{"id":12778,"date":"2017-09-05T16:14:50","date_gmt":"2017-09-05T20:14:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/?p=12778"},"modified":"2017-09-05T16:16:44","modified_gmt":"2017-09-05T20:16:44","slug":"on-stage-duhon-decides-not-to-go-it-alone-anymore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/?p=12778","title":{"rendered":"On Stage: Duhon decides not to go it alone anymore"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Denny Dyroff,<\/strong> Staff Writer, The Times<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

The Andrew Duhon Trio<\/p><\/div>\n

For years, Andrew Duhon pursued his music career as a solo artist. He toured and recorded on his own. But, that changed recently.<\/p>\n

Duhon is a songwriter from New Orleans — a teller of stories\u00a0with insightful lyrics and a distinctive voice. He has released three albums, the latest of which (\u201cThe Moorings\u201d) was nominated for a Grammy in 2014 for \u201cBest Engineered Album.\u201d<\/p>\n

Duhon, who had a few of his songs featured on \u201cThe Ranch\u201d on Netflix this summer, is visiting the area on September 5 as part of a northeastern U.S. tour with his band the Andrew Duhon Trio \u2013 the band that played on \u201cThe Moorings.\u201d The tour will stop at the World Caf\u00e9 Live (3025 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, 215-222-1400, www.worldcafelive.com<\/a>)<\/p>\n

\u201cThis tour will be with my trio for all the dates,\u201d said Duhon, during a phone interview Friday from a stop in Cape Cod, Massachusetts.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re playing clubs for singer\/songwriter folks. It\u2019s basically \u2018An Evening with Andrew Duhon\u2019 with my trio — upright bassist Myles Weeks and drummer Maxwell Zemanovic.<\/p>\n

Duhon, whose list of influences includes Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, Van Morrison, Leonard Cohen, Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Edwin Torres, Robert Frost, Walt Whitman, Mark Twain, John Prine, and Townes Van Zandt, explained the shift from one-piece to three-piece.<\/p>\n

\u201cI needed a band to make a record four years ago,\u201d said Duhon. \u201cI was looking at the usual suspects here in New Orleans and it wasn\u2019t working out. Myles was always the guy I wanted to call.<\/p>\n

\u201cMax was a recommendation from a drummer I had worked with previously. When I heard him play, it only took a few seconds to realize it was right.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith hired guns, you want guys who can make a good record. We all got along really well. When I had tours coming up and sked them to play with me, they always said yes. We were all pumped about being out there together and honing new songs.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeginning with the first session, we all realized that we were making a record with music we all honed together. To have finally done it was an exciting thing for all of us.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo have two guys that are the best musicians I ever played with is great. It\u2019s truly encouraging to be able to tour with guys like them. It\u2019s a special situation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Weeks and Zemanovic are what you\u2019d call \u201cin demand\u201d musicians. Weeks tours and records with Steph Walker and Zemanovic is a key member of Miranda Lambert\u2019s band.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I\u2019m planning a tour, I have to book around Miranda Lambert\u2019s tour,\u201d said Duhon. \u201cBut, her tours are booked way in advance so it\u2019s not really a problem for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

If you listen to \u201cThe Moorings,\u201d it is apparent that the music has been created by an organic unit \u2013 not just session men backing a singer\/songwriter. That vibe is carrying on to the trio\u2019s next album.<\/p>\n

\u201cLyrically, I\u2019m still the songwriter,\u201d said Duhon. \u201cBut, it would be false to say that they didn\u2019t musically inform these songs. They\u2019re not just players \u2013 they\u2019re molders of the music.\u201d<\/p>\n

Video link for Andrew Duhon \u2013 https:\/\/youtu.be\/wyGaqAQBcuw<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The show at the World Caf\u00e9 Live will start at 8 p.m. Tickets are $12.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Shannon McNally<\/p><\/div>\n

When Shannon McNally made a long-awaited return to the area back in May with a show at the Ardmore Music Hall, she was touring in support of her new album \u201cBlack Irish.\u201d<\/p>\n

The only drawback was that the album was still one month away from being released. It officially dropped on June 9 on Compass Records.<\/p>\n

Now, the album is in fans\u2019 ears and McNally is returning to the area for a show on September 6 at the Sellersville Theater (24 West Temple Avenue, Sellersville, 215-257-5808,\u00a0www.st94.com<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\u201cThe album is out and the fans love it,\u201d said McNally, during a phone interview Monday morning from a stop in Long Island.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re working on a really great new video that we shot at Ground Zero \u2013 a blue club in Clarksdale, Mississippi. It\u2019s a live video featuring Cedrick Burnside on drums, Audley Freed on Guitar Eric Deaton on bass and me on guitar and vocals.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were doing a blues set at the club. It\u2019s a blues song. I had a badass blues band. And, we were playing at a great blues club. The song we did was \u201cI Went to the Well.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the second video we\u2019ve done for the album. The first was \u2018You Made Me Feel For You,\u201d a song I co-wrote with Rodney Crowell.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBlack Irish\u201d is McNally\u2019s eighth album in a career that started with her debut album \u201cJukebox Sparrows\u201d in 2001. She recorded for six record companies over the last 16 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really happy to be with Compass Records,\u201d said McNally. \u201cThey\u2019re right on Music Row in Nashville and the last of the privately-owned independent labels. They do a lot of Americana so I was happy when they came on board.<\/p>\n

\u201cI definitely think my music is Americana \u2013 or you could call it American roots music \u2013 blues, soul, country and some that\u2019s more like pop music.<\/p>\n

\u201cBasically, what I\u2019m doing is Americana blues. Because it\u2019s song-based, it\u2019s expandable. Singer-songwriter, Americana, blues, country \u2013 it\u2019s just a name. It\u2019s song-based music. It\u2019s just the song.<\/p>\n

\u201cI recorded \u2018Black Irish\u2019 in Nashville in 2016 with Rodney Crowell as my producer. We recorded some of it at his studio and some at other studios in Nashville, including Sound Emporium. We had about a half-dozen recording sessions.<\/p>\n

\u201cRodney found me some years ago and we\u2019ve been friends ever since. This is his first time to produce me but I sang on his record \u2018Famous Last Words of a Fool.\u2019 (from his \u201cTarpaper Sky\u201d album in 2014).\u201d<\/p>\n

The lead track on the McNally\u2019s new album \u2013 \u201cYou Made Me Feel For You\u201d \u2014 was co-written Crowell, and serves as a metaphor for their collaboration.<\/p>\n

According to Crowell, \u201cI first heard of Shannon McNally through John Leventhal, who described her vocal skills as having just the right amount of girlish smoke. At the time, I was looking for just the right singer to make a cameo appearance on a song I was recording called \u2018Famous Last Words of a Fool.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cTrusting John\u2019s appraisal \u2014 from his description I imagined something of a cross between Joan Jett and Lauren Bacall \u2014 I set about tracking the mystery singer down.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I eventually discovered in the small town of Holly Springs, Mississippi was this dark-eyed beauty who wrote grownup songs, played a pretty mean Fender Stratocaster and, at times, sounded a lot Jesse Mae Hemphill.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom our first meeting, I couldn\u2019t shake the feeling that I was the right man for the job of shepherding the next Shannon McNally record into existence. Now that the record is made, I hope music lovers around the world will come to know what I and many others already know \u2014 this girl belongs in the Americana Music spotlight.\u201d<\/p>\n

The album concept began in 2013 when McNally was going through what she calls \u201ca miserable divorce,\u201d raising her daughter Maeve, and nursing her terminally ill mother Maureen. Her parents had relocated to Holly Springs, Mississippi, and McNally moved in, caring for her mom until her death in 2015.<\/p>\n

\u201cWorking with Rodney was pretty inspiring,\u201d said McNally, who spent time in this area years ago getting a degree from the College of Anthropology at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to write songs that he thought were good. My songs for the album were building up and Rodney wrote a few.\u201d<\/p>\n

McNally co-wrote three of the album\u2019s 12 songs \u2014 one with Crowell, who also penned two more for her. The rest include her personal favorites by Stevie Wonder (\u201cI Ain\u2019t Gonna Stand For It\u201d), Robbie Robertson (\u201cIt Makes No Difference\u201d), and J.J. Cale (\u201cLow Rider\u201d).<\/p>\n

Today, McNally makes her home in the Mississippi hill country which she calls \u201cthe most Southern place on earth.,\u201d Her musical journey began in New York, where she was born on St. Patrick\u2019s Day and raised in Hempstead, Long Island. Growing up in the age of \u201880s MTV-pop, she found an escape route.<\/p>\n

McNally became a performing singer\/songwriter\/guitarist in college and eventually signed with Capitol Records. After some time in Los Angeles, she moved to New Orleans soaking up that city\u2019s music. Later, she moved to North Mississippi.<\/p>\n

\u201cI live in Oxford, Mississippi,\u201d said McNally. \u201cHurricane Katrina picked Oxford for me \u2013 and I\u2019m happy here.<\/p>\n

\u201cMississippi, Memphis and New Orleans are places that never really leave you. There\u2019s a depth. Bringing all those experiences with you \u2013 essentially all the places and things along with big life moments that form you.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese places are real great, greasy, soulful, historically-challenges places. They light a fire \u2013 and they bring the honesty. They all were a part of my new album which I guess you could say is the bluesiest album I\u2019ve ever made.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m pretty much playing the whole record in my shows now. My live set now is half songs from \u2018Black Irish\u2019 and half older songs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Video link for Shannon McNally \u2013 https:\/\/youtu.be\/iwVDwO2N644<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The show at Sellersville, which has Caroline Reese as the opener, will start at 8 p.m. Tickets are $19.50 and $29.50.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Denny Dyroff, Staff Writer, The Times For years, Andrew Duhon pursued his music career as a solo artist. He toured and recorded on his own. But, that changed recently. Duhon is a songwriter from New Orleans — a teller of stories\u00a0with insightful lyrics and a distinctive voice. He has released three albums, the latest […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12780,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4357],"tags":[6102,3162,5646,6159],"class_list":["post-12778","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-d-arts-entertainment","tag-feature","tag-featured","tag-shannon-mcnally","tag-the-andrew-duhon-trio"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12778","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12778"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12778\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12779,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12778\/revisions\/12779"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/downingtowntimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}