Oct. 5, 2006
Hi,
As a radio host here in Montana, and fan of Folk Alley, I wondered if you had suggestions of how to best circulate the news of our folk music concert series. I have noticed that folsk drive many miles to get to a show IF they got to know about it. And Folk Alley and other online places to listen makes me think of asking you. If you can use any part of this in your Comments section, I paste it below. And if you have any other email addresses or websites that you think might be effective, please send them along to me. Thanks a lot, for this, and for all the great music you play - I have been spreading the word about Folk Alley on my show, as there are lots of people who want more than on a weekly show. Best, Rik James, Bozeman, MT (d28rik@msn.com)
PRESS RELEASE - effective immediately until Nov. 2, 2006
BILL STAINES
Wednesday, November 1, 2006 - 7:30 p.m.
TICKETS: $15 general admission
$13 (BFS & MOR members),
$5 children age 5-12
ONLY available at the door -- opening at 7:00 p. m.
VENUE: Museum of the Rockies “Hager Auditorium”
600 West Kagy Blvd., Bozeman
INFO: Rik James (406) 586-4123 or D28Rik@msn.com
BFS WEBSITE www.bozemanfolklore.org
PRESS PHOTO: www.acousticmusic.com/staines
PRESS QUOTE:
"His gentle lilting voice, spacious melodies and common-chord lyrics give his songs a homespun grace that often belies his mastery of the folk form. He is such a pure pleasure too, people forget to notice how damn good at the job of singer-songwritering he really is." - New England Folk Almanac
PRESS RELEASE:
The Bozeman Folklore Society and the Museum of the Rockies will present a special evening concert of folk music with Bill Staines in his only Montana appearance on Wednesday, November 1 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets will be available only at the door at 7:00 p.m. General admission is $15, and $13 for BFS & Museum members. For more information contact Rik James at (406) 586-4123.
Singing mostly his own songs, Bill Staines has become one of the most popular singers on the folk music circuit today and averages around 200 concert dates a year. Bill weaves a magical blend of wit and gentle humor into his performances, and as one reviewer wrote, "he has a sense of timing to match the best stand-up comic." His music is a slice of Americana, reflecting with the same ease, his feelings about the prairie people of the Midwest or the adventurers of the Yukon.
Interspersed between original songs, Bill also includes songs ranging from traditional folk tunes to more contemporary country ballads and delights in having the audience participate in many of the numbers. He may even do a yodeling tune or two- having won the National Yodeling Championship in 1975 at the Kerrville Folk Festival in Kerrville Texas.
A number of Bill's songs have been recorded by other artists including, Peter, Paul, & Mary, Makem and Clancy, Nanci Griffith, Mason Williams, The Highwaymen, Glen Yarborough, Jerry Jeff Walker, Grandpa Jones, Priscilla Herdman and others. Bill has recorded twenty-three of his own albums, sixteen of which are still in print. Additionally, Bill's songs have been published in four songbooks, If I Were A Word, Then I'd Be A Song, River, Music To Me, The Songs of Bill Staines, and All God's Critters Got A Place In The Choir. Two of the books contain nearly one hundred of Bill's songs. His latest book, The Tour, published earlier this year, is a troubadour’s autobiography with great detail and a veritable history of the folk music scene since the 1960’s.
Radio and TV appearances have included A Prairie Home Companion, Mountain Stage, The Good Evening Show and a host of local programs on PBS and network TV. Bill continues to drive over 65,000 miles a year, doing what he loves, bringing music to people.
For more info about this special evening concert, visit the BFS website, www.bozemanfolklore.org/concerts.html, or Bill's website at www.acousticmusic.com/staines.
The Bozeman Folklore Society (BFS) is an all volunteer, non-profit organization dedicated to promoting, preserving, enjoying and sharing the music, dance, arts, crafts, and skills of traditional cultures. The BFS is an associate group of the Country Dance and Song Society (CDSS).
QUOTES:
"Bill Staines has been my hero since 1977. He carries on where Woody left off-carrying on the tradition of stories and characters you wish you knew." - Nanci Griffith
"Staines is one of the best songwriters in folk music today, penning lyrics that evoke a sense of place and a generous spirit to go along with his pretty melodies. - Associated Press
"Staines is one of folk music's best songwriters and entertainers." - Milwaukee Journal
"There is no better writer of instantly memorable singalong choruses in this genre of music!" - The Boston Globe
"Folk singer Bill Staines' compositions recall the paintings of Grandma Moses - simple, literal and evocative of a bucolic tranquility that modern times have almost erased." - Hartford Courant
"Bill Staines is one of our very best folk and country singer/songwriters. He's a New Englander who dreams of open plains and vast, Western skies, and damn his soul, he writes better cowboy songs than anybody in the Southwest. - The Houston Post
"Bill Staines is a prototypical singer/songwriter, long on the anecdote, quick with the quip, not a stranger to his character's plights and/or escapades. He's an old hand at selling you the kind of truisms that crop back into your consciousness a few days after his tunes have floated off into the ether." - The New Paper (Providence)
"One of the most admired and imitated writers on the contemporary folk circuit.. [He writes] pensive, probing narratives made especially memorable by their ability to translate the common details of common lives into songs of uncommon eloquence and beauty." - The Austin American-Statesman
"He is a poet with Insight about a world that many of us let pass by. He is a storyteller with a gift for transporting the listener into the body of his songs." - The Record Roundup
"A craftsman who has cobbled together evocative details, pithy aphorisms and singalong melodies into a trunkful of unassuming, marvelous songs." - The Washington Post
Off to Nashville
