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TICKET LINK: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/879110512207?aff=oddtdtcreatorPiper & The Hard Times
2024 International Blues Challenge Band Winner
The eclectic and entertaining roots music group Piper & the Hard Times deliver intense, rhythmically dynamic music. Each member enjoys a wide array of musical genres, and they bring those diverse influences into their performances. The blues are one of the foundations that buttress their work, along with an instrumental prowess that enables them to improvise with flair, while still creating music that has a melodic appeal and can immediately connect with audiences that want both a high degree of musical competence and songs with a strong groove, familiarity and sensibility.
Piper & the Hard Times enjoy doing original music, but also are comfortable with established blues, R&B, rock and soul standards. Their shows mix contemporary and classic influences and material, and the band is known to improvise for the crowd, but never so that they become self-indulgent. That balance is maintained by the comfort levels they've established with each other through thousands of performances. And with the group's recent incarnation, there has also been a level of confidence and polish that makes their collective sound even more formidable. The core of Piper & the Hard Times is Al "Piper" Green, Steve Eagon, and Dave Colella and they have known each other since 2000. They are joined by pro-level players covering bass guitar, keyboard/organ, and horns for a big rootsy vibe.
Each principal member has an interesting and intriguing personal story to tell. Al "Piper" Green's lead vocals combine the flamboyance and earthiness of blues with the power and authority of gospel and represent the two biggest influences in his life. Growing up in a very musically inclined family in Bolivar, Tennessee, he sang in a gospel choir growing up while also hearing the best of soul, pop and rock on radio. But Green remembers perhaps his biggest influence, as well as mentor from a sensibility/style approach, was his uncle. "Every 4th of July he'd come down to visit us from Chicago and he'd be riding in this grand blue Fleetwood Cadillac,” Green recalled. "He'd be decked out and have a bunch of folks with him playing the blues. I wasn't old enough just then to really get the full impact of what I was seeing, but I knew this guy had style and flair and really represented the essence of the blues. I think that's where I got a lot of my vocal approach from, duplicating that personality and that spirit." Green contributes to the band's original songs with lyrics based on personal stories and experience.
Guitarist Steve Eagon grew up in Northern Ohio and has been playing guitar since his teen years. Unlike Green, Eagon did not grow up in a musical family but was drawn to the guitar because of its “coolness factor.” A multitude of artists have served as influences from Muddy Waters' blend of electrified Delta blues to B.B. King's more urban stylings and the dynamic, power approaches of Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page and Stevie Ray Vaughan,. As the band's principal composer, his writing style meshes multiple elements into an engaging and captivating personal group sound. That collective firepower is also indicative of the closeness shared by Eagon, Green, and drummer Dave Colella.
Dave Colella shares arranging duties on the original songs, and brings a percussive edge and energy to the group's performances. A drummer since age seven, Colella's prior associations include studies with the great jazz drummer Joe Morello, best known for his years with Dave Brubeck. Colella says that it taught him "how" to play as opposed to "what." He also saw his fair share of jazz bands, most notably one led by the master swing drummer Buddy Rich. He's been in the Nashville area since 1994, when he relocated from New Jersey with his band Timberwolf. Colella's band wasn't considered country enough for Nashville's Music Row, yet they'd been way too country for New York. He quickly began playing in other groups and with various country and rock artists before settling in with Green and Eagon to form Piper & The Hard Times. Colella's playing also reflects a widespread knowledge and love of multiple idioms, as well as a thorough knowledge of vintage and contemporary blues.
Piper & the Hard Times have been delighting audiences across the South for many years and have become one of the favorite bands on blues festival circuits. When you hear them, you're getting a lot more than just inspired covers or retooled bar band material. Instead, you're hearing poignant, inspired and "from the heart and soul" music from these talented guys who love playing and they bring that energy and vitality to the bandstand each and every night.
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
4920 Bellemeade Ave, Evansville, IN, United States, Indiana 47715
