BRATTLEBORO — Strolling of the Heifers presents an evening of acoustic blues with Guy Davis on Friday, Dec. 15, at the Robert H. Gibson River Garden at 157 Main St.
The concert is a fundraising event for Strolling of the Heifers' Farm-To-Table Culinary Apprenticeship Program.
A widely-known American blues musician, Davis first appeared in Brattleboro in a memorable concert alongside the legendary Pete Seeger in 2008 (also a Stroll fundraising event). His most recent album, Sonny & Brownie's Last Train - A Look Back at Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry, has been nominated for a 2018 Grammy award in the Traditional Blues category.
“We are honored to have Guy Davis back to play in the River Garden for this fundraising concert.” said Orly Munzing, executive director of Strolling of the Heifers, in a news release. “And this will be his first U.S. concert after being nominated for a Grammy. It's going to be an exciting show!”
Davis once said, “I like antiques and old things, old places, that still have the dust of those who've gone before us lying upon them.”
Davis's musical storytelling is influenced by artists like Blind Willie McTell and Big Bill Broonzy, and his musicality by artists as diverse as Lightnin' Hopkins and Babatunde Olatunji. However, the one musician he most credits for his harmonica techniques is the legendary Sonny Terry.
His new album is an homage to Terry and McGhee, two hugely influential artists.
Davis has spent his musical life carrying his message of the blues around the world. His work as an actor, author, and music teacher mark him as a renaissance man of the blues. What music and acting have in common, he once explained, “is that I don't like people to see the hard work and the sweat that goes into what I do. I want them to hear me and be uplifted.”
When Davis plays the blues, he doesn't want audiences to notice how much art is involved.
“It takes work making a song that's simple, and playful, and easy to do,” he says. “And I don't want people to see that. I want some little eight-year-old kid in the front row to have big eyes and say, 'Hey, I want to do that!'”
Above all, he's looking to bring people together through music. “With the world falling apart it's up to all of us to be ambassadors and to spread the music everywhere we can,” he says. “There's nowhere that I don't want to play.”