NEWFANE — Bob Zentz and Jeanne McDougall Zentz return to Moore Free Library for a concert of folk music and “edu-tainment” on Friday, Oct. 20, at 7 p.m.
Zentz is a singer of songs about people, places, and times gone by, a teller of the tales behind the songs he sings and a scholar of the evolution of homemade music. From traditional Celtic ballads and sea shanties to science fiction songs and poetry set to music, the evening's selections will be chosen from Bob's vast repertoire of more than 2,000 songs.
He brings to every performance a variety of instruments ranging from the more common guitar and concertina to the more unusual hurdy-gurdy and his one-inch harmonica. In their shows, Bob and Jeanne weave together vocals, instruments, anecdotes, humor, humanity, and history.
Bob began performing professionally in his native Norfolk, Va., in 1962 in “The Troubadours” with James Lee Stanley. In 1966, he began a two-year stint as a sonar man in the Coast Guard, aboard the high-endurance cutter CGC Sebago. During this time, his songwriting came to the attention of Hollywood, and upon leaving the service in 1969, he was hired as a writer for The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.
But fate had other plans for Bob when the show was cancelled by CBS. After the 1971 San Fernando earthquake literally shook him out of bed, he packed up and returned home to Norfolk with the dream of creating a special place for people who loved traditional music and acoustic sounds as much as he did.
Ramblin' Conrad's Guitar Shop and Folklore Center was named for the man who embodied Bob's ideal of the singer and the song - the late William Conrad Buhler, immortalized by Bob in song as “Ramblin' Conrad.”
In late 2016, Bob announced the donation of the first phase of his folklife collection to Old Dominion University, as well as the founding, with Jeanne, of the Ramblin' Conrad Folklife Institute at Old Dominion. In February 2017 Bob became the first folk artist ever honored by a star in the Virginia Legends of Music Hall of Fame.
Bob has served as artist-in-residence for students of all ages, has appeared on Prairie Home Companion and has crewed on the late Pete Seeger's Clearwater Sloop. In 2006, his recording of his song Horizons was selected for inclusion in Songs for the Earth, a tribute to environmental author and pioneer Rachel Carson. Johnny Cash called Bob's first release, Mirrors and Changes, “one of the finest works I've heard by any artist.”
Currently, Bob divides his time between performing and teaching, traveling both within the U.S and internationally. Musicians Bob and Jeanne perform nearly every week of the year and their “informances” combine his folk music “edu-tainment” style with her focus, as a history scholar, on the understanding of music in historical context.
From schools to concert halls, festivals to fairs, museums to libraries, and everywhere in between, Bob and Jeanne are dedicated to presenting, performing, and introducing traditional music and its derivatives to those who are already fans and those unaware of its existence.