating initially on the music his father loved, the country picking of Chet Atkins and Merle Travis, young Richard digested everything he heard, learning even the most complicated of these tunes with ease, and confounded everyone with his dexterity. It seemed that, not only did the boy possess amazing physical skill, but a photographic musical memory as well. Often, a single hearing was all it took to get a piece under his fingers.
Richard first met his hero, the "Godfather" of finger style guitar, Chet Atkins when he was only eleven and was invited by Chet to play with him on stage at Her Majesty's Theatre in London in front of an audience of about a thousand. He played Chet's arrangement of "Whispering," and Chet played along with him. Then the audience went mad and Chet asked him to play another one. Before Richard could decide what to play, someone shouted "Little Rock Getaway." and Richard played Chet's arrangement of it while Chet, not playing this time, watched him in amazement playing to a stunned and appreciative audience. By the time he reached his early twenties, both Chet Atkins and Jerry Reed began to refer to Richard Smith as their "Hero", and still do.
There seems to be no limit to Richard's ability to quickly master whatever guitar style captures his fancy. The complex styles of many guitar greats including Django Reinhardt, Les Paul, and Lenny Breau have proved to be no impediment to his voracious musical appetite. Apart from his guitar virtuosity, he is also an accomplished banjo and violin player.
Richard has toured around the world, surprising audiences everywhere with his genius, showcasing a repertoire spanning an incredible range of musical styles from country, bluegrass, mainstream jazz, modern pop and rock, to classical guitar. Richard also plays several of John Phillip Souza's marches and, incredibly, comes close to sounding like an entire marching band, drums and all.
$15.00
Ticket prices reflect an
additional 10% tax and handling fee
$16.50 Total
The Knight of Acoustic Blues
Doug MacLeod is a singer-songwriter in the American tradition. He is a traveling artist that writes and sings original songs that are based on his own life and experiences. He learned from the old masters, lived the music, survived the life and carries forward a valuable tradition.
MacLeod is known for his superb songwriting, guitar wizardry, warm soulful vocals, wit and unforgettable live performances. At the heart of this is his knack for storytelling, bringing characters-from the faceless to the legendary-to strikingly real life. While he developed his rich, soulful voice MacLeod also worked out a unique, unorthodox and powerfully rhythmic acoustic guitar style. His distinct style of playing was a byproduct of pent-up rage from his turbulent childhood and the segregation drama in his new home of St. Louis. The rage of his youth was eventually channeled through his guitar, using his relentless right hand to pound out an insistent, churning beat to complement his intricate bottleneck and finger-style technique.
"There's A Time"
"Heart-felt, emotionally powerful and, as is often the case with artists of this nature, timeless. - Billtown Blues Society.
“What’s remarkable about Doug MacLeod’s music is the stuff you don’t hear. MacLeod does not dabble in filler or extraneous patter. He’s a master of direct, Delta-inspired storytelling... A National Reso-Phonic guitar upon his hip speaking in steel-timbered tongues. - Living Blues.
|
