Little Toby Walker, the 2002 International Blues Challenge Winner who has been drawing well-deserved buzz on both sides of the Atlantic for his finger picking-good blues and ragtime guitar playing, will celebrate the release of his second live album, Just Rolled In, during an April 20 concert at the Our Times Coffeehouse in Garden City.
The album features 14 songs recorded during a January 26 performance at Bay Shore’s Boulton Center for the Performing Arts. A short musical slide show from that performance appears on his website, www.littletobywalker.com.
Shortly after his Garden City gig, Walker embarks on another concert tour of the United Kingdom.
Tom Griffith, who produced Walker’s latest project, is a talented singer- songwriter in his own right. A decade since the local release of his first album, Griffith is issuing his first national commercial release, 40 Years Later, this month.
“I wanted to write about issues that were important to us as baby boomers back in the sixties, but looked at from today’s perspective,” says Griffith of the album that is semi-autobiographical in nature. “In a funny way, it took me 40 years to be able to write 40 Years Later. I feel like it was worth the wait.” Griffith, a former commercial jingle writer and long a mainstay on the local acoustic scene (along with his wife, Martha Trachtenberg), will perform selections from his new solo release during an April 27 CD release concert at Cool Beanz in St James.
(See the AcoustiCalendar for details on both of these CD release concerts).
Also out with a new CD this month is LI singer-songwriter Bob Koenig. Abbey Lane (whose cover resembles a similarly-titled one by four blokes from across the pond), is a collection of songs primarily about or inspired by Koenig’s adopted hometown of Levittown and is being released in tandem with the 60th anniversary of America’s first suburban community. Koenig, who also manages the Levittown Historical Society’s web site, has been performing selections during events marking the anniversary recently.
Maintaining that Levittown “has always embodied the American dream,” Koenig felt he could “contribute some kind of ‘offering’ of songs for the people who started this dream, and for the people working hard to continue it today.” Among the CD’s eight Levittown-oriented tracks are the Woody Guthrie-inspired “Talking Suburban Veteran Blues,” which celebrates the veterans who were the community’s first homeowners; “Levittown,” which features snippets of a News 12 interview with the hamlet’s founder, William Levitt; a reworking of Malvina Reynolds’ classic “Little Boxes” (which actually was not about Levittown) and a couple of poems by Levittowner Wendell Storms, that Koenig set to music. Copies of the CD will be available later this month at various locations around Levittown and online at www.bobkoenigmusic.com.
A New York City CD Release Party for LI-based folk-rock singer-songwriter Johnny Cuomo’s American Idle on Paradiddle Records is slated for Tuesday, April 10 at 9 p.m., at the 11th Street Bar, 510 East 11th Street, Manhattan. Dan Lowery, who also is featured on the CD, accompanies Cuomo on guitar and vocals. Cuomo, who plays guitar and mandolin, also is known in Celtic music circles for his work with Gallowglass.
On the strength of two songs from his forthcoming sophomore release, Smaller Things, LI singer-songwriter Glen Roethel has been named as one of eight finalists in the Susquehanna Songwriting Contest. He will perform “One Word” and “Pumpkin Street” on Friday, May 11, during the Susquehanna Music & Arts Festival (SMAF) at the rustic Ramblewood Resort in Darlington, Maryland. As previously reported here, “People of the Earth,” another inspirational track from Roethel’s upcoming release, will appear in the new Unity songbook, Special Services and Chants, Volume 2, to be published in June by the Association of Unity Churches International.
Arlon Bennett, a folk Americana singer-songwriter who grew up in Bay Shore, currently co-chairs Princeton Songwriters, a New Jersey chapter of the Nashville Songwriters Association International. He recently released Summer’s Voice, his third album on Red Sea Records. Recorded in Nashville, its 11 tracks include a remix of “Be the Change,” a socially relevant number and 2006 Music to Life Awards finalist that Bennett performed during a showcase at the Kerrville Folk Festival last summer. Music-for-Life is sponsored by the Public Domain Foundation, established by Noel Paul Stookey (of Peter, Paul & Mary fame) to promote and facilitate the creation of cause-related music and further its impact upon issues and organizations of social and political justice. Bennett returns to Long Island on May 9 as the featured performer for Acoustic Long Island at Cool Beanz in St. James.
LI Artists Offer Quality Music for Children, Too
Singer-songwriter Patricia Shih has been invited to sing at the Washington Monument grounds in Washington, D.C. on June 9 to help the nation’s Girl Scouts celebrate their 95th anniversary. Five years ago, more than 120,000 Girl Scouts and their families and friends cheered and sang along with Shih, Odetta, Michelle Shocked and others as they marked the organization’s 90th anniversary.
In collaboration with her husband and accompanist Stephen Fricker, Shih, a frequent performer at schools and libraries throughout the tri-state area, also recently released a new CD for children and families. Entitled The Power of One, the album features 12 songs, including 10 originals, geared towards youngsters in grades 3-6.
Paul Helou, a singer-songwriter and interactive musical storyteller, performed in an official family showcase during the recent 2007 International Folk Alliance Conference in Memphis, Tennessee. Helou makes his west coast debut on April 22 at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles, where he’ll perform songs from Bears, Bees & Butterflies, his award-winning children’s CD.
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