tag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:/blogs/news?p=1News2024-01-05T12:31:20-06:00Barry Walshfalsetag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702142018-09-27T19:00:00-05:002022-06-01T20:03:19-05:00MEMPHIS MUSIC HALL OF FAME!<p>On Thursday, November 1st, a band I've been a member of for nearly eighteen years will be inducted into the <a title="Memphis Music Hall of Fame" href="http://memphismusichalloffame.com/news/" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Memphis Music Hall of Fame</a> at the Cannon Center for the Performing Arts in Memphis, Tennessee. I first played with this band in January of 2001 in Winnipeg, Canada, and I've played with them across the US, Canada and Europe. I'll be so proud to watch the three surviving original members, Gary Talley, Bill Cunningham and John Evans accept this well-deserved accolade. </p>
<p>Other inductees this year are: </p>
<p>Aretha Franklin (born in Memphis), Eddie Floyd, George Klein, The Rock and Roll Trio, 8Ball and MJG, and O'Landa Draper.</p>
<p>The Box Tops will be performing three songs as part of the ceremony: The Letter, Cry Like A Baby, and Soul Deep. I'm sad that Alex Chilton (who died on March 17, 2010) won't be there to see this, but his family will be represented, as will the family of the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin. </p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702132017-09-16T19:00:00-05:002022-05-21T11:56:51-05:00BANFF CENTRE<p>This Thursday night, September 21, at 7:30PM, I'll be performing at <a title="Banff Centre" href="https://www.banffcentre.ca/events/open-concert-featuring-barry-walsh/20170921/1930" target="_blank" data-imported="1">The Banff Centre</a> in Banff, Alberta, Canada. It's part of the Banff Centre's Arts Program and I'm honored they asked me to be a part of it. </p>
<p>https://www.banffcentre.ca/events/open-concert-featuring-barry-walsh/20170921/1930</p>
<p> </p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702122016-07-27T19:00:00-05:002022-04-27T01:22:36-05:00SHETLAND ISLANDS REVIEWS<p><a title="Shetland News" href="http://www.shetnews.co.uk/reviews/13086-fantastic-songwriter-peters-shines-at-mareel" target="_blank" data-imported="1"><strong>http://www.shetnews.co.uk/reviews/13086-fantastic-songwriter-peters-shines-at-mareel</strong></a></p>
<p>and:</p>
<p><a title="The Shetland Times" href="http://www.shetlandtimes.co.uk/2016/07/27/american-songstress-cuts-right-to-the-heartstrings" target="_blank" data-imported="1"><strong>http://www.shetlandtimes.co.uk/2016/07/27/american-songstress-cuts-right-to-the-heartstrings</strong></a></p>
<p>We had a great two days in the Shetland Islands. We hope to get back up there someday. Thanks to Neil Riddell and the Mareel venue for putting on a great gig!</p>
<p>Cheers!</p>
<p>Barry</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702102016-03-25T19:00:00-05:002022-05-25T07:58:44-05:00SILENCIO REVIEW - AllMusic.com<h4 class="review-author headline">Review by <span>Thom Jurek</span>:</h4>
<div class="text" style="padding-bottom: 35px;">
<p>Nashville's <a class="name-link" href="http://www.allmusic.com/artist/barry-walsh-mn0000787739" data-imported="1">Barry Walsh</a> spent decades as a go-to pianist iconic musicians pursued when they wanted the best. How many other piano men can claim <span class="name-link">R</span><span class="name-link">oy Orbison</span>, <span class="name-link">Waylon Jennings</span>, and <span class="name-link">Alex Chilton</span> on their résumés? But that's only one part of a fascinating story. <span class="name-link">Walsh</span> is not only a hell of a pianist, but a fine composer as well. In his work one can hear the modernism of <span class="name-link">E</span><span class="name-link">rik Satie</span>, the line-blurring jazz pianism of <span class="name-link">Paul Bley</span> and <span class="name-link">Keith Jarrett</span>, classical minimalists (<span class="name-link">Reich</span> and <span class="name-link">Glass</span>), and ambient strategists such as <span class="name-link">Brian Eno</span> and <span class="name-link">Michael Brook</span>, but his musical vocabulary -- as displayed on 2008's <a class="album-link" href="http://www.allmusic.com/album/the-crossing-mw0001199737" data-imported="1">The Crossing</a> and 2012's <a class="album-link" href="http://www.allmusic.com/album/paradiso-mw0002325323" data-imported="1">Paradiso</a> -- displays a range that seamlessly incorporates everything from <span class="name-link">Copland</span> to <span class="name-link">Ray Charles</span>. <em><span class="album-link">Silencio</span> </em>is not just the next step in his evolution, but a leap. Spending over two years in his home studio, <span class="name-link">Walsh</span> sat down whenever there was time "to focus on space and restraint...the space between the notes." To get there, he appears not only on piano, but selectively on accordion, glockenspiel, guitar, and synth. He is accompanied by cellist <a class="name-link" href="http://www.allmusic.com/artist/john-catchings-mn0000211924" data-imported="1">John Catchings</a>. The title track opener is makes elliptical chord voicings manifest by resonant reverb. A whispering synth slips through them almost imperceptibly. The space "between" is inside the articulation of played notes, the space created by their echoes and the electronic keyboard that comments on their resonances. The pianist and <span class="name-link">Catchings</span> touch on <span class="name-link">Ravel</span> in "Prague." The cello's wistful sonorities add an elegiac dimension to <span class="name-link">Walsh</span>'s languid melody. "The Ice Storm" quotes from his own "Exeter Cathedral." But the addition of the accordion adds a more complex emotional element; it suggests a dramatic tango reminiscent of <span class="name-link">Piazzolla</span>'s more streamlined moments. The coloration by glockenspiel and the strategic key changes balance that impression, though, to offer a gentler sense of release. "Escape Velocity," co-composed with his son <a class="name-link" href="http://www.allmusic.com/artist/brennan-mn0002887239" data-imported="1">Brennan</a>, uses the same instruments but is buoyed by the younger man's spectral electric guitar playing. Rhythm and melody interlock, creating a natural sense of flow that evolves into something otherworldly. In "Belgian Afternoon," one can hear <span class="name-link">Satie</span>, but the feel is more redolent of continental chamber jazz in the dialogue between piano and cello. There is also a sly yet lovely quote from <span class="name-link">Bacharach</span> in the melodic line. Harmonic interplay between those two instruments on "The Violet Hour" suggests the first part of <span class="name-link">Glass</span>' Metamorphosis emotionally, yet its more complex strategy and detailed articulation put it in a class of its own; the explorations of shape and texture deliver brooding utterances and shadows. <em><span class="album-link">Silencio</span></em> is breathtaking in approach and imagination. <span class="name-link">Walsh</span>'s methodology is based on an intrinsic aesthetic that serves music first. Whatever is called for in a given tune is conjured: from inspiration, the unshakeable spirit of inquiry, practiced discipline, and the willingness to discover rather than dictate. While a number of younger composers have absorbed the same influences, none of them approach <span class="name-link">Walsh</span>'s creative reach or emotional warmth. </p>
<p>-Thom Jurek, AllMusic.com</p>
</div>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702112015-08-05T19:00:00-05:002016-03-26T05:49:57-05:00INTERVIEW WITH BARRY AND GRETCHEN PETERS<p>Here's an interview my wife Gretchen and I did with music journalist Jeff Miller for his Flashpointarts.org website. It's in two parts.</p>
<p>Part One: </p>
<p><strong>http://www.flashpointarts.org/featured/gretchen-peters-and-barry-walsh/ </strong></p>
<p>Part Two:</p>
<p><strong>http://www.flashpointarts.org/featured/gretchen-peters-and-barry-walsh-part-2/</strong></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702092014-12-20T18:00:00-06:002014-12-21T11:41:10-06:00OBAMACARE!<p>Those of you who know me know I've been a supporter of the ACA since day one. I jumped at the chance to share my story in a public forum on this very important subject. The link to the piece is <a title="Dept of HHS Interview" href="http://www.hhs.gov/blog/2014/12/15/barrys-getcovered-story-getting-health-insurance-thats-tune.html?utm_campaign=121514_hhs_blog_barry&utm_medium=email&utm_source=hhs_blog_updates&utm_content=121514_hhs_blog_barry_titlelink" target="_blank" data-imported="1">here. </a></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702082014-09-29T19:00:00-05:002014-11-18T08:45:50-06:00SADIE AND THE HOTHEADS!<p>I'm honored that I've been invited to join Elizabeth McGovern's band Sadie And The Hotheads for their first US tour. I'll be replacing my friend, the great keyboardist Nick Lacey, who had a prior commitment and could not make these US dates. The dates are listed on my tour page, but I'll list the whole tour here:</p>
<p>USA TOUR DATES<br>December<br>9- Annapolis, MD - Ram's Head On Stage<br>10- Albany, NY - Sawyer Theatre @ Empire State Plaza PAC<br>12- Norfolk, CT - Infinity Hall Norfolk</p>
<p>13- Pawtucket, RI - The Met<br>14- Hartford, CT - Infinity Hall Hartford</p>
<p>Here's a nice piece on how this band came about. Again, I'm so honored they asked me along. They are all great people and I cannot wait to hang out with them!</p>
<div class="showOverview">
<div><img src="http://www.infinityhall.com/Customer-Content/www/Events/Images/Full/sadieandthehotheadsweb2014.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="Sadie and The Hotheads" height="310" id="mainImage" width="550" /></div>
</div>
<p>Artist Bio:</p>
<p>Yes, yes, Sadie and the Hotheads are Elizabeth McGovern’s band. But despite the transatlantic, Oscar-, Grammy- and Golden Globe-nominated star of Downton Abbey being the central figure, this is far from simply being time off from the day job.</p>
<p>Sadie and the Hotheads are a real band, quite simply, one of the most fascinating acts around today playing… well, it’s difficult to say exactly what they play. Elizabeth’s sometimes winsome, sometimes sultry vocals – and quirky, off-the-wall lyrics – front a world of musical influences, from 60s pop to country, esoteric folk to jazz, Celtic to torch songs. But nothing for very long – just when you think you’ve got a handle on what’s going on, they’ve swished and swirled and danced on to something completely different.</p>
<p>And while Sadie’s found fame of late, thanks to the global appreciation of Downton, this is no hastily put together group of individuals. The band have been gestating, creating, and imagining their curious and thoroughly engaging brand of world music for a number of years. “I’m not a solo performer,” she insists. “Without these musicians I wouldn’t exist.”</p>
<p>Yet McGovern is the poster girl of fiftysomething women (happy to declare that it’s the decade when a woman is at her sexual peak) and has worked single-mindedly to create something new at a time when it would have been all too easy to sit back and simply enjoy her Downton fame.</p>
<p>It all started in 2007 when Elizabeth, long given to writing and strumming, responded to an ad for a guitar teacher and engaged the services of Steve Nelson. Steve was – and, indeed, still is – one of the Nelson Brothers, along with Simon, a much admired act in the British country-roots scene.</p>
<p>The pair hit it off and soon Steve was not only helping with Elizabeth’s playing but also her writing. It wasn’t long before Simon, a breathtaking guitarist himself, was on board along with chums, including drummer Rowan Oliver from electro-pop act Goldfrapp, and created the extraordinary album I CAN WAIT. The record received lavish reviews such as “a great pop record” and “intriguing and very catchy”.</p>
<p>Elizabeth’s film credits include Robert Redford’s Ordinary People, and Ragtime, for which she was nominated for an Oscar as best supporting actress but she’d moved to England from the US to start a family.</p>
<p>“I had more time on my hands,” she reflects. “I wasn’t working quite so much, my kids were a lot younger – there was an empty space there for me to live in and fill up. That’s why it happened.”</p>
<p>But she, and Sadie and the Hotheads, hadn’t bargained for the astonishing rise of Downton Abbey. The band played occasional dates but hung on in there as their singer worked tirelessly and, against all the odds, five years later came up with a second album, HOW NOT TO LOSE THINGS, featuring guest vocals from Downton co-star Michelle Dockery. The same unusual instrumentation remained (Simon and Steve playing all things stringed, including dobro, mandolin, banjo, ukulele and even bouzouki) yet the band had progressed, becoming more assured while still retaining their playful and intelligent outlook.</p>
<p>More shows followed and a stable line-up, with the Nelsons, original member Ron Knights, pianist Nick Lacey, percussionist Terl Bryant and vocalist Danica Chapman, a line-up that between them has worked with everyone from John Paul Jones to Joss Stone, Walter Trout to Faith Hill, Mavis Staples to Roddy Frame.</p>
<p>The band toured in 2014 with Mike Rutherford’s Mike and the Mechanics (Elizabeth sometimes making a mad dash from Downton set to stage), have appeared at the Isle of Wight Festival twice, have played a string of dates at the Edinburgh Fringe and opened for Sting at the Montreux Jazz Festival.</p>
<p>Elizabeth fronts the band on stage with a girlish enthusiasm combined with a rock ‘n’ roll style that puts her up there with any of the bright young things of the music scene – and all a beguiling world away from her persona as the dignified Lady Cora in Downton</p>
<p>A third album, STILL WAITING, in 2014 had Grammy and Emmy award-winning producer Kipper Eldridge (a veteran of several platinum-selling Sting albums) at the helm, featured guest appearances from guitarist Mike Rutherford as well as Nashville star Gretchen Peters.</p>
<p>As well as breathtaking original material, there are also covers that say much about the band’s breadth of vision – an ethereal take on the Bee Gees’ Staying Alive and beautiful, dreamy rendering of the Rolling Stones’ Wild Horses. The record crosses more borders than ever before, being at once a cutting edge creation while never likely to offend her TV followers</p>
<p>And given Elizabeth’s celebrity status, the band has celebrity fans, including former BBC1 controller Alan Yentob and actor John Malkovich, who were both there to see a packed but low-key performance in West London’s Troubadour. The band are now set to conquer America with PBS – which screens Downton – ready to record them in concert for a TV special.</p>
<p>Ask Elizabeth what Sadie and the Hotheads are about and she admits: “Even I find it very difficult to describe – it doesn’t slot into any one thing, but that’s what makes it special.”</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702072014-06-29T19:00:00-05:002014-06-30T09:51:09-05:00A FEW LIVE RECORDINGS<p>"Gretchen's Theme" live from Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, March 8, 2013. With Christine Bougie on electric guitar:</p>
<p><a href="/files/535354/01-gretchens-theme-live.mp3" data-imported="1">Gretchen's Theme.mp3</a></p>
<p> "The Steps Of The Parthenon" live from Eddie's Attic, October 9, 2008:</p>
<p><a href="/files/535355/08-the-steps-of-the-parthenon-live.mp3" data-imported="1">The_Steps_of_The Parthenon-_live.mp3</a></p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702062014-06-07T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:25:42-05:00LETTER TO A YOUNG ARTIST<p>Recently, my wife wrote a post for CD Baby that's received a lot of attention. I think it's such great advice for young artists I want to post it in its entirety. Here's Gretchen Peters:</p>
<p><a href="http://wp.me/p4fLAY-4SK" data-imported="1"><img src="http://diymusician.cdbaby.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/GretchenImage_v2.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="GretchenImage v2 A letter to a young artist, from Gretchen Peters" height="410" width="614" /></a></p>
<p>[T<em>his post, written by <a title="Gretchen Peters on CD Baby" href="http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/GretchenPeters" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Gretchen Peters</a>, is part of <a title="Advice for songwriters" href="http://diymusician.cdbaby.com/2014/04/letter-young-songwriter-mary-gauthier/" target="_blank" data-imported="1">a series of letters</a> from established artists to young musicians</em>. <em>Gretchen is a Nashville-based recording artist and Grammy-nominated songwriter. She's released a number of great solo albums, and also composed hits for Martina McBride, Faith Hill, Etta James, Trisha Yearwood, Patty Loveless, George Strait, Anne Murray, Neil Diamond, and Bryan Adams.</em>]</p>
<p>When I was a kid I wouldn’t have called myself an artist. I just had a profound itch to make things – songs, poems, paintings – anything. People call it self-expression but it’s really self-discovery. It’s a way of figuring out how you feel and what you think. A way of understanding yourself in the context of the greater world. You don’t become an artist. You are one or you’re not. If you are, you’re either creating or you’re not creating. Both have their drawbacks; but while creating is frustrating, difficult, scary, occasionally exhilarating and often humiliating, not creating is to doubt one’s own reason for being. The choice is clear, then; to stay alive the artist needs to create like the shark needs to swim.</p>
<p><strong>These are some things I’ve learned while swimming:</strong></p>
<h3>
<strong>- </strong><em><strong>Don’t live entirely in your head.</strong> </em>
</h3>
<p> </p>
<p>Just because you work with ideas doesn’t mean your body doesn’t play a part in what you do. Take lots of walks. There are studies that prove that walking boosts creativity. I think this is because walking takes you out of your head and puts you in the world. Your brain is working all the time, whether you realize it or not. Many’s the time I’ve spontaneously arrived at the answer to a songwriting problem while on a long walk. Your subconscious mind is your collaborator. Walking (or napping, or dancing, or whatever your physical outlet is) gives your subconscious mind the time and space to do some of the work.</p>
<h3><strong>- <em>Don’t neglect the other side of your brain. </em></strong></h3>
<p>Neglecting to learn basic skills of life, like handling your money, fixing your drippy faucet and changing your oil, doesn’t make you any more artistic. It just makes you hapless and incapable, and a target. The whole left brain/right brain thing is an oversimplification anyway. You are a real person living in the real world – and you might actually be good at some ‘left brain’ things. I used to have a day job as an accountant. I was pretty good at it. Go figure.</p>
<h3><strong>- <em>Listen to your gut. </em></strong></h3>
<p>It’s all you have. If you don’t learn to hear it and trust it, you will be as a boat tossed upon the sea. There is no compass; there is no map; there is no master plan except to keep your nose down and turn your amorphous thoughts and feelings into coherent and honest work. You will surprise and disturb and disappoint yourself. Your finished work will never be as good as it was in your imagination, when it was an unrealized spark. You will be advised, ignored, revered and reviled – and all you have to keep you on course is your instinct. You’ll need it to know what’s worth fighting for. You’ll need it to know when to say no. You’ll need it to know when you’re full of shit. You’ll need it when you feel like giving up. And you will feel like giving up.</p>
<h3><strong>- <em>Skill counts. </em></strong></h3>
<p>These days amateurism is more celebrated and rewarded than ever, thanks to YouTube and the internet (and I actually mean that; there’s always room for a great dog video). We are more impressed by ‘natural’ talent than by skill that takes a lifetime to acquire. Our very notions of ‘talent’ and ‘inspiration’ imply that some people are simply touched by magic, and do no actual work. But the romantic notion of The Artist as a melancholy dreamer who subsists solely on the fairy dust of inspiration is fiction… although much sexier than the reality. Most art is the result of a short burst of inspiration followed by a long slog of grunt work. Or perhaps the drudgery precedes the flash of brilliance. Either way, skill, craft and hard work are the bones. They’re the foundation and the framework that determine how strong and enduring the work is. No matter how inspired your stream-of-consciousness is, until you understand that, you’re an amateur.</p>
<p><em>“Why shouldn’t my work be hard? Almost everybody’s work is hard. One is distracted by this notion that there is such a thing as inspiration, that it comes fast and easy. And some people are graced by that style. I’m not. So I have to work as hard as any stiff, to come up with the payload.” – Leonard Cohen</em></p>
<h3><strong>- <em>Know your elders.</em></strong></h3>
<p>You did not spring fully formed from the forehead of Zeus.You are a stew of influences, and those who influenced you were influenced by the ones who went before them. Be curious enough to learn who they were, and what they did. Your work will be better for it, and you’ll discover that there were incredibly smart people doing what you do hundreds of years before you, which will be disconcerting at first. The more you learn, the more you’ll realize there is to learn. That’s when you really start learning.</p>
<h3><strong>- <em>It will not get easier. </em></strong></h3>
<p>In fact, it will get harder. Every time you start, you are starting from nothing. Each song, each performance starts with a blank page or an empty stage. You are always, eternally starting over. That’s the blessing and the curse. And as your self-imposed standards rise ever higher, you’ll be less easily pleased with yourself. This is not necessarily reassuring information, but it may help to remember that Leonard Cohen (see above) fills several notebooks for each song he writes (yes, <em>“whole notebooks. I’m very happy to be able to speak this way to fellow craftsmen. Some people may find it encouraging to see how slow</em> <em>and dismal and painstaking is the process.”</em>).</p>
<h3><strong>- <em>You must be present to win. </em></strong></h3>
<p>When I’m performing on the road, there are inevitably those nights when I can’t get in the zone. I’m left with a sense of frustration and disappointment. Even guilt. I have bad nights when conditions are perfect, and I have great nights when conditions are far from it, so it’s not simply a matter of conditions, obviously. But I know that if I don’t show up at all, that reduces my chances of getting there to nil. So I like to increase my odds by doing what I do frequently and with the optimism that every performance has the possibility of being transformative. It’s the same for writing, or recording. You have to do it, and you have to fail at it. A lot. The more you fail, the more you learn, the better your odds. Never underestimate the power of dogged, repeated effort.</p>
<h3><strong>- <em>Don’t mistake cynicism or irony for art. </em></strong></h3>
<p>We live in an age of irony – everyone is superior to or laughing at someone. We mistake it for sophistication, but it’s cowardice. It’s an unwillingness to stake one’s heart and mind on something for fear of appearing naive. Irony is lazy. Its point is that conviction is meaningless; its point is that there is no point. We think of it as edgy, but nothing is edgy if everyone’s doing it. The really revolutionary act is to create art that attempts to be redemptive, to stand for something, to be unrepentantly earnest. We need that art in this world. Go make it.</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702052013-09-22T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:26:15-05:00FIRST-EVER ALL IRELAND TOUR!<p><span class="userContent">So excited to be doing a first-ever tour of (only) Ireland next month with <a title="Gretchen Peters" href="http://www.gretchenpeters.com/tour/" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Gretchen Peters</a>. We're playing a total of nine dates in Eire, and then returning home. Here's our Belfast friend <a title="Real Music Club" href="http://app.cooleremail.com/v.pl?33c62b2a43e66617de3d1b6fde479ea9e65b33ffa7627ce2" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Jim Heaney's</a> web site with two of the dates that he'<span class="text_exposed_show">s promoting. </span></span></p>
<p><span class="userContent"><span class="text_exposed_show">Saturday 19th October - Island Arts Centre in Lisburn</span></span></p>
<p><span class="userContent"><span class="text_exposed_show">Thursday 24th October - Flowerfield Arts Centre in Portstewart. </span></span></p>
<p><span class="userContent"><span class="text_exposed_show">The rest of the shows are on my Tour Page. Come have a Guinness with us!</span></span></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702042013-08-02T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:26:41-05:00NEW VIDEO!<p>My friend and videographer Bluematter1969 has created a stunning video of my song "Years May Go By" from The Crossing. In case you missed it, it's on my home page, here:</p>
<p>http://barrywalshmusic.com/index/</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702032013-02-22T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:27:55-05:00WALK-IN MUSIC "WOMAN ON THE WHEEL TOUR 2013"<p>I just finished putting together our walk-in music disc for the upcoming "Woman On The Wheel Tour 2013". It's one of my favorite parts of the touring process. We get to pick our favorite new (to us) music, put it on a disc, and listen to it in each venue on the tour as people walk in. It's a nod to the artists we listen to, as well as a surreptitious way of pushing our musical tastes on to an unsuspecting public! Seriously, there is something very comforting and even seductive, about hearing this music that we love so much come wafting over a darkened theater on a great sound system, before the audience comes in. It gets me every time.</p>
<p>So here's the 2013 version of some of the music we are currently listening to. Feel free to comment on it when we see you on the road. We leave for Ireland tomorrow. Sláinte! </p>
<p>Barry</p>
<p><strong>Walk In Music - Woman On The Wheel Tour 2013</strong></p>
<p><br>Monteleone - Mark Knopfler (Get Lucky) <br>Down From Dover - Marianne Faithful (Easy Come Easy Go) <br>Where's Home? - Richard Thompson (Electric) <br>Little Tornado - Aimee Mann (Charmer) <br>Duquesne Whistle - Bob Dylan (Tempest) <br>Seven Times The Charm - Shawn Colvin (All Fall Down) <br>Alabama Pines - Jason Isbell (Here We Rest) <br>Million Miles - Bonnie Raitt (Slipstream) <br>Salford Sunday - Richard Thompson (Electric) <br>Use It Up - Sadie & The Hotheads (How Not To Lose Things) <br>There's A Whole Lotta Heaven - Iris Dement (Sing The Delta) <br>Not Cause I Wanted To - Bonnie Raitt (Slipstream) <br>Chains Of Love - Ryan Adams (Ashes & Fire) <br>Early Roman Kings - Bob Dylan (Tempest) <br>The Boxer -Jerry Douglas with Mumford & Sons and Paul Simon (Traveler) <br>Lucky - Sadie & The Hotheads (How Not To Lose Things)</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702022013-01-29T18:00:00-06:002024-01-05T12:31:20-06:00GRETCHEN'S THEME USED IN DUTCH FILM<p>The Sex Police was released a few weeks ago. Here's the news from the film company, KeyDocs, in Amsterdam:</p>
<p><strong>January 16, 2013</strong></p>
<p>"The premiere of The Sex Police on the dutch television channel Nederland 2 was a great success. Almost 700.000 viewers tuned in to watch the documentary of Roy Dames. <br> <br> Prevention and suppression of sexual slavery is high on the dutch political agenda. All the rules and procedures however, make it hard for John and his colleagues to get human trafficers behind bars. A passionate inspector in an aberrant world."<br> <br>After the 14th of January you can watch The Sex Police online: <strong>www.uitzedinggemist.nl</strong></p>
<p><br>Here's the trailer: <br><strong>http://www.idfa.nl/nl/tags/project.aspx?id=ba5007da-c50f-4ba1-a3f1-2cc700362fb7</strong></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702012012-12-30T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:29:42-05:00Sláinte!<p>I seldom blog, but this year the accolades coming in about a CD I co-produced warranted a response. The recognition for my wife Gretchen Peters' Hello Cruel World CD has been gratifying. It's her career album, and a singular artistic achievement. This little recording, without a large Music Biz budget or record label machine behind it, has really made its mark in the world, for which we are grateful. But don't take my word for it. Here are some of the great mentions we've gotten about it in the last few weeks of 2012:</p>
<p>Proper Music UK: <a title="Proper Records" href="http://sut5.co.uk/l/c.php?c=14047&ct=126620&si=26001536" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Country Album Of The Year</a>!</p>
<p><a title="Americana Top 100 Albums of 2012" href="http://americanamusic.org/home" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Americana Music Association: Top 100 Albums</a> Hello Cruel World is #30! Click the button ("Top 100 Albums") on right side of the page.</p>
<p>Allmusic.com <a title="AllMusic.com Best Country Albums of 2012" href="http://blog.allmusic.com/2012/12/12/allmusics-favorite-country-albums-of-2012/" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Best Country Albums of 2012</a> </p>
<p>In the Telgraph's (UK) <a title="Telegraph 10 Great Roots Albums of 2012" href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/worldfolkandjazz/9754112/10-great-roots-albums-of-2012.html" target="_blank" data-imported="1">10 Great Roots Albums of 2012,</a> I co-produced two out of ten: Tom Russell's <a title="Mesabi" href="http://www.amazon.com/Mesabi-Tom-Russell/dp/B005CQ5XZY" data-imported="1">Mesabi</a> as well as Hello Cruel World. </p>
<p>No Depression: <a title="No Depression Top 50 Ablums of 2012" href="http://www.nodepression.com/profiles/blogs/the-no-depression-community-s-top-50-favorite-albums-of-2012" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Top 50 Albums of the Year</a>. Hello Cruel World comes in at #13! </p>
<p>WFUV's John Platt. <a title="WFUV's John Platts Favorites of 2012" href="http://folkmusicramblings.blogspot.com/2012/12/john-platts-faves-of-2012.html" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Favorites of 2012</a>: </p>
<p>From Mando Lines at No Depression. <a title="Mando Lines/No Depression" href="http://www.nodepression.com/profiles/blogs/2012" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Top 10 Albums of the Year.</a> HCW #2! </p>
<p>In the Netherlands, we're on the shortlist in Heaven magazine. <a title="Heaven Magazine Best of 2012" href="http://www.popmagazineheaven.nl/stem-mee-op-het-beste-album-van-2012" target="_blank" data-imported="1">The Best albums of 2012</a>! </p>
<p>In the <a title="Folk Alley Listener Poll" href="http://www.folkalley.com/surveys/bestof2012" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Folk Alley Listener Poll,</a> Hello Cruel World is number 37! </p>
<p>Folk Alley's <a title="Elena See's Best of 2012" href="http://www.folkalley.com/archives/001276.php?entry_id=1276" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Elena See</a> and <a title="Linda Fahey Best of 2012" href="http://www.folkalley.com/archives/001279.php" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Linda Fahey</a>. Top Albums Of The Year List.</p>
<p>KDHX’s Ed Becker’s <a title="Ed Becker's Best of 2012" href="http://kdhx.org/music/news/881-kdhx-djs-top-10-albums-of-2012" target="_blank" data-imported="1">Top 10 Albums Of The Year</a>! </p>
<p>And finally, Twang Nation's Top 100 Albums of the year list. I don't have a working link for this one. Will fix this when Twang Nation comes back online.</p>
<p>In the words of Frank Sinatra, "It was a very good year". We had a ball crisscrossing the USA all year, and crossing the Atlantic four times before August 1st. We hope to keep up this mad pace for a while longer. In the meantime, Happy New Year, and Sláinte!</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701612012-10-23T19:00:00-05:002012-10-29T10:43:48-05:00PROPER RECORDS UK HAS RELEASED PARADISO!<p>Here's the Proper Records page for Paradiso: <a href="http://www.propermusic.com/product-details/Barry-Walsh-Paradiso-143328" target="_blank" data-imported="1">http://www.propermusic.com/product-details/Barry-Walsh-Paradiso-143328</a></p>
<p>I'm proud to be part of the Proper family. Home of Bonnie Raitt, Aimee Mann, Richard Thompson, Gretchen Peters, Dr. John, Ian Hunter, Nanci Griffith....I'm very proud to be here!</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60702002012-09-16T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:31:30-05:00JOHN PRINE<p>Happy to announce that Gretchen Peters and I will be opening a few shows for John Prine next month. October 26th in Tuscaloosa, AL, and October 27th in Jackson, MS. Come out & hear the legend, John Prine. He's an amazing performer, and we're honored to be opening these shows for him!</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701992012-07-07T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:31:05-05:00PARADISO REVIEW - FATEA UK<p><strong>Paradiso – Barry Walsh<br><br>Label: Scarlet Letter</strong></p>
<p><strong>Tracks - 12 </strong></p>
<p> </p>
<p>Barry Walsh has been busy recently producing albums for Gretchen Peters and Tom Russell, but is best known as a professional musician for more than three decades; in this time he has performed with Roy Orbison, Jimmy Webb and Al Green, and he's written songs that were recorded by Waylon Jennings, Jessi Colter and the Amazing Rhythm Aces. He has played keyboards for years for The Box Tops and all of this is in addition to touring extensively with singer-songwriter Gretchen Peters (over twenty five UK tours since 2001). During this time he has mesmerized UK audiences with his piano playing, both accompanying Gretchen (his introduction to A Bus to St Cloud, is enough to make a grown man cry) and during his now highly anticipated solo piece during her shows. I’m not sure he’d now be able to leave The Sage, Gateshead, without playing "Leaving Newcastle", for us, from his first CD, <em>The Crossing</em>.<br>Barry’s second CD, <em>Paradiso</em>, has been a long time coming, but mark my words, it is worth the wait! Produced by Walsh, the album comprises twelve pieces of music, all but one self penned. Doug Lancio (Patty Griffin, John Hiatt, Gretchen Peters) adds his guitar prowess to "There’s Been an Incident", which is further enhanced by a stunning choral arrangement by Gretchen Peters. Rob Ickes of Blue Highway adds some dobro to "Marathon Motor Works" and, in a total twist, Peters who plays piano while Walsh adds guitar on a track they co-wrote, called "Seven Weeks". This will be a bit of a surprise to fans of Gretchen, who have been seeing her play guitar at shows for a while now! Walsh’s son Brennan co-wrote and accompanies his Dad on guitar, for "Youth and Age"; perhaps two generations playing this piece together adds a certain poignancy. Finally, esteemed musician Dave Henry adds his cello to several of the pieces on the CD.<br>"North Platte" debuted on the Gretchen Peters/Tom Russell collaboration; <em>One to the Heart, One to The Head</em>, where it appeared in two parts, and I am happy to see it also made it’s way onto this collection. It is such an atmospheric piece that it takes you away in your mind, to the place it ‘describes.’ Again demonstrating his admiration for French composer Eric Satie, we see one of his compositions, "Son Binocle", covered to great effect here. The music conveys the humour in the piece, without any need for words. This then reappears to close the CD...there is a reason...<br>I admitted that before hearing Barry’s first CD I had always struggled to ‘get’ music without lyrics. <em> The Crossing</em> changed that for me...so much so that I spent a week in New Orleans and fell in love with the jazz music that surrounded me there. I was able to relate to it, to catch the emotion in the music and infer its meaning and the story it was telling me, without any need for words. It gave me a new appreciation of music I’d never had previously. <em>Paradiso</em>, in one listen, took me on a musical journey, to somewhere I had never been before, but I know that every time I put the CD in the player, I will go back. A place where music tells its own stories and stirs your emotions. That is Barry Walsh’s talent and that talent is the reason why every one should own <em>Paradiso</em>. While you’re at it, pick up <em>The Crossing,</em> if you don’t already own a copy.</p>
<p>-Helen Mitchell</p>
<p>http://www.fatea-magazine.co.uk/</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701982012-07-07T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:32:27-05:00MAVERICK MAGAZINE PARADISO REVIEW<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Barry Walsh<br>PARADISO<br>Scarlet Letter Records</strong><br><br><strong>An accomplished collection of mainly piano-led, melodic instrumentals.</strong></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Four years on from his accomplished debut solo set, THE CROSSING, Walsh has produced, arranged, engineered and penned the majority of the twelve selections on PARADISO. Walsh (piano, electric piano, synthesiser, accordion and electric guitar) is assisted on his sophomore outing by spouse/skilled songwriter Gretchen Peters (piano, vocals), multi-talented Nashville studio owners/ album producers/sidemen Doug Lancio (electric guitars) and David Henry (cello), Barry’s son Brennan (electric guitar) and from bluegrass band Blue Highway the inimitable Rob Ickes (Dobro). There’s a definite European flavour to this collection with titles including the brisk and airy yet assertive, cello-supported "Koblenz", and "Paradiso", named after the iconic Amsterdam concert venue where Peters and Walsh have performed. The title "Paradiso" is also undoubtedly a reflection on the joyous quality of (Walsh’s) life these days, having married Gretchen in late 2010. Appropriately "Gretchen’s Theme" opens this album, and there’s an extended interpretation of "North Platte" which opened (and was also reprised on) the Gretchen Peters with Tom Russell collaboration ONE TO THE HEART, ONE TO THE HEAD (2009). "Marathon Motor Works" prominently features Ickes, and the three-way, fold-out, card liner includes a picture of Barry outside this former early twentieth-century factory in downtown Nashville, re-developed a quarter of a century ago as Marathon Village into a complex of artists’ and photographers’ studios, offices, radio station and more. At some six and a half minutes duration each, "Youth And Age" (co-written with Brennan, it takes its name from a William Butler Yeats poem) and "July 20", a reference to the date the melody was created, are the longest selections on PARADISO. Both are gently/moderately paced melodic delights. Written by Gretchen and Barry the album’s only other composing collaboration is "Seven Weeks". Thereon the latter switches to keyboard and electric guitar, while the former plays piano. Running out at just short of two minutes each interpretations of "Son Binocle" (it translates as His Monocle), from the pen of classical music composer Erik Satie, bookend four selections and constitutes the second half of this album. Inclusion of the latter finds Walsh echo THE CROSSING, which featured Satie’s "Je Te Veux". Here, the first version is piano led while the second employs electronic sounds and confirm Barry’s love for this Frenchman’s oeuvre. Waxing and waning, twice, Gretchen adds a delicately angelic vocal to "There’s Been An Incident", one of the foregoing (bookended) quartet and this album’s penultimate selection.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Arthur Wood<br>http://www.maverick-country.com/</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701972012-02-08T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:32:44-05:00KELLY REITERMAN'S BLOG<p>Here's a beautiful blog I just read from a friend in the Bay area, Kelly Reiterman. She writes beautifully, and is an original thinker. Proud to call her a friend.</p>
<p>http://kellyreiterman.com/</p>
<h1 class="entry-title"><a title="Permalink to Finding Paradise in a Cruel World" href="http://kellyreiterman.com/2012/02/08/finding-paradise-in-a-cruel-world/" rel="bookmark" data-imported="1">Finding Paradise in a Cruel World</a></h1>
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<span class="sep">Posted on </span><a title="10:46 AM" href="http://kellyreiterman.com/2012/02/08/finding-paradise-in-a-cruel-world/" rel="bookmark" data-imported="1">February 8, 2012</a>
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<p><a href="http://kellyreiterman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/images1.jpg" data-imported="1"><img src="http://kellyreiterman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/images1-150x150.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="" height="150" width="150" /></a><a href="http://kellyreiterman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/images-11.jpg" data-imported="1"><img src="http://kellyreiterman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/images-11-150x150.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="" height="150" width="150" /></a></p>
<p> We’ve all heard the saying that “Music calms the savage beast”. I haven’t been in the company of any beasts bordering on savagery lately, so I’ll just have to take it on faith. What I do know, however, is how music can inspire and soothe a sad and solitary soul. That has been the state of my own soul more times than not lately.</p>
<p style="text-indent: 2em;">When I’m in one of these dark places, the last thing I want to do is go out and be around people. But that’s exactly what I need to do. Luckily for me and my morose mood, I decided to venture over to Berkeley a couple of nights ago to hear some music. Two musicians who I knew via Twitter were performing. <a href="http://www.gretchenpeters.com/" data-imported="1">Gretchen Peters</a> is an award-winning singer-songwriter and a fellow “grammar geek”. I mentioned Gretchen back in <a href="http://kellyreiterman.com/2011/11/29/typo-no/" data-imported="1">this post</a>. She has a new album out called <em>Hello Cruel World</em>. Accompanying her on the tour is <a href="http://ats.barrywalshmusic.com/" data-imported="1">Barry Walsh</a>, an amazing pianist and songwriter and also Gretchen’s husband. Barry, too, has a new album out called, <em>“Paradiso”</em>.</p>
<p style="text-indent: 2em;">Barry’s piano playing evokes such powerful emotions in me. Whether the songs are his compositions or his take on something by French composer <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Satie" data-imported="1">Erik Satie</a>, for example, Barry’s playing brings me to tears. The tears may be joyful or filled with sadness, but I’m definitely moved.</p>
<p style="text-indent: 2em;">What sets Gretchen’s music apart from much of what we hear today is authenticity. She not only tells you a story but she uses her words beautifully to paint a scene, set a mood or describe a character. There are no clichés or gimmicks to be found. Take for example these lyrics:</p>
<p> <em>There’s a man out here puts his head in the mouth of a crocodile.<br> Puts the whole thing in, takes it out and gives the crowd a great big smile.</em><br> “Woman on the Wheel”</p>
<p><em>The moon had a fight with the parking lot light<br> And slunk off to hide in the clouds.</em><br> “Camille”</p>
<p><em>I’m a ticking clock, a losing bet.<br> I’m a girl without a safety net.<br> I’m a cause for some concern.</em><br> “Hello Cruel World”</p>
<p style="text-indent: 2em;"><em>Hello Cruel World</em> walks on the darker side when it comes to the mood it exudes. You may think that a dark collection of songs would be the last type of music to lift me out of my heavy fog. When I listen to Gretchen’s stories about regret or resolve, passion or pain, it provides exactly what’s been lacking in my life: connection. Certain lyrics resonate and make me feel less alone in my solitude or sorrow. When you add the benefit of sharing the experience with others, be they friends or strangers, the effect is like an elixir.</p>
<p style="text-indent: 2em;">I know that one night out, or one CD isn’t a cure-all for life’s problems. But what it is a cure for is that sense of isolation that arises from the feeling that nobody else knows what you’re going through. A gifted artist can reach inside himself or herself and pull something out that reverberates with something within you. Gretchen and Barry do this for me and I want to thank them for that.</p>
<p style="text-indent: 2em;">I urge you to check out both of their sites and if they’re coming to a town near you on their tour, make a point to see them in concert. At the very least, take a listen to some of their music. You will not be sorry.</p>
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<p><span class="cat-links"> <span class="entry-utility-prep-cat-links entry-utility-prep">Posted in</span> <a title="View all posts in Life" href="http://kellyreiterman.com/category/life/" rel="category tag" data-imported="1">Life</a>, <a title="View all posts in Media" href="http://kellyreiterman.com/category/media/" rel="category tag" data-imported="1">Media</a> </span> <span class="sep"> | </span> <span class="tag-links"> <span class="entry-utility-prep-tag-links entry-utility-prep">Tagged</span> <a href="http://kellyreiterman.com/tag/barry-walsh/" rel="tag" data-imported="1">Barry Walsh</a>, <a href="http://kellyreiterman.com/tag/gretchen-peters/" rel="tag" data-imported="1">Gretchen Peters</a>, <a href="http://kellyreiterman.com/tag/hello-cruel-world/" rel="tag" data-imported="1">Hello Cruel World</a>, <a href="http://kellyreiterman.com/tag/music/" rel="tag" data-imported="1">Music</a>, <a href="http://kellyreiterman.com/tag/paradiso/" rel="tag" data-imported="1">Paradiso</a> </span> <span class="sep"> | </span> <span class="comments-link"><a title="Comment on Finding Paradise in a Cruel World" href="http://kellyreiterman.com/2012/02/08/finding-paradise-in-a-cruel-world/#comments" data-imported="1"><strong>6</strong> Replies</a></span></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701962012-01-21T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:33:06-05:00KOBLENZ VIDEO<p>The video you see on my homepage was produced by Eric Temple of Highway 89 Media, out of Salt Lake City, Utah. He's done great work in the past for my friend Tom Russell and also for my wife, Gretchen Peters. The song, Koblenz, is from my new Paradiso album. I'm really happy with the way it came out. It's also up now on YouTube.</p>
<p>I'm writing this from a hotel room in Manhattan, where Gretchen and I have been holed up for a few days doing media events in preparation for the release on January 31 of her "Hello Cruel World" album, which we produced together with Doug Lancio. We are playing a gig tonight in The Village at Joe's Pub, to kick off the "Hello Cruel World Tour". Things are going be very busy for us for the next five months as we travel across North America and Europe to promote what I've called Gretchen's career record. I hope you'll make it out to see us when we get near your town. Come by and say hello after the gig...I'll keep you updated as the tour progresses.</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701952011-12-29T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:33:26-05:00HELLO CRUEL WORLD TOUR 2012<p>Gretchen Peters and I are leaving soon for the 2012 Hello Cruel World Tour. We'll be traveling all over North America and also through England, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Germany and Holland, between now and June. If we get close to your town, I hope you'll come out and see us. Below is the tour schedule as it now stands. In the meantime, have a Happy New Year!</p>
<p><strong>GRETCHEN PETERS (WITH BARRY WALSH) HELLO CRUEL WORLD TOUR 2012</strong><br>January 8th-15th<br>Delbert McClinton's Sandy Beaches Cruise, St. Bart's, St. Kitts & Nevis, The Caribbean<br><br>January 22nd<br>CD Release Show *with special guests Barry Walsh & John Lester<br>Joe's Pub, New York, NY, USA<br><br>January 27th<br>CD Release Show *with special guests Barry Walsh, Doug Lancio, David Henry & John Gardner<br>The Rutledge, Nashville, TN, USA<br><br>January 28th<br>Blue Ridge Community Theater, Blue Ridge, GA, USA<br><br>February 1st<br>Tales From The Tavern, Santa Ynez, CA, USA<br><br>February 3rd<br>Acoustic Music San Diego, San Diego, CA, USA<br><br>February 4th<br>Zoey's, Ventura, CA, USA<br><br>February 6th<br>Freight & Salvage, Berkeley, CA, USA<br><br>February 7th<br>Don Quixote's, Felton, CA, USA<br><br>February 9th<br>The Palms Playhouse, Winters, CA, USA<br><br>February 11th<br>Alberta Rose Theater, Portland, OR, USA *with Martyn Joseph<br><br>February 12th<br>Treehouse Cafe, Bainbridge Island, WA, USA<br><br>February 16th<br>Susanna's Kitchen, Wimberley, TX, USA *with Kevin Welch & Jimmy LaFave<br><br>February 17th<br>Jefferson Freedom Cafe, Fort Worth, TX, USA *with special guest John Fullbright<br><br>February 18th<br>Cactus Cafe, Austin, TX, USA *with John Fullbright & Jimmy LaFave<br><br>February 20th<br>Burning Bush Coffee House, Corpus Christi, TX, USA<br><br>February 21st<br>Dosey Doe, The Woodlands, TX, USA<br><br>February 23rd-24th<br>24th International Folk Alliance Conference, Memphis, TN, USA<br><br>March 1st<br>The Sage, Gateshead, UK<br><br>March 2nd<br>The Arc, Stockton on Tees, UK<br><br>March 3rd<br>The Met, Bury, UK<br><br>March 4th<br>The Arches, Glasgow, UK<br><br>March 5th<br>Buxton Opera House, Buxton, UK<br><br>March 7th<br>Robin 2, Bilston, UK<br><br>March 8th<br>Fibbers, York, UK<br><br>March 9th<br>Kelly's, Galway, Ireland<br><br>March 10th<br>Damer Court Hotel, Roscrea, Ireland<br><br>March 12th<br>Village Arts Centre, Kilworth, Ireland<br><br>March 13th<br>Whelan's, Dublin, Ireland<br><br>March 14th<br>Roe Valley Arts & Cultural Centre, Limavady, Northern Ireland, UK<br><br>March 15th<br>Errigle Inn, Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK<br><br>March 16th<br>Coliseum, Aberdare, UK<br><br>March 18th<br>The Assembly, Leamington Spa, UK<br><br>March 19th<br>Norwich Arts Centre, Norwich, UK<br><br>March 20th<br>Bush Hall, London, UK<br><br>March 21st<br>The Phoenix, Exeter, UK<br><br>March 23rd<br>Fabrik, Hamburg, Germany<br><br>March 24th<br>Crystal Club, Berlin, Germany<br><br>March 25th<br>Studio 672, Köln , Germany<br><br>March 27th<br>de Schalm, Westwoud, Netherlands<br><br>March 28th<br>Transvaria, Den Haag, Netherlands<br><br>March 29th<br>Paradiso, Amsterdam, Netherlands<br><br>March 30th<br>In The Woods, Lage Vuursche, Netherlands<br><br>March 31st<br>Muziekgebouw, Eindhoven, Netherlands<br><br>April 2nd<br>Komedia, Brighton, UK<br><br>April 3rd<br>The Apex, Bury St. Edmunds, UK<br><br>April 4th<br>The Stables, Milton Keynes, UK<br><br>April 5th<br>The Glee Club, Nottingham, UK<br><br>April 12th<br>Grand Valley Dale Ballroom, Columbus, OH, USA<br><br>April 13th<br>Old Town School Of Folk Music, Chicago, IL, USA<br><br>April 21st<br>Swallow Hill Music, Denver, CO, USA<br><br>April 22nd<br>Steve's Guitars, Carbondale, CO, USA<br><br>April 26th<br>Hugh's Room, Toronto, Ontario, Canada<br><br>April 27th<br>Blacksheep Inn, Wakefield, Quebec, Canada<br><br>April 28th<br>Le Petit Campus, Montreal, Quebec, Canada<br><br>May 4th<br>Eddie's Attic, Decatur, GA, USA<br><br>May 5th<br>Bowman House Concerts, Lawrenceville, GA, USA<br><br>May 8th<br>Seaside REP, Seaside, FL, USA<br><br>May 11th<br>Sandhill Stage at Prairie Creek Lodge, Gainesville, FL, USA<br><br>May 12th<br>Evening Of Story & Song, Fernandina Beach, FL, USA<br><br>May 23rd<br>Music City Roots, Nashville, TN, USA<br><br>June 15th<br>McDavid Studio at Bass Hall, Fort Worth, TX, USA</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701942011-11-30T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:33:45-05:00PARADISO REVIEWS<p>Three days after it's release, the first review of Paradiso has come in, and so far, so good. Editors Pick on CD Baby:</p>
<p>http://www.cdbaby.com/Picks/newage</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701932011-11-16T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:34:02-05:00SCARLET LETTER RECORDS PRESS RELEASE<p>Musician, producer, and recording artist Barry Walsh is releasing his follow-up to 2008’s critically acclaimed The Crossing on November 29, 2011.</p>
<p><br>In the four years since his first release, Walsh has been a busy man. In between tours with long-time musical partner and now wife Gretchen Peters, he co-produced recent albums by Peters (Northern Lights, Hello Cruel World) and singer-songwriter Tom Russell (Blood and Candle Smoke, Mesabi). He recorded with Nanci Griffith and Rodney Crowell, and now has written, produced, and engineered his own second album, Paradiso. <br>Once again using an album title as a metaphor for life changes, Paradiso implies a period of happy stability in the life and career of the artist.</p>
<p><br>Broadening the palette from his mostly solo piano first effort, Walsh enlisted help from among his wide circle of musical friends. Producer-guitarist Doug Lancio (Patty Griffin, John Hiatt) layers his vibe-filled guitars on the atmospheric “There’s Been an Incident”, which also features Peters’ Renaissance-like choral arrangement. Dobro star Rob Ickes of Blue Highway duets on “Marathon Motor Works”; and turning things upside down, it’s Peters who plays piano while Walsh plays guitar on a track they wrote together, “Seven Weeks”. Walsh’s son Brennan Walsh co-wrote and adds guitar to “Youth and Age”, and David Henry, who has mixed both of Walsh’s solo efforts, adds his cello to “Youth and Age”, as well as the Philip Glass influenced “Koblenz” and “Marathon Motor Works”.</p>
<p><br>Included in this album is a new recording of a piece that was originally used in two parts on the Gretchen Peters with Tom Russell album One to the Heart, One to the Head, the cinematic “North Platte”. <br>Continuing a tradition he began on The Crossing, Walsh again covers an obscure Erik Satie piece as the only outside material, the whimsical “Son Binocle” (“His Monocle”). The album closes with an atmospheric re-imaging of this piece.</p>
<p><br>This is an instrumental recording that sails effortlessly between genres and across the lessons and influences of a forty year career of music making. <br><br>www.barrywalshmusic.com</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701922011-11-15T18:00:00-06:002022-02-20T06:45:19-06:00PARADISO SONG BY SONG<p>Here's the song by song description of Paradiso, to be released this coming Tuesday, November 22: Paradiso to me represents an era of resolution, beauty and calm, possibly after a stormy stretch of life. The feelings in me that the music generates call to mind old world art, beauty, drama, and warmth. Some of the music that influenced me before and during the recording of Paradiso include a recent fascination with Tchaikovsky, as well as long-time influences Erik Satie, Beethoven, Bach; and film composers Craig Armstrong and Philip Glass. Like my previous project, “The Crossing”, my goal was to avoid the mine-field of cliches that solo piano music naturally calls to mind, while creating original pieces of art. A SONG BY SONG DESCRIPTION:</p>
<p>GRETCHEN’S THEME: Obviously written for my musical partner and wife, singer-songwriter Gretchen Peters. There are shades of (Scottish film composer) Craig Armstrong and Beethoven in this piece.</p>
<p>NORTH PLATTE: This piece was written, recorded and released previously in two parts on the album “One To The Heart, One To The Head”, by Gretchen Peters with Tom Russell. At the time that album was being written, Tom asked me to write an atmospheric piece to open the album. I had just watched the movie “Something about Schmidt”, starring Jack Nicholson, with a great soundtrack that included Erik Satie’s music . A large part of the film was shot on the Northern High Plains in between Minnesota and Denver. The starkness of the landscape was in my mind as I wrote this piece, and North Platte, both the town and the river, captured in two words exactly what I was seeing and hearing.</p>
<p>KOBLENZ: I wrote this piece shortly before Gretchen Peters and I left for a tour of Germany and Holland in March, 2011. I was fine tuning it during the tour, and debuted it one night at our gig in Koblenz, a lovely city on the Rhine in Northern Germany. It was received warmly, and I promised the audience I would name it after their beautiful city. David Henry’s cello adds much to this piece.</p>
<p>YOUTH AND AGE: My son Brennan came over while I was recording this album, and we wrote and recorded this piece over the course of a few days. His guitar parts added a whole new dimension to both the song and the album. Gretchen came up with the title from a William Butler Yeats poem. We all thought it was a great title for this ‘cross-generational’ musical moment.</p>
<p>PARADISO: Very much influenced by French parlor music of the last century, with a splash of Philip Glass on the intro. Like “Koblenz”, I had written most of this piece in the year before our German/Holland tour of March 2011. I finished it and started playing it during our soundchecks. The live debut came one night at the famous Paradiso venue in Amsterdam, and as happened in Koblenz, I promised the audience that I would name the piece for them. I liked the title so much I decided to use it for the album title.</p>
<p>SEVEN WEEKS: I wanted to record a piece where Gretchen played simple piano lines that I could overdub to. She came up with a nice, atmospheric melody, and I played around with electronic keyboard sounds weaving in and out of her notes. I added the guitar later on as an afterthought. Gretchen came up with this title one day while we were asking ourselves how we were going to get through some rough times. She said we’d just take it “seven weeks at a time”.</p>
<p>SON BINOCLE: As a lifelong Erik Satie fan, I was pleasantly surprised to find this short gem I hadn’t heard before in a collection of his piano works. The harmonic shifts are what attracted me to it. Since I recorded a Satie piece on my first album, I thought it would be cool to continue the tradition. JULY 20: It was July 20, 2011, and this was the last piece written for this project. I was playing the opening theme on the piano and Gretchen called to me from the other room saying, “that’s beautiful, what is it?” At the time it was just a simple idea that was crying out for further exploration. I still needed one more piece for the album, and I wanted a piece with a strong solo. This one piece alone took me three weeks to wrangle, but I think it was worth the sweat equity I put in to capture it.</p>
<p>MARATHON MOTOR WORKS: This piece was influenced partly by Philip Glass and the way his music propels itself forward. After I recorded the piano part, it reminded me of machinery in constant motion, with pistons moving up and down. There is a 100 year old abandoned auto plant near us in Nashville where they used to make the Marathon automobile back in the 1920‘s. Gretchen had taken some photos of me there for the album package, so it was fresh in my mind. I thought it needed at least one other lead instrument. Something that could soar freely over the more mechanical sounding piano part. I had been thinking about doing a piano/dobro duet for a long time. I called dobro virtuoso Rob Ickes up and he came over one morning and overdubbed a brilliant dobro part to the piano track. As a musician and a person Rob could not have been more gracious and accommodating.</p>
<p>MAVERICK RADAR: An Asian influenced melody that came to me a year before recording began. The idea kept haunting me, so in the course of a year I kept following where it led me. Once I had the gist of it done, I overdubbed accordion and guitar to fill it out.</p>
<p>THERE’S BEEN AN INCIDENT: I’ve had this title laying around for a few years. Before I created one note of music, I envisioned an ambient, atmospheric kind of thing. The kind of thing soundtracks are made of. I wanted to have a piece where I could use Gretchen’s great background vocals, and also our good friend guitarist Doug Lancio, who is great with ambient, vibey type tracks, so I wrote this piece with the two of them in mind. Doug added his guitar magic to my piano track, and then Gretchen put some otherworldly vocals on. Magic.</p>
<p>SON BINOCLE (reprise): An electronic imaging of the Erik Satie piece I discovered while writing for the album. A different way of ending this album, but I like the space and the tones. It makes me want to slowly breathe in and slowly breathe out, in and out...</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701912011-11-04T19:00:00-05:002023-12-10T10:52:22-06:00PARADISO COVER<p>The search for a cover for my new album, “Paradiso” is an interesting story. Here’s how it unfolded: My idea to use Paradiso originally came about when Gretchen Peters and I were touring Germany and Holland in March, 2011. We played one night at the famous Paradiso venue in Amsterdam for the first time, and I premiered a new, as yet untitled instrumental song at that show. After I got through it, I spontaneously told the audience that since they seemed to like the song, I would name it “Paradiso” in their honor. It seemed like a good song title, and later on I decided it would make a great album title as well. I didn’t think much more about it as the year wore on and I began recording the album. When the album was finished and I had to start thinking about artwork, I began to think about Dante, his classic “Divine Comedy” and part three of that book, “Paradiso”, which I own but have never read all the way through. Now I’ll just have to... I did a Wikipedia search on “Dante Paradiso”, and a page came up with some great images. Scrolling down the page, I was immediately smitten by an illustration from a medieval manuscript with bright colors that seemed to leap off the page. This could be my cover, I thought. When I showed it to Gretchen, she agreed right away with me. But how to use it? I had just started working on the package with a Nashville graphic designer named Karen Cronin. Between the two of us, we tracked down the image to the British Library on Euston Road in London. Karen sent a query there, explaining our desire to use the image for a CD cover. Licensing fees were quickly arranged, and a digital copy 24 inches wide of this magnificent piece of art was soon crossing the ocean at the speed of light via email to Karen, who took the image and created the cover that you see today. The image was created in the 15th century by Giovanni di Paolo di Grazia (c. 1403 – 1482). He was an Italian painter, working primarily in Siena, and was a prolific painter and illustrator of manuscripts, including Dante’s texts. The print is a miniature of Dante and Beatrice before Folco, who inveighs against the corruption of the Florentinians. Satan is seen dropping gold coins into the hands of the Clergy. I love the yin and yang of it. Right and wrong, good and evil, spiritualism vs. materialism. Dante and Beatrice heading to the heavens vis-a-vis the corruption of church leaders and public officials here on earth. This was painted over 500 years ago. Some things never change...</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701902011-10-27T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:36:27-05:00"PARADISO" RELEASED!<p>New album "Paradiso", coming November 22, 2011. There is a great back story to this cover image which I'll share in a future post. <img src="http://barrywalshmusic.com/img/thumbs/NewSplash.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="NewFolkSplash" /></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701892011-09-16T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:37:01-05:00"PARADISO" DONE<p>After 7 months of work, my new release, "Paradiso", is now finished! I'm planning on releasing it on Tuesday, November 22nd. It's been four years since the release of my first CD, "The Crossing", and I'm excited about getting this follow-up out in the world. It's mostly solo piano, but there are guest appearances by cellist <a href="http://www.truetonerecording.com/True_Tone/Home/Home.html" data-imported="1">David Henry</a>, guitarists <a href="http://www.allmusic.com/artist/doug-lancio-p96253" data-imported="1">Doug Lancio</a> and my son Brennan Walsh; and <a href="http://www.robickes.com/" data-imported="1">Rob Ickes</a> of <a href="http://www.bhighway.com/" data-imported="1">Blue Highway</a> fame on dobro. I hope you'll check back with me on November 22. It will be available on this website, as well as iTunes, CDBaby.com, and Amazon.com. In other news, the <a href="http://tomrussell.com/" data-imported="1">Tom Russell</a> CD that Tom & I co-produced, "Mesabi", is now out and doing great. It was released a few weeks ago and shot immediately to #1 on <a href="http://www.rootsmusicreport.com/" data-imported="1">RootsMusicReport.com</a>. It's currently #15 on the Billboard Folk Chart. <a href="http://www.gretchenpeters.com/" data-imported="1">Gretchen Peters</a> new album, "Hello Cruel World", which I also co-produced along with Gretchen and Doug Lancio, is coming out in late January. I think it's her best album yet, with some of her best songs ever. We had a dream team of a tracking band including <a href="http://www.willkimbrough.com/" data-imported="1">Will Kimbrough</a>, <a href="http://www.viktorkrauss.com//" data-imported="1">Viktor Krauss</a> and John Gardner; along with Gretchen, Doug and myself. <a href="http://rodneycrowell.com/" data-imported="1">Rodney Crowell</a> and <a href="http://www.kimrichey.com/" data-imported="1">Kim Richey</a> also make guest appearances. Can't wait for this release... Gretchen and I will be out touring hard in 2012 as we will both have new albums out. The schedule is getting pretty full already, highlighted by a European Tour starting on March 1 and lasting through April 8. We'll be appearing all over the UK and Ireland, as well as Germany and The Netherlands. I'll post the tour schedule as soon as the dates are firm, so check back in with me. Until then, enjoy the cool Autumn air!</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701882011-06-20T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:37:25-05:00GRETCHEN PETERS<p>I could not be more proud right now of my wife, Gretchen Peters. I first met her over twenty years ago when I was called to play on a song demo for her. Born just eight miles apart (and a few years) in Westchester County, NY, we felt instantly sympatico about our similar upbringing and interests. She came in the studio one morning not long after our original meeting and had a song called, "Souvenirs", later recorded by Suzy Bogguss. When I heard the first line of that song, "Set out like Kerouac...", I realized this was more than your run-of-the-mill Nashville songwriter at work. We have worked together ever since, on demo sessions, all of her great records, and live tours in the US and Europe. We lived together for many years before getting married in October, 2010. This week, my wife was nominated for induction into the Nashville Songwriters Hall Of Fame. This is the highest honor a Nashville-based songwriter can hope for. She is so deserving of this great honor. I'm going to let our friend Tamara Saviano tell you why I think this. Congratulations, Gretchen! Tamara SAVIANO June 17, 2011 For Immediate Release Gretchen Peters nominated for induction into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame Esteemed songwriter penned hits for artists including Bryan Adams, Bonnie Raitt, Faith Hill, Trisha Yearwood, George Strait, The Neville Brothers, Shania Twain, Martina McBride, and Randy Travis. Her songs have been included in dozens of motion pictures. The majority of Peters’ compositions written solo Respected Nashville songwriter Gretchen Peters has been nominated for induction into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, the highest honor bestowed by the songwriting community. Candidates are considered for induction when their first significant works achieved commercial success at least 20 years ago and who have positively impacted and been closely associated with the Nashville Music Community and deemed to be outstanding and significant. Peters’ name is on the 2011 ballot along with 14 of her colleagues. Inductees will be determined by votes cast from Hall of Fame members and professional songwriter members of the Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI), as well as the boards of the Songwriter Hall of Fame and NSAI. Of the 167 members of the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, only 12 are women. Peters has written the vast majority of her hits alone, without a co-writer, which is unusual in modern day freelance songwriting and hasn’t been done consistently since Country Music Hall of Fame songwriter Cindy Walker in the 50s and 60s. Peters arrived in Nashville in the late ‘80s, a singing, songwriting product of New York, Boulder, CO, and politically active parents. She landed a publishing deal and that began a season of striking commercial success. Her closely observed story songs hit a sweet spot with some of mainstream country’s finest voices of the ‘90s; “On A Bus to St. Cloud” with Trisha Yearwood, “You Don’t Even Know Who I Am” with Patty Loveless, “Secret of Life” with Faith Hill, “Chill of an Early Fall” with George Strait, “Let That Pony Run” with Pam Tillis and—most famously—“Independence Day” with Martina McBride. Culturally and critically the impact of “Independence Day”—an arresting song about an abused woman fighting back—still reverberates. It earned Peters a GRAMMY nomination and CMA Song of the Year honors. And there were more bold steps where those came from. Peters has always shown an uncanny ability to capture the stories of people—especially women—who feel trapped in hope-draining situations. With her 2007 Burnt Toast & Offerings, she mined her own life—the disintegration of her twenty-year marriage and risk-taking on a new love—for just such affecting vignettes, and set a new high watermark for her songwriting. https://app.e2ma.net/app/view:CampaignPublic/id:718.9462461817/rid:e7b76796a91b734dba5feb2b4fdd1414 For more information check out gretchenpeters.com</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701872011-05-17T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:38:28-05:00TOM RUSSELL - "MESABI"<p>Last year <a href="http://tomrussell.com/" data-imported="1">Tom Russell</a> asked me to co-produce his next album with him. I had played on his last three albums in Austin and Tucson and we developed a great working relationship over those last six years. We worked on this new one - called "Mesabi" - for almost a year, in a series of recording sessions that took place all across America. Starting in Tucson, AZ in August of 2010, we worked for a week at <a href="http://www.localpages.com/az/tucson/1845307419-wavelab-recording-studios.html" data-imported="1">Wavelab Studio</a> and got nearly half the songs down. We started work again in Nashville in October 2010, the week after my wedding to <a href="http://www.gretchenpeters.com" data-imported="1">Gretchen Peters</a>, who sang some beautiful background vocals on the album. We got most of the rest of the album done at that time. Here's Tom and me with Ann McCrary of the fabulous <a href="http://www.mccrarysisters.net/Aboutus.html" data-imported="1">McCrary Sisters</a>, (who sang background vocals on a song called "Heart Within A Heart"), Gretchen Peters, Regina McCrary, and the extraordinarily versatile <a href="http://WillKimbrough.com" data-imported="1">Will Kimbrough</a>: <img src="/img/Truetone4_25_11.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="TRTruetoneSessions" /> The songs on this album are some of Tom's strongest songs ever, and the group of musicians who ended up on the album is a stellar cast of some of America's finest recording musicians. Beginning last year in Tucson, we were very lucky to get the core of the band <a href="http://www.casadecalexico.com/" data-imported="1">Calexico</a>, including Joey Burns on bass and guitars, John Convertino on drums and percussion, and Jacob Valenzuela on trumpet, along with Tom on acoustic guitar and myself on keys. In Nashville the band was <a href="http://www.viktorkrauss.com/" data-imported="1">Viktor Krauss</a> on bass, Will Kimbrough on electric and acoustic guitars, John Gardner on drums; and again, Tom and myself. After the October 2010 sessions, two songs were tracked in LA with <a href="http://www.vandykeparks.com/" data-imported="1">Van Dyke Parks</a> on piano and accordion, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Glaub" data-imported="1">Bob Glaub</a> on bass, Don Heffington on drums and <a href="http://www.thadbeckman.com/" data-imported="1">Thad Beckman</a> on electric and acoustic guitars. Another song was tracked in San Antonio with <a href="http://www.augiemeyers.com/" data-imported="1">Augie Meyers</a> on piano and <a href="http://www.guzmanfox.com/bio.html" data-imported="1">Joel Guzman</a> on accordion; and finally Tom went back to his home in El Paso, where he tracked one last song with a stunning Flamenco guitar performance by guitarist <a href="http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/jacobmossman" data-imported="1">Jacob Mossman</a>. To cap it all off, <a href="http://www.lucindawilliams.com/" data-imported="1">Lucinda Williams</a> agreed to add a duet vocal to an epic and surprising eight minute cover of Bob Dylan's "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall", a song we had tracked in Tucson during those initial sessions back in 2010. We mixed the album in May in Nashville with the amazing David Henry at the controls. The release date is set for September 6, on Shout Factory records. I'm very excited about this album, and I'll put the reviews up on this site as they come in. The album was a joy for me to work on, and I consider myself lucky to have been a part of it. These songs are what Americana is really about. The vast underbelly of this great country. Shady characters, down and out former child movie stars, border chaos in Juarez and El Paso. This is not the Americana of shopping malls, chain restaurants and American Idol. This is the dark night of the American soul. Stay tuned...</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701862011-03-27T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:38:49-05:00GERMAN/DUTCH TOUR JOURNAL<p>I could not have said it any better, so I didn't even try. This is my partner Gretchen Peters' tour journal for the just completed German/Dutch Tour, Posted on Artist Data on March 28, 2011. Apart from a hellish, sleepless flight to Frankfurt in a plane full of screaming babies we arrived in Germany fairly unscathed and spent a Lost In Translation 24 hours at our hotel near the airport. We met up with our tour manager, Rebecca Kemp, the next morning and headed off to Cologne, city of the beautiful cathedral and the first show of the tour. We had a video shoot for German TV before the show; a little unnerving as we were just getting our sea legs. Our first German audience, a nice size crowd, gathered just before doors opened as we were wrapping up the video. As it turns out, the audience was not entirely German – Roy from Newcastle came over for the show, bearing 2 bottles of Newcastle Brown. Bringing beer to Germany is a little like bringing coals to Newcastle, but it is good stuff. We also met up with Thomas, who told us he drove 5 hours to the gig but we don’t know from where. Thomas, if you’re out there, thank you! After a night off in Berlin the next four days were a blur. The second show of the tour was at Berlin’s Crystal Club, where we were graced with a nice crowd and this lovely review. On to the indescribable Blues Garage (venue) & Motel California (accommodations). The audience at the Blues Garage was great, a bit larger than the night before – and the Motel California was a crazy quilt of Americana, blues, rock and western memorabilia, all lovingly curated by our host and promoter, Henry. We had a Wurlitzer organ in our room. Here’s the proof: MotelCalifornia Show #4 was in Duisburg at a cozy venue called Cafe Steinbruch. We tried out a little of our newly learned German (“Frühstück zu Hause”) on the crowd who very kindly indulged us and promptly switched back to English! Then it was on to Koblenz, and Cafe Hahn. We were greeted at soundcheck with tea & homemade cheesecake, a baby grand piano and gorgeous sound courtesy of Jörg. Along with gorgeous accommodations (a heated slate floor in the bathroom? Bathrobe and slippers? Are we on tour or at a spa?). All of this would have been enough to make us happy but an audience of 150 and two encores made Cafe Hahn the best show of the tour so far. A week into the trip we drove across the border into the Netherlands for our first of 5 Dutch shows at the famous Paradiso in Amsterdam. Our old friend John Lester, who is about to move from Amsterdam to New York City, graced us with his bass playing…. I’ve long wanted to play the Paradiso and it did not disappoint. After our Amsterdam show we flew through the remaining 4 Dutch shows in Den Haag, Bakkeveen, Lage Vuursche and Venlo. The gig in Bakkeveen was especially memorable – a beautiful venue, great crowd and a boxer dog, Pips, with whom I fell immediately and deeply in love. Our show at In The Woods in Lage Vuursche was packed with people and we were so happy to see so many familiar faces on our third visit there. Bart & crew are always so good to us and we look forward to the great company at dinner almost as much as the show. The Venlo show was at Perron55, where they have an outstanding crew who took such good care of us. We had a few more fans from far-flung places (Julian from the UK) and some friends from Twitter (hello Ruud!) who tweeted the gig as it happened. We drove back to Cologne that night for a few hours sleep before flying to Munich the next morning. It was originally scheduled as a day off but we were offered the chance to play live on BR2, Germany’s national public radio, on a show called Nachtmix, which is hosted by Karl Bruckmaier, a veritable encyclopedia of music and a lovely guy as well. With the studio lights turned down low, and a small audience of 15 or so, it was like playing a little speakeasy or a jazz club. Easy to forget the huge audience out there in Radioland. Regrettably we didn’t see much of Munich, but we’ll save it for next time. We did get to sample some local beer though – Wow! The last four German shows were a blur – some of the longest drives were at the end of the tour so much of it was spent in the van, driven by the ever-capable (and cheerful!) Rebecca. In Kassel we had a sold-out crowd (yes, sold out!) and a grand piano – two things that make us very happy. We also met up with singer-songwriter Markus Rill, another Twitter friend. The show in Erfurt the next night was a bit strange, with audience members sitting around the perimeter of the room but dead space directly in front of us. Bad Feng Shui, people! Then it was on to Dresden – a long haul but we arrived in time to wander around the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen and marvel at the post WWII restoration of Dresden’s historic buildings. The audience that night at Tante Ju was warm and very vocal, and we felt right at home but wish we could have stayed to see more of the city. We finished up the tour in Hamburg at the Downtown Bluesclub. I can’t say enough about Uwe, our host and promoter. All gigs should be like this one. We were treated so well; first a long, leisurely soundcheck, then a lovely dinner (amazing schnitzel!) with Uwe, the crew, our record label head Michael Golla, our booking agent and the TV crew who were there filming the show. The club was packed and the audience showed us the love. Afterwards, Uwe brought the champagne and we celebrated the end of a successful tour – 15 shows in 16 days. Next time (yes, there will definitely be a next time) we will build in more days off so as to see more sights and get more rest. We’re not spring chickens, you know. Much gratitude to the awesome Rebecca Kemp for keeping us between the lines and never losing her cool, to Michael Golla for an incredible job on tour promotion, and to Nigel Morton at Moneypenny Agency, Joanna Serraris at Musemix, & ASS Concert & Promotion for booking the shows. Heartfelt thanks to all the lovely people who came out to see us, in some cases showing up at the venue hours early for autographs and/or driving hundreds of kilometers to get there. We are so grateful.</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701852011-02-16T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:39:25-05:00NEW CD ON THE WAY!<p>I've started work on the follow up to "The Crossing". I've recorded about half of the-as yet untitled-new CD. Here's what it looks like so far: <a href="http://s71.photobucket.com/albums/i136/Barrywalsh/?action=view&current=Piano1-1.jpg" target="_blank" data-imported="1"><img src="http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i136/Barrywalsh/Piano1-1.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="Piano Session1" /></a> Since we are leaving soon for Germany and Holland, I won't be able to finish the album until June. I'm looking at a late August release date. I'll keep you posted!</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701842010-11-18T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:39:45-05:002011 EUROPEAN TOUR IS COMING!<p>We are slowly getting our 2011 European Tour together. We've got firm dates now for Germany and Holland. We're working on the Swedish and Irish legs that will follow those we've posted here so far. See the Tour page. See you on the road...</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701832010-10-01T19:00:00-05:002022-05-10T13:01:21-05:00JUST MARRIED.<p>Longtime partner in life and music, songwriter Gretchen Peters and I got married on October 2nd in a churchyard near our home in Nashville, TN, with our family and close friends surrounding us. We are very happy to be starting this new chapter in our lives. It was only twenty years in the making, as Gretchen and I met and started working together in 1990. Gretchen has some pics posted on her website (www.gretchenpeters.com), but I wanted to put one up on this site. This shot is of Bryan Adams (in the background) serenading us with his song "Heaven" for our first dance together as Mr. & Mrs. And we were in heaven... <a href="http://s71.photobucket.com/albums/i136/Barrywalsh/?action=view&current=WeddingDance2.jpg" target="_blank" data-imported="1"><img src="http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i136/Barrywalsh/WeddingDance2.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="Photobucket" /></a></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701822010-08-17T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:40:50-05:00BACK TO TUCSON<p>We had a great UK tour last month, with many highlights including Terry Wogan's "Weekend Wogan" show in London with his great house band; the Cambridge Folk Festival; the Trowbridge Festival; and a great gig (and great shopping) in Bristol, which is fast becoming one of our favorite UK haunts. I'm Heading to Tucson in a few days to help Tom Russell with his next CD. We're working at Wavelab with the boys from Calexico, and it's always a great time. Updates to follow...</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701812010-06-11T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:41:14-05:002010 UK TOUR REVIEW<p>Artist:Gretchen Peters & Barry Walsh Venue:The Sage Town:Gateshead Date:17/05/10 Website:www.gretchenpeters.com/ & barrywalshmusic.com Over the past fourteen plus years, Gretchen Peters has become one of the most revered artists to play in the UK, year after year. Her love affair with the UK has become apparent for all to see, and it is clear that she loves playing over here, as does partner Barry Walsh. With this in mind she wanted to bring her ever growing fan base here in the UK something unique and very special. Thus her latest tour was her first ever all request tour, encompassing all of her work. There were only two rules: fans had to write in with their request ahead of the show, and tell her their story or connection to the song, and it had to be a song she had written or performed. It promised to feature the stories behind the songs, personal anecdotes and glimpses behind the scenes of her 20 plus year career. The set list would change daily, dependent upon requests. None of it would be rehearsed beforehand and a lot would be improvised. A little mad – maybe, but if anyone could pull off such a tour, Gretchen could. Something of a risk – maybe, but I think Gretchen knows her fans here in the UK well enough to know that we’d be right there with her, however it turned out on the night. The idea alone held so much promise, it could only be an amazing experience; how amazing, we could not have predicted. It is no secret, I am sure, that The North East, and more specifically, The Sage, Gateshead, is one of Gretchen’s very favourite places to play and it was obvious from the outset that she was ecstatic to be back and to be sharing this unique experience with us. She introduced the evening by telling us if we didn’t enjoy the setlist we only had ourselves to blame; typical Gretchen humour! Above her head was a huge screen, with the image from the Circus Girl CD, with the added wordage of ‘Without a Net,’ the name of the tour. Launching into Room With a View, it was obvious we were in for some more obscure songs, alongside some faithful ‘friends.’ My request came next in the form of ‘Let That Pony Run,’ a song made famous by Pam Tillis, which she introduced by telling how I had first seen her fourteen years ago, back in a room of 40 people. How times have changed for her, but it’s been amazing watching them change! As for her performance of this stunning song, what can I say, but ‘Wow!’ It reminded me, once again, that there really is nothing like hearing the writer sing their own songs as they intended them At this point, Barry Walsh came out to join her onstage, adding brilliant piano accompaniment to a great version of Steve Earle’s I Ain’t Ever Satisfied. Firing up the screen, images were projected of her childhood, and her family. This led to one of her father and his comrades; he was an RAF pilot and the subject of ‘The Aviator’s Song.’ Preceeded by the funny story that had gone with the request for this song, Gretchen pointed out which on the picture was her father and told us a little about him. Just a couple of years ago, Gretchen ‘sent him on his way’ on that very stage, with that very song, the day after he had passed away. I found it incredibly emotive, to now be hearing that song, on that same stage, whilst looking at his picture above. Sunday Morning, Up and Down My Street,followed a set of images of their neighbourhood in Nashville, and their dog,Nigel, who is back home. Somehow talk of their English breed dog, led to talk of the recent elections; ‘What’s up with that?’ before she moved on to talk about Nashville and the recent devastating floods. Credit to her that she wanted people to see what has happened, and the damaged caused to so much of ‘the home of country music.’ (To that end, they had a top hat on the merchandise table and over the course of the tour raised over £800 to take back for the Nashville flood relief fund.) Dedicating it to her ‘hometown’ (anyone who read her recent website entry will understand), a stunning version of Revival followed, with an almost haunting image of the backstage door of The Grand Ole Opry underwater, on the screen. Even more haunting was the beautiful addition of a chorus and verse of Randy Newman’s Louisiana 1927, about the New Orleans flood, ‘...the streets of Evangeline,’ seeming an equally apt description of the city of music. The Secret of Life, of course, recorded by Faith Hill, came next, which she admitted she wrote to prove that she could write a song about men, though it didn’t quite end up what it had started out as! Starting in the wrong key, she joked, ‘Well, now you know what we mean when we say without a net!’ Showing us some old photographs of her early days in music out in Boulder, Colorado, including her ‘rock phase and kiss phase,’ she explained that this song from the ‘Circus Girl’ bonus disc was never actually meant to see the light of day. That song was the gorgeous Black Eyed Susan. Moving onto more recent works, she talked of her recent CD project with Tom Russell, "One To The Heart, One To The Head", she talked about how a cowboy project maybe wasn’t the most obvious choice for her. She then brought up some pictures which proved that she really does have an inner cowgirl, before showing us a childhood picture of Barry in cowboy attire. This of course, led to Guadalupe, during which you could have heard a pin drop. I have to agree with her that this is the best song Tom Russell has ever written, and as for interpretation of it, well, it could have been written for or by her. Next came the song which first brought her name into the spotlight, really; Independence Day, of course made a hit by Martina McBride. Gretchen’s delivery is slightly different, but equally passionate. A Wine, Women and Song flashback ensued (for anyone who doesn’t know, this is the name used when Gretchen plays with Suzy Bogguss and Matraca Berg – not to be missed!) and she mentioned that Suzy would be touring here soon, ash cloud not withstanding! Speaking of Suzy, she then explained that the next song, Waiting For The Light to Turn Green, was written with Suzy when their ‘clocks’ were talking to them; having hit 30 this year, this song has taken on a whole new meaning for me, and I am sure I am not alone! Something they have realized on this tour, it seems, is that some songs have never been played live and they have no idea why that is the case, it is no longer the case for Summer People, which got its first live outing at The Sage. Halfway through we were all laughing with her as she sang, ‘...and I can’t remember the words...’ Following some good humoured jokes about whether we were in Gateshead or Newcastle, it was Barry’s turn to wow us, with an offering from his CD of piano music, The Crossing; his love song to the Northeast, "Leaving Newcastle". Quite simply, breathtaking. This theme was continued ‘as it is about here,’ with England Blues, which of course mentions the River Tyne so is very popular at The Sage! Showing us some pictures from UK tours of old, including a couple I had taken at that first local show at The Ropery, all those years ago, Gretchen moved into the song most loved by radio 2’s Terry Wogan and Bob Harris, ‘the song which started it all’ in terms of radio play; When You Are Old. On the subject of radio play, she then thanked local Radio presenter, Brian Clough, who was in the audience and has long supported Gretchen’s work. Another song which hadn’t been played in a while was "Like Water Into Wine", recorded by Patty Loveless, although, as Gretchen reminded us, she omitted the third verse, finding it too controversial. Gretchen, however, sang it in all its glory, ‘the un-expedited version’ as she put it, and it was all the better for it. Moving back to Barry for a while, Gretchen told us of the huge list of people with whom he has worked, from Waylon Jennings to The Boxtops. As a tribute to the latter’s Alex Chilton, who passed away recently, they had, following someone’s ‘brilliant idea,’ reworked a beautiful version of "The Letter". Barry himself said later that he had never heard a woman sing it, but Gretchen really made it her own. Alex Chilton would be proud. Talking about the whole concept of undertaking such a daredevil feat as ‘Without a Net,’ she said it seemed time to play the most requested song of the whole tour ; "Circus Girl". It seemed fitting this should be so, since this was the name of the whole project. Gretchen also spoke about how this song was originally written after taking her daughter to the circus, but over the years it has felt increasingly that it is about her life on the road. Next came "On A Bus To St Cloud", which is always especially poignant as Gretchen has always felt this song took on a life of its own here, after she was disappointed by its reception in the USA following Trisha Yearwood’s fabulous version. This song, without a doubt, is one of Gretchen’s most beautiful pieces of writing and there was an almost reverent silence around Hall 2, as everyone listened, obviously moved by the lyrics. Showing pictures of places they have visited, from Paris, to Route 66, and talking of how, even though they miss Nigel and home, she confided that she knows how blessed she is in this life to get to see these places. Firing up a final image, she told us that despite it all, that is her favourite place in the world. The picture? Her back to us, looking out from the stage. In that moment, I was never in less doubt as to her reasons for coming back time and time again; simply, she loves what she does as much as we love what she does. Thanking us, clearly from a very deep place, she and Barry launched into "To Say Goodbye"; absolutely fitting as not one of us in that room was ready to do just that. Not yet, despite the duo leaving the stage to rapturous applause. Returning to the stage, Gretchen told us that despite it being a joy to look back and rework old songs, she could not be in this place without looking forward just a little; thus we were treated to a stunning new song; "Woman on the Wheel". Certainly a good omen for the next CD. The final flourish of the evening came in a totally rocking version of "Over Africa", which is somewhat ironic as that was my request way back at that first gig of Gretchen’s 14 years ago. All too soon, the night was over, and I don’t know who was more disappointed; us in the audience, or them onstage. Gretchen thanked us once again, and left the stage to a thoroughly deserved standing ovation. Somehow, she just gets better and better and I suspect this is just the beginning of something, though what I have no idea. I was reminded during the course of the evening, of something a lady said to me on a Greyhound bus in North Carolina; that during our lifetime, as we cross paths with people, whether we meet again or not, we become a part of each others stories and therefore a part of each others lives. Whilst Gretchen’s music has long been a part of many people’s lives, without a doubt, in Hall 2, Gretchen and her audience became a part of each others stories in a very special way. Suffice to say that it was a magical night and we all have taken away some very special memories of having spent an evening in a ‘room with a view’ of musicianship at its finest. I know there is already talk of Gretchen and Barry and of Wine Women and Song returning, but for now all I can say is a huge thank you to Gretchen and Barry and wish them safe travels and a speedy return. The Sage and your audience are ready when you are... Helen Mitchell</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701802010-05-08T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:41:35-05:00"WITHOUT A NET" TOUR WALK-IN MUSIC<p>Gretchen and I are leaving tomorrow for London, and the start of our next UK tour; the all request, "WITHOUT A NET UK Tour 2010". We've had to go back and relearn a lot of songs that have been requested in the last few months that we haven't been playing lately. We changed some arrangements to mix things up a bit, and in the process re-claimed some of the older songs that needed updating. We put together the walk-in music for the tour this morning. It's one of our favorite things about touring. We get to showcase some things we've been listening to lately, as well as some old favorites. This list is a little different. If you'll notice, there's a lot a songs about rain. We put them on the list to honor the victims of the biggest flood in our town's history. Many people were affected by this flood, and some of our town's landmarks sustained serious damage. There's also a Big Star song on the list, "The Ballad of El Goodo"; in memory of our friend and my Box Tops bandmate Alex Chilton, who passed away much too young on St. Patrick's Day this year, and who is the writer and singer of this beautiful song. So here's the list, and the tour dates are below it. Hope you can make it out to see us. It's always the highlight of our year. GRETCHEN PETERS “Without A Net” UK Tour 2010 Walk-in Music: John Boy - Brad Mehldau Rainy Night In Georgia - Hem Early Morning Rain - Eva Cassidy Im On A Roll - Over The Rhine Oh Cumberland - Matraca Berg Without Jesus Here With Me - Holly Williams The Ballad Of El Goodo - Big Star Buckets Of Rain - Neko Case Every Time It Rains - Randy Newman Box Of Rain - Grateful Dead Why Does It Always Rain On Me? - Travis Dreamville - Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers We’re Gonna Pull Through - Over The Rhine Still Learning How To Fly - Rodney Crowell Birds - Holly Williams Let Him Fly - Patty Griffin “WITHOUT A NET” TOUR 2010 May 12: Bilston, (Midlands): Robin 2 May 14: Glasgow, (Scotland): King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut May 15: Cheadle Hulme (Northwest): Chads Theatre May 16: Selby (Northeast): Town Hall May 17: Gateshead (Newcastle Tyneside): The Sage May 19: London (Notting Hill): The Tabernacle May 22: Milton Keynes (Wavendon): The Stables May 23: Bristol (Southeast): The Tunnels May 25: Cambridge: The Junction May 26: East Grinstead: Chequer Mead May 27: Derby (Midlands): The Flowerpot</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701792010-05-07T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:41:56-05:00THE GREAT NASHVILLE FLOOD OF 2010<p>I wanted to post a news item about our recent flood here in Nashville, but when I read Gretchen Peters blog on it I realized that she had written exactly what I wanted to write about it. So here is her blog on the great flood of 2010, and on the city that I moved to in 1969. Like Gretchen, I was born in Westchester County, New York. I moved to Nashville when I was 16 years old, and this town has now become my home. Barry My Home Town I've always struggled with the question "where are you from?". For as long as I can remember I've never felt I had a home town in the sense that most people do. I never felt a strong sense of rootedness in any one particular place. I was born in Westchester, New York and lived there until I was 13, and I still feel in some ways like a Northeasterner, if not a New Yorker. I have family ties there, and probably the most important tie, childhood memories. Last weekend, my adopted home of 22 years, Nashville, Tennessee, endured a flood of biblical proportions. Fifteen inches of rain fell in two days. At first we made light of the situation; we even went to a party in the midst of the torrential storm that raged that Saturday night. We kept an eye on the weather report, but flash flood warnings around here are as common as biscuits and gravy. The rain kept falling on Sunday, in sheets. The word started to trickle out that the flooding would be bad. Still, we thought that would only mean a few flooded basements, maybe a couple of road closures. We'd seen it all before. Except we hadn't. There's no way to describe the surreality of waking up on a Monday morning to a perfect, blue-sky spring day, and utter devastation. Water was everywhere. We took a walk in our neighborhood, and saw crazy, impossible things - traffic lights hanging just a few feet above water, entire cars submerged to their roofs. Rivers where our neighborhood streets used to be. People boating across soccer fields. By Monday morning we knew that the river was still rising, and according to the cruel physics of flooding, would continue to rise until late that night, when it crested at 12 feet above flood stage. As the waters ravaged the downtown area, Opryland, and countless outlying suburbs and surrounding towns, we realized that almost no one from the outside world knew. And it did feel like the world was somewhere far outside of this sphere of death and destruction - there was a strange sense of isolation, even though cell phones were working (sporadically) and a few of the lucky ones (us included) never lost power or internet. No one seemed to have noticed that Nashville was drowning. Normally when a natural disaster happens, the media coverage is obsessive, and if you're in the vicinity the telephone calls start coming in almost immediately. On that Monday, the only calls we got were from friends in Nashville, checking to see how we made it and letting us know they were OK. Other news stories, deemed more important, took precedence, and we were left to our own devices (fortunately, the reaction from the White House was not slow and FEMA was here almost immediately - it was the media that was absent). This is where it began to dawn on me how much I love this city. I can't explain exactly why, or how, but seeing the Opry stage door, which I've been privileged to walk through several times, up to its doorknobs in water - knowing the beautiful pipe organ at the Schermerhorn Symphony Hall, which I heard played magnificently at a concert last year, was severely damaged - all of this terrible destruction bestowed an epiphany on me. This is my home town. These people, who put on their waders and work clothes and face masks and got to work Monday, because things needed doing and people needed help, are my fellow Nashvillians. All of us cried at the sight of the Opry under six feet of water. All of us felt outrage that the media wasn't paying attention to this, our worst crisis since the Civil War. All of us beamed when the local telethon, star-studded and led by Vince Gill (who else would step up to lead yet another benefit, this time maybe the most important one he's ever done) raised $1.7 million in a few hours. I've never been so proud of my city, from the micro-local level (on Monday night, at least half of my neighborhood was out sandbagging at a nearby waste treatment plant) to city-wide (there was virtually no looting or other opportunistic crime - just neighbors, asking what they could do). I felt a sudden and deep stab of love for this city and all its familiar and now endangered landmarks, the beautiful ones, the historic ones and the cheesy ones alike. This city, which has by turns frustrated and charmed and ignored and loved me - just like a spouse - for better or worse, was mine, too. I have history here. I have roots here. Nashville will recover. It's a great city, and great cities draw creative, talented and energetic people. We have those in abundance, and they will rebuild Nashville, and in some ways it will be even better. Nashville would recover with or without me. But I'm here, and one week after the flood, I know the answer to the question. I'm from Nashville. Gretchen Peters</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701782010-03-16T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:42:28-05:00ALEX CHILTON<p>The news of Alex Chilton's death has hit us hard. It was 9 years ago, on a cold January morning in 2001, when I first got a call to play a string of dates in Canada with The Box Tops. I met Alex that morning at the airport in Minneapolis, where we all met for the connecting flight to Winnipeg. I learned the Box Tops songs that day on the airplanes, writing out charts while listening to a Walkman. Through the last nine years, I came to expect the unexpected whenever I was around Alex. One day he would bring up Graham Greene, another day it might be politics or food or classical music. Erudite and very liberal with a quick mind, he carried himself through this world floating on his own cynical nonchalance. He was never one to shy away from an opinion. And I always valued his opinions.The son of a Memphis judge who also played jazz piano, Alex was a self-educated man his whole life after quitting school to go on the road with The Box Tops at age 16. I once caught him playing Bach on my piano while we were screwing around during a soundcheck. He had memorized some pieces and was slowly working them out. A few months later I heard him playing a different Bach piece on a guitar in a dressing room. I started looking at Bach with a new appreciation. Nine years later, I credit Alex for, among many other things, leading me back to J.S.Bach. Here's one of my favorite pictures of Alex. He's in mid-flight, onstage in Cleveland, Ohio at the Beechland Ballroom in March, 2007. The picture was shot by my then 20 year old son Brennan. RIP and godspeed, Alex. You were one of the good guys. <img src="//d10j3mvrs1suex.cloudfront.net/u/392755/8507c5aa01d13de3a32fa273b4194326dc0b7e21/original/alexchilton-resized.jpg/!!/b%3AW10%3D.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="Alex Cleveland_resized" /></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701772009-11-21T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:45:23-05:0026 DAYS ON THE ROAD!<p>11.22.09. Bush Hall, London:</p>
<p>Gretchen and I are looking back at the last month in wonder. From Boston on 10.24.09 to London tonight on the anniversary of the death of JFK, 11.22.09. We've managed to survive flight changes, driving ourselves around for 2 weeks in Northern Ireland (on the wrong side of the road), torrential rains in both England and Holland, great meals and bad meals along the way, great hotels and some not-so-great hotels along the same way, and most importantly, great audiences throughout. In fact, we've done 23 shows in 4 countries in less than a month. One stretch was 14 days in a row through 3 countries. We played to sold-out houses in almost every venue, and through it all, we managed to stay healthy! No swine flu for us. We might have dragged ourselves through a few days, but when it came time to perform, we always found energy from all the great houses we played to. Here's Gretchen at the London/Bush Hall soundcheck: <a href="http://s71.photobucket.com/albums/i136/Barrywalsh/?action=view&current=GPBushHall.jpg" target="_blank" data-imported="1"><img src="http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i136/Barrywalsh/GPBushHall.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="Photobucket" /></a></p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701752009-10-28T19:00:00-05:002022-08-14T09:17:11-05:00ROOTS ON THE RAILS<p>I'm in Albuquerque on the way home after an amazing week in the Southern Rockies, riding the narrow gauge railroads of Colorado and New Mexico. Tom Russell, Gretchen Peters, Wylie Gustavson, Sourdough Slim, Paul Zarzyski and I spent the last week entertaining the 60 or so music lovers on the trip. We started here in Albuquerque at the historic El Rey theater last Friday night, then drove up to Durango and the (also historic) Strater Hotel and Theater. The next night we were in Silverton, Colorado at about 9,500 ft. We took the Durango and Silverton railroad back to Durango the next day. We drove on to Pagosa Springs, where we spent the next two days. The last gog day for us was spent in Chama, New Mexico. We got there early on Wednesday and boarded the Cumbres & Toltec narrow gauge train (the "longest and highest narrow gauge railroad in the world") and rode up to Cumbres Pass, where we were met by a van that took us back to Chama. The views were incredible! More on this later as I have to get on the plane...</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701762009-10-03T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:46:09-05:00TRAINS, PLANES, AND BLUEBIRDS<p>The Train trip (Roots On the Narrow Gauge Rail) was a resounding success. Everyone had a great time, and the artists on the trip (Gretchen Peters and myself, Tom Russell and Thad Beckman, Wylie Gustafson, Paul Zarzyski and Sourdough Slim) all had a great time. We performed in Albuquerque, Durango, Silverton, Pagosa Springs and Chama, New Mexico. We rode the train from Silverton to Durango, and also from Chama to Cumbres Pass. What a trip...Made a lot of great new friends. We Came back to Nashville and played the Bluebird last night. Here's a review Janis Ian just emailed me: "Well, the fantastic foursome (Janis Ian, Gretchen Peters, Tony Arata and Craig Carothers) blew the room away...again...and those who were there can see why these musicians sell out the venue in less than 30 minutes when they appear there. The intimate setting of the Bluebird Cafe (21 tables and some seats at the bar) is the perfect place to see singer/songwriters tell their anedotes regarding their songs, listen intently to their interpretations and meet the players afterwards. Janis looked and sounded great, as usual. Gretchen's voice was in top form, as was her guitar playing. Tony's bluesy romps kept the place jazzed and Craig's tongue-in-cheek lyrics added the humor. As a side note, accordianist Barry Walsh accompanied on some songs, even on "At Seventeen", which gave the song an international feel -- and it worked. Each singer gave the crowd seven songs, more than worth the $15 cover charge...and watching them play since you are so close to the "round arena" allows you to see just how magnificently these musicians crank out their songs. And they provide accompaniment and background vocals on each other's songs too. In essence, you saw a solo concert and a group performance at the same time. What more could you ask for?" Here's a pic: <a href="http://s71.photobucket.com/albums/i136/Barrywalsh/?action=view&current=Bluebird.jpg" target="_blank" data-imported="1"><img src="http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i136/Barrywalsh/Bluebird.jpg" class="size_orig justify_inline border_" alt="Bluebird, 10.3.09" /></a> See you in DC this weekend, Illinois next weekend, Boston the weekend after that, or somewhere in Europe after that, where we'll be for a month starting on October 28 in Cookstown, Northern Ireland. We travel throughout Northern Ireland, play for a week in England, another 10 days in The Netherlands, and then one last gig in London at Bush Hall on November 22. See you there!</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701672009-06-26T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:46:34-05:00NEWS FLASH!<p>"The Crossing" nominated for 2009 Album of the Year. "The Crossing" has been nominated for Whisperings Solo Piano 2009 album of the Year. See: http://www.solopianoradio.com/favorites.htm The Solo Piano channel is also featuring six of the tracks from the album at: http://www.solopianoradio.com/</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701682009-05-22T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:47:02-05:00NEW RELEASES IN 2009.<p>I'm privileged to have worked on a whole raft of CD's that either have come out recently, or will come out soon. Some of these include: <a href="http://gretchenpeters.com/" data-imported="1">Gretchen Peters</a> with <a href="http://tomrussell.com/" data-imported="1">Tom Russell</a>, "One To The Heart, One To The Head", produced by Gretchen and Tom, and recorded last summer in Austin at Mark Hallman's <a href="http://www.congresshouse.com/" data-imported="1">Congress House Studio</a> (with additional recording in Nashville at Nigel's House Studio). Released early this year. Gretchen's voice has never sounded better on this collection of Western themed covers that begins with my own "North Platte". <a href="http://nancigriffith.com/" data-imported="1">Nanci Griffith's</a> "The Loving Kind", to be released on June 9. Recorded in early December, we started recording the morning after I got back from Holland. Great songs, great sounds, and Nanci singing at her finest. I've been a fan since of hers since the 80's. Tom Russell's soon to be released "Blood and Candle Smoke". Wow. This one is going to be a classic. We recorded it in February at the famous <a href="http://www.myspace.com/wavelabstudio" data-imported="1">Wavelab Studios</a> in Tucson (Neko Case, Calexico, Giant Sand....) with an additional song called "Guadaloupe" (maybe Tom's best song) that I produced here in Nashville at David Henry's <a href="http://www.truetonerecording.com/True_Tone/Home/Home.html" data-imported="1">True Tone Studio</a>. It's one of the most unusual recordings I've ever had the pleasure of working on. Very creative stuff all the way around- songs, sounds, instruments, vocals and most importantly, approach. Can't wait for this one to get out there. <a href="http://www.zobl.com/" data-imported="1">Dave Zobl's</a> fine new CD called "And So It Goes", produced by Will Kimbrough. Dave is a Denver based singer-songwriter. I played accordion on it, and a rockin' good time was had by all. <a href="http://www.torisparks.com/" data-imported="1">Tori Sparks</a> third CD, "The Scorpion in the Story", produced by David Henry at True Tone. I think it's Tori's best album yet, and I loved working with her. Stay tuned for more...</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701692009-04-08T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:47:24-05:00ONE TO THE HEART, ONE TO THE HEAD REVIEWS<p>ONE TO THE HEART, ONE TO THE HEAD REVIEWS Here's four early reviews of the new Gretchen Peters with Tom Russell CD "One To The Heart, One To The Head", currently climbing the Americana charts. It includes my song, "North Platte". From the El Paso Times: http://elpasotimes.typepad.com/pullen/2009/04/gretchen-peters-eps-tom-russell-evoke-old-new-west-on-new-cd.html From Americana UK: http://www.americana-uk.com/auk/modules.php?op=modload&name=Reviews&file=index&req=showcontent&id=4479 From Pop Matters: http://www.popmatters.com/pm/review/71632-gretchen-peters-with-tom-russell-one-to-the-heart-one-to-the-head/ And finally this one from TwangNation: http://www.twangnation.com/2009/04/03/album-review-gretchen-peters-with-tom-russell-one-to-the-heart-one-to-the-head-scarlet-letter-recordsbuddy-and-julie-miller-written-in-chalk-new-west/ Enjoy every sandwich! bw</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701702008-12-26T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:47:46-05:00HIGHLIGHTS OF 2008:<p>Starting the year out in San Diego on Jan 1 by visiting with journalist Kenny Weisberg and going to the San Diego Zoo after playing New Years Eve with the Box Tops. Getting lost after leaving a gig in Sautee Nacoochee, GA, in mid-January and winding up in North Carolina-knowing we had to leave for the UK the very next day. Wandering The Lanes in Brighton, UK at the end of January, in what would turn out to be the first of two trips to the coast of the English Channel in one year and five trips to Europe in 13 months. Hearing Gretchen sing "On A Bus To St. Cloud" in St. Cloud, Minnesota for the very first time in April. Not a dry eye in the room-onstage or off. Recording "One to the Heart" in Austin in May at Mark Hallman's studio with Tom Russell, and getting to play a beautiful old upright-perfect for this project about the West-and an antique pump organ tuned down a half-step. Whenever I played it the tracks had to be slowed down to be in tune with the pump organ Recording Mickey Clark's record in June with legendary producer Jim Rooney, to be released in March, '09. Mickey swapped vocals on one soon-to-be barroom classic- "Don't Piss On My Boots (and Tell Me It's Rainin')" with John Prine, Jerry Jeff Walker and Kinky Friedman. Needless to say, a good time was had by all. Driving across Switzerland on the way to Tom and Nadine Russell's wedding in Gstaad, listening to the Sound Of Music. And yes, the hills really were alive.... Singing "Love Me Tender" along with a roomful of people led by a French accordion player in a restaurant in a small town nestled in the Alps, the night of Tom and Nadine Russell's wedding rehearsal dinner. Stumbling on the National Yodeling Festival of Switzerland while staying overnight in Lucerne on the way back to Zurich. Recording the Christmas album at home in April.... And May..... And June......... Playing the Wolfeboro, New Hampshire Folk Festival in a tent next to Lake Winnipesaukee while the sun was setting on a cool night in late July. Playing the Gosport, UK Festival in a tent five days later on the banks of the Solent, looking out at the Isle of Wight. Our second time this year to see the English Channel, and what would be one of five trips to Europe in 13 months. Touring the Napa/Sonoma wineries in mid-September while playing dates in Northern California. No earthquakes or wildfires this time but some damn fine wine.... Seeing Gretchen's name in lights on the marquee in front of the Crystal Bay Casino, on the north shore of Lake Tahoe; right next to the famed Cal-Neva lodge where Frank, Dean and Sammy hung out with Ava in the Rat Pack days. Playing at the Bowman House Concert series in a beautiful barn outside of Atlanta in mid-October, with strands of white lights in the roof beams; and falling leaves and acorns tapping on the tin roof during the quiet last verse of "On A Bus To St. Cloud". The election of Barack Hussein Obama. All the rest of this blog is filler. Gretchen and I both worked on his campaign, along with hundreds of thousands of other people. We were all part of an historic event the likes of which we have never seen. Ending the touring year in Amsterdam on December 8, in a beautiful city made even more striking when it's lit up with beautiful lights for the Holidays. We stayed (and performed) with old friend and songwriter/bassist John Lester, and his beautiful family. We had SRO audiences on all three gigs in Holland. Starting Nanci Griffith's new album (the working title is "The Loving Kind") the morning after getting in from our return from Amsterdam. I had no time for jet lag as I worked on the record for the next three days. I did take a few 10 minute power naps slumped over the piano but I don't think anyone got hurt. Performing the entire Christmas album live on radio Lightning 100 in Nashville on December 21st, with a band composed of myself, Doug Lancio, Dave Francis, and our Highway 101 buddy Cactus Moser. What a year! Peace and Love to all for 2009</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701712008-12-18T18:00:00-06:002014-07-01T11:48:02-05:00BEST OF 2008<p>In Kerry Dexter's Best of 2008 column that came out today, THE CROSSING made the list. Also making the list is Gretchen Peter's NORTHERN LIGHTS, which Barry Walsh co-produced. NORTHERN LIGHTS is a Holiday/Winter/Christmas album, light on the Christmas songs but heavy on the Winter/Snowy/Introspective songs. Check it out at: http://musicroad.blogspot.com/2008/12/best-music-2008.html</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701722008-09-30T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:49:06-05:00BARRY & GRETCHEN IN FT. WORTH, FRIDAY, 10/3, Friday, 10/3<p>Amazing week at Bass Hall, McDavid Studio 2:35 PM Wed, Oct 01, 2008</p>
<p>Michael Granberry, Dallas Morning News:</p>
<p>For lovers of acoustic music, this promises to be quite a week in Fort Worth. It all gets started Wednesday night, when a trio of virtuoso guitarists (Tommy Emmanuel, Monte Montgomery and Rhett Butler) team up for a show at Bass Performance Hall at 7:30. It carries with it a special $10 ticket offer for students and faculty. But like a fine wine, the week only gets better with age. The Sarah Palin-Joe Biden debate notwithstanding, John Gorka comes to McDavid Studio (across the street from Bass Hall) for one of his one-of-a-kind shows at 7 p.m. Thursday. And then, one of my personal favorites, the great Gretchen Peters, finishes off the week with a show in McDavid Studio at 8 p.m. Friday. Gretchen will be backed up, as usual, by one of the world's greatest piano players, Barry Walsh. For more information, call 817-212-4280 or visit www.basshall.com. http://musicblog.guidelive.com/archives/2008/10/amazing-week-at-bass-hall-mcda.html</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701742008-09-15T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:49:24-05:00WILD HORSES CLIP<p>Here's a youtube clip of Gretchen Peters, Janis Ian and myself doing Wild Horses in Winters, CA on 9/12/08 at The Palms Playhouse- a great venue.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT3n0LbBmiU</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701732008-09-15T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:49:40-05:00EXETER CATHEDRAL<p>My good friends, The Amber Rose Guitar Duo (Martin Nockalls and Steve Merrett), from Doncaster, UK, have released their tastful version of my song "Exeter Cathedral" on their new CD, Acoustic Axis. It is an eclectic mix of instrumentals, old and new, but great listening throughout. It's available in hard copy from: www.amberroseguitarmusic.co.uk and also downloadable from iTunes and other online stores. Hear Exeter Cathedral on their myspace site at: http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=152894195</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701652008-09-04T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:53:44-05:00"THE CROSSING": Review<p>Barry Walsh has been making music professionally for more than thirty years. Most of that has been spent in Nashville recording studios. In recent years he has been touring in support of singer and songwriter Gretchen Peters, and with Alex Chilton and the Box Tops. His past history includes backing up Roy Orbison and Jimmy Webb, and writing songs that Waylon Jennings and The Amazing Rhythm Aces, among others, have recorded. Thanks in part to encouragement from Peters, Walsh has now gotten around to recording his first solo album, and it has something none of those credits noted above would likely prepare you for. Original, mostly just Walsh and his piano, it is music that draws on both Bach and folk, and remains true to the voice of this artist. Without the first word being said, Walsh speaks clearly and movingly of connection, discovery, love's questions and love's certainties, and the varied landscapes of thought and emotion. David Henry adds masterful cello on several tracks, including the opening title cut, and Mark Selby brings in guitar on Nigel's Blues. The only cover is a twice imagined take on Erik Satie's Je Te Vieux, a piece which Walsh presents as at once somber and seeing the possibility of joy. It fits in perfectly with the rest of the collection.</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701642008-09-04T19:00:00-05:002022-05-29T09:11:52-05:00Review of "THE CROSSING": Dallas Morning News<p>Barry Walsh The Crossing (Scarlett Letter Records, 2008) Terrific sidemen are the unsung heroes of the music world. Barry Walsh is a piano virtuoso whose gifts at the keyboard have added so much to the music of the Box Tops and singer-songwriter Gretchen Peters, as they did in the past for Roy Orbison, Jimmy Webb and Al Green. Mr. Walsh has released a solo album of his own compositions, and it's nothing short of spellbinding. He admits being influenced by Bach, and it shows. This is not a pop album, nor is it New Age. Rather, it has elements of classical, jazz and blues, and it takes you on a mesmerizing journey. Mr. Walsh has circumvented the genre of solo piano recordings by slowing down the pace and letting the individual pieces speak for themselves. And they do, loudly and lyrically. Michael Granberry- Dallas Morning News:</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701632008-09-04T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:51:48-05:00Second Review of "THE CROSSING":<p>Artist:Barry Walsh Album:The Crossing Website:http://www.barrywalshmusic.com Barry Walsh has been a professional musician for more than three decades, and in that time he's performed with Roy Orbison, Jimmy Webb and Al Green, and he's written songs that were recorded by Waylon Jennings, Jessi Colter and the Amazing Rhythm Aces. Currently, in addition to touring extensively with singer-songwriter Gretchen Peters (over ten UK tours since 2001), Walsh plays keyboards for the recently revived Memphis rock and soul band The Box Tops, featuring Alex Chilton. The Crossing was recorded at Walsh's home on a Kimball Viennese Edition grand piano with touches of backing by cellist David Henry and guitarist Mark Selby. Walsh's Labrador Retriever Nigel lay motionless at the feet of Selby as he overdubbed on an as yet untitled song. It was duly named "Nigel's Blues" in his honor. I have to confess to being one of those people who never really 'got' music without lyrics. However, maybe as a result having been mesmerized so many times watching him play with Gretchen, I was eagerly anticipating the release of this album. On first listen, what was immediately obvious was the emotion that had gone into these beautiful pieces of music. Even before reading about the album, it is apparent that each one came from a personal place, be it experience of affinity. The latter is true of 'Je Te Veux.' Barry comments of the track, "This is an Erik Satie (the French composer) piece, and the only song I didn't write on the CD. I have been playing Satie's music for 40 years." That, therefore leads us to the rest of the album, Walsh's own compositions. The Title song, 'The Crossing,' a metaphor for the changes in two lives over a period of time, one of which was his own. Angel of Repose' was the title of one of his favorite books, by Wallace Stegner and 'Years May Go By' was inspired by a line in a Rikki Lee Jones song. The obvious love for England which has grown over his years of playing here is evidenced in the fact that two songs on the album refer to UK cities; the haunting 'Leaving Newcastle' and 'Exeter Cathedral', the melody of which remains with you long after the final piano chord is played. Barry Walsh truly is one of the most remarkable and intuitive musicians I have ever had the pleasure to watch and he has created his own piece of magic in his first CD release. I am hoping that when he tours here with Gretchen this year we may be given the opportunity to hear even just one of these tracks performed live - maybe 'Leaving Newcastle' in the city which it honours. In the meanwhile this Cd will continue to have heavy rotation on my CD player and I only hope there are more where this came from. Apparently I do 'get' music without lyrics after all.</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701622008-09-04T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:56:29-05:00Review of "THE CROSSING": FATEA.UK<p>Helen Mitchell - FATEA UK: http://www.fatea-records.co.uk/magazine/barrywalsh.html</p>
<p>World traveler and musical explorer Barry Walsh has done many things and made music with some extraordinary figures, but only now has he composed and recorded a solo instrumental album. The 11 original piano works on Walsh's new CD The Crossing are serene, airy and cyclical, but they have a gravity born of their inspiration in specific experiences. "The title is a metaphor for the changes that have happened in my life in the last three years," says Walsh. "A long-time marriage ended, and a new relationship began with a singer-songwriter I've known for many years." That would be Nashville artist Gretchen Peters, author of hits such as "Independence Day" and whose critically acclaimed recent CD Burnt Toast & Offerings investigated the birth of the new relationship with the candor and clarity of a poet. On The Crossing, Walsh offers his take on the story in the universal language of spare, elegant instrumental music, a telling that's more abstract but no less emotionally potent. The title track takes the long view on the journey he and Peters made together and toward each other with a suspenseful pulse in the high register and a breath of release and relief at the end. The delicate second cut "Leaving Newcastle" was named for a special place shared on tours in the UK. During a two-week separation, when Peters was in England and Walsh was home alone composing, he conceived the album's wistful "To See You Again." The CD closes with the Erik Satie influenced "The Steps Of The Parthenon," a reference to the Parthenon replica in Nashville, long a meeting place for local lovers. Walsh has been a professional musician for more than three decades, and in that time he's performed with Roy Orbison, Jimmy Webb and Al Green, and he's written songs that were recorded by Waylon Jennings, Jessi Colter and the Amazing Rhythm Aces. Currently, in addition to touring extensively with Peters, Walsh plays keyboards for the recently revived Memphis rock and soul band The Box Tops, featuring Alex Chilton. The decision to step forward with a solo work after so many years of supporting others allows these many influences, as well as Walsh's many travels and life epiphanies to come together in a style he can claim as his own. The Crossing was recorded at Walsh's home on a Kimball Viennese Edition grand piano with touches of backing by cellist David Henry and guitarist Mark Selby. Walsh's Labrador Retriever Nigel lay motionless at the feet of Selby as he overdubbed on an as yet untitled song. It was duly named "Nigel's Blues" in his honor. The recording breathes with expansive, roomy warmth, and the music captures the bittersweet reverberations of adults changing course.</p>Barry Walshtag:barrywalshmusic.com,2005:Post/60701662008-08-31T19:00:00-05:002014-07-01T11:54:33-05:00First Review of "THE CROSSING":<p>From Maverick Magazine (UK), May '08: Barry Walsh The Crossing( Scarlet Letter Records 207141-2) *** Barry Walsh is probably familiar to a good many Maverick readers, as for the past eighteen years he has played keyboards for Gretchen Peters and accompanied her on most of her UK tours. Now he steps into the spotlight with his solo album of deftly played piano pieces. He plays a Grand piano, and apart from Erik Satie's Je Te Veux, all the tunes have been penned by Barry and several were inspired by his tours in the UK like the delicate and reflective Leaving Newcastle and the more grandiose Exeter Cathedral. Though recorded in Nasville, this has no connection to country music, but just might be of interest to Gretchen Peters' fans. Reviewed by Alan Cackett</p>Barry Walsh